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ftarts; and before he is recovered from his furprife, I fhall CHAP, add, on the fame teftimony, that if all who took the crois LVIII. had accomplished their vow, above SIX MILLIONS Would have migrated from Europe to Afia. Under this oppreffion of faith, I derive fome relief from a more fagacious and thinking writer (75), who, after the fame review of the cavalry, accufes the credulity of the prieft of Chartres, and even doubts whether the Cifalpine regions (in the geography of a Frenchman) were, fufficient to produce and pour forth fuch incredible multitudes. The cooleft scepticifm will remember, that of thefe religious volunteers great numbers never beheld Conftantinople and Nice. Of enthufiafm the influence is irregular and tranfient: many were detained at home by reafon or cowardice, by poverty or weakness; and many were repulfed by the obftacles of the way, the more infuperable as they were unforeleen to thefe ignorant fanatics. The favage countries of Hungary and Bulgaria were whitened with their bones; their vanguard was cut to pieces by the Turkifh fultan; and the lofs of the firft adventure by the fword, or climate, or fatigue, has already been ftated at three hundred thousand men. Yet the myriads that furvived, that marched, that preffed forwards on the holy pilgrimage, were a fubject of aftonishment to themselves and to the Greeks. copious energy of her language finks under the efforts of the princefs Anne (76): the images of locufts, of leaves and flowers, of the fands of the fea, or the ftars of heaven, imperfectly reprefent what the had feen and heard, and the daughter of Alexius exclaims, that Europe was loofened from its foundations, and hurled against Afia. The anci ent hofts of Darius and Xerxes labour under the fame doubt of a vague and indefinite magnitude; but I am inclined to believe, that a larger number has never been contained within the lines of a fingle camp than at the fiege of Nice, the firft operation of the Latin princes. Their motives, their characters, and their arms, have been

The

(75) Guibert, p. 556. Yet even his gentle oppofition implies an im menfe multitude. By Urban II. in the fervour of his zeal, it is only rated at 300,000 pilgrims (cpift. xvi. Concil. tom. xii. p. 731.).

(76) Alexias, 1. x. p. 283. 305. Her faftidious delicacy complains of their ftrange and inarticulate names, and indeed there is scarcely one that fhe has not contrived to disfigure with the proud ignorance, fo dear and familiar to a polifhed people. I fhall felect only one example, Sangeles, for the count of St, Giles.

CHAP. been already difplayed. Of their troops, the most nume◄ LVIII. rous portion were natives of France: the Low Countries,

the banks of the Rhine, and Apulia, fent a powerful reinforcement: fome bands of adventurers were drawn from Spain, Lombardy, and England (77); and from the diftant bogs and mountains of Ireland or Scotland (78) iffued fome naked and favage fanatics, ferocious at home but unwarlike abroad. Had not fuperftition condemned the facrilegious prudence of depriving the pooreft or weakeft Chrif tian of the merit of the pilgrimage, the ufelefs crowd, with mouths, but without hands, might have been ftationed in the Greek empire, till their companions had opened and fecured the way of the Lord. A finall remnant of the pilgrims, who paffed the Bofphorus, was permitted to vifit the holy fepulchre. Their northern constitution was fcorched by the rays, and infected by the vapours, of a Syrian fun. They confumed, with heedlefs prodigality, their ftores of water and provifion: their numbers exhausted the inland country; the fea was remote, the Greeks were unfriendly, and the Chriftians of every fect fled before the voracious and cruel rapine of their brethren. In the dire neceffity of famine, they fometimes roafted and devoured the fleth of their infant or adult captives. Among the Turks and Saracens, the idolaters of Europe were rendered more odious by the name and reputation of cannibals : the fpies who introduced themfelves into the kitchen of Bohemond, were fhewn feveral human bodies turning on the fpit; and the artful Norman encouraged a report, which encreased at the fame time the abhorrence and the terror of the infidels (79).

I have

(77) William of Malmsbury (who wrote about the year 1130) has inferted in his hiftory (1. iv. p. 130-154.) a narrative of the first crufade: but I wifh that, instead of liftening to the tenue murmur which had paffed the British ocean (p. 143.), he had confined himself to the numbers, families, and adventures of his countrymen. I find in Dugdale, that an English Norman, Stephen earl of Albemarle and Holderneffe, led the rear-guard with duke Robert, at the battle of Antioch (Baronage, part i. p. 61.).

(78) Videres Scotorum apud fe ferocium alias imbellium cuneos (Guibert, P. 471.): the crus intettum, and hifpida chlamys, may fuit the Highlanders; but the finibus uliginofis, may rather apply to the Irish bogs. William of Malmsbury exprefsly mentions the Welth and Scots, &c. (l. iv. p. 133.) who quitted, the former venationem faltuum, the latter familiaritatem pulicum.

(79) This cannibal hunger, fometimes real, more frequently an artifice pra lye, may be found in Anna Comnena (Alexias, l. x. p. 288.), Guibert

(P. 546.)

LVIII.

May 14

I have expatiated with pleafure on the first steps of the CHA P. crufades, as they paint the manners and character of Europe but I fhall abridge the tedious and uniform nar- siege of rative of the blind atchievements, which were performed Nice, by ftrength and are defcribed by ignorance. From their A.D. 1997. firft ftation in the neighbourhood of Nicomedia, they advanced in fucceffive divifions; paffed the contracted limit of the Greek empire; opened a road through the hills, and commenced by the fiege of his capital, their pious warfare against the Turkifh fultan. His kingdom of Roum extended from the Hellefpont to the confines of Syria, and barred the pilgrimage of Jerufalem: his name was Kilidge-Arflan, or Soliman (80), of the race of Seljuk, and fon of the first conqueror; and in the defence of a land which the Turks confidered as their own, he deferved the praise of his enemies, by whom alone he is known to pofterity. Yielding to the firft impulse of the torrent, hel depofited his family and treafure in Nice; retired to the mountains with fifty thoufand horse; and twice defcended to affault the camps or quarters of the Chriftian befiegers, which formed an imperfect circle of above fix miles. The lofty and folid walls of Nice were covered by a deep ditch, and flanked by three hundred and feventy towers; and on the verge of Christendom, the Moflems were trained in arms and inflamed by religion. Before this city, the French princes occupied their stations, and profecuted their attacks without correfpondence or fubordination : emulation prompted their valour; but their valour was fullied by cruelty, and their emulation degenerated into envy and civil difcord. In the fiege of Nice, the arts and engines of antiquity were employed by the Latins; the mine and the battering-ram, the tortoife, and the belfry or moveable turret, artificial fire, and the catapult and balift, the fling, and the cross-bow for the cafting of ftones

t

(p. 546.), Radulph. Cadom. (c. 97). The ftratagem is related by the au thor of the Gefta Francorum, the monk Robert Baldric, and Raymond des Agiles, in the fiege and famine of Antioch.

(85) His Mufulman appellation of Soliman is ufed by the Latins, and his character is highly embellished by Taffo. His Turkish, name of KilidgeArfian (A. H. 485-509. A. D. 1192-1206, See de Guignes's Tables, tom i. p. 245.) is employed by the Orientals, and with fome corruption by the Greeks but little more than his name can be found in the Mahometan writers, who are dry and fulky on the fubject of the first crufade (de Guignes, tom. iii. P. ii. p. 10-39.).

:

CHAP. ftones and darts (81). In the space of feven weeks, LVIII. much labour and blood were expended, and fome progrefs,

Battle of

efpecially by count Raymond, was made on the fide of the befiegers. But the Turks could protract their resistance and fecure their efcape, as long as they were masters of the lake (82) Afcanius, which stretches feveral miles to the weftward of the city. The means of conqueft were fupplied by the prudence and induftry of Alexius; a great, number of boats was transported on fledges from the fea to the lake; they were filled with the moft dextrous of his archers; the flight of the fultana was intercepted; Nice was invefted by land and water; and a Greek emiffary perfuaded the inhabitants to accept his master's protection, and to fave themselves, by a timely furrender, from the rage of the favages of Europe. In the moment of victory, or at least of hope, the crufaders, thirsting for blood and plunder, were awed by the imperial banner that ftreamed from the citadel; and Alexius guarded with jealous vigilance this important conqueft. The murmurs of the chiefs were ftifled by honour or interest; and after an halt of nine days, they directed their march towards Phrygia under the guidance of a Greek general, whom they fufpected of a fecret connivance with the fultan. The confort and the principal fervants of Soliman had been honourably restored without ranfom; and the emperor's generofity to the miscreants (83) was interpreted as treason

to the Chriftian cause,

Soliman was rather provoked than difmayed by the lofs Dorylæum, of his capital: he admonished his fubjects and allies of this A. D. 1097, ftrange invafion of the western Barbarians; the Turkish July 4. emirs obeyed the call of loyalty or religion; the Turkman hords encamped round his ftandard; and his whole force is loosely stated by the Chriftians at two hundred, or even three

(81) On the fortifications, engines, and fieges of the middle ages, fee Aluratori (Antiquitat. Italiæ, tom. ii. differt. xxvi. p. 452-524.). The belfredus, from whence our belfrey, was the moveable tower of the ancients (Ducange, tom. i. p. 608).

(82) I cannot forbear remarking the resemblance between the fiege and lake of Nice, with the operations of Hernan Cortez before Mexico. See Dr. Robertson, Hift. of America, 1. v.

(83) Mecreant, a word invented by the French crufaders, and confined in that language to its primitive fenfe. It fhould feem, that the zeal of our ancestors boiled higher, and that they branded every unbeliever as a rafcal. A fimilar prejudice still lurks in the minds of many who think themselves Chriftians.

LVIII.

three hundred and fixty thousand horfe. Yet he patiently CHA P. waited till they had left behind them the fea and the Greek frontier; and, hovering on the flanks, obferved their carelefs and confident progrefs in two columns beyond the view of each other. Some miles before they could reach Dorylæum in Phrygia, the left, and leaft numerous, division was surprised, and attacked, and almost oppreffed, by the Turkish cavalry (84). The heat of the weather, the clouds of arrows, and the barbarous onset, overwhelmed the crufaders; they loft their order and confidence, and the fainting fight was fuftained by the perfonal valour, rather than by the military conduct, of Bohemond, Tancred, and Robert of Normandy. They were revived by the welcome banners of duke Godfrey, who flew to their fuccours with the count of Vermandois, and fixty thousand horse; and was followed by Raymond of Tholoufe, the bishop of Puy, and the remainder of the facred army. Without a moment's paufe, they formed in new order, and advanced to a fecond battle. They were received with equal refolution; and, in their common difdain for the unwarlike people of Greece and Afia, it was confeffed on both fides, that the Turks and the Franks were the only nations entitled to the appellation of foldiers (85). Their encounter was varied and balanced by the contraft of arms and difcipline; of the direct charge, and the wheeling evolutions; of the couched lance, and the brandifhed' javelin; of a weighty broadfword, and a crooked fabre; of cumbrous armour, and thin flowing robes; and of the long Tartar bow, and the arbalift or cross-bow, a deadly weapon, yet unknown to the Orientals (86). As long as the horses were freth and the

quivers

(84) Baronius has produced a very doubtful letter to his brother Roger (A. D. 1098, N° 15.). The enemies confifted of Medes, Perfians, Chaldæans be it fo. The first attack was cum noftro incommodo; true and tender. But why Godfrey of Bouillon and Hugh brothers? Tancred is tyled filius; of whom? certainly not of Roger, nor of Bohemond.

:

(85) Veruntamen dicunt fe effe de Francorum generatione; et quia nullus homo naturaliter debet effe miles nifi Franci et Turci (Gefta Francorum, p. 7). The fame community of blood and valour is attested by archbishop Baldric (p. 99).

(86) Balita, Bileftra, Arbaletre. See Muratori, Antiq. tom. ii. p. 517524. Ducange, Gloff. Lat. tom. i. p. 531, 532. In the time of Anna Comnena, this weapon, which the defcribes under the name of tangra. was unknown in the Eaft (1. x. p. 291). By an humane inconfiftency, the pope ftrove to prohibit it in Chriftian wars.

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