Part 2 — Chapter III. (These four articles abrogated by the four articles following them, 118-122.) Article 118. The Federal Constitution may at any time be amended. (continued 3)

CRETE: A. D. 1204-1205. Acquired by the Venetians.

See BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D.1204-1205.

CRETE: A. D. 1645-1669. The long siege of Candia. Surrender to the Turks.

See TURKS: A. D. 1645-1669.

CRETE: A. D. 1715. Complete Expulsion of the Venetians by the Turks.

See TURKS: A. D. 1714-1718.

CRETE: A. D. 1866-1868. Unsuccessful revolt. Struggle for independence. Turkish concession of the Organic Regulation.

See GREECE: A. D. 1862-1881.

—————CRETE: End—————

CRETE, Party of the. Crêtois.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1795 (APRIL).

CRIMEA, OR CRIM TARTARY: Early history.

See TAURICA; also BOSPORUS, CITY AND KINGDOM.

CRIMEA: 7th Century. Conquest and occupation by the Khazars.

See KHAZARS.

CRIMEA: 12th-13th Centuries. Genoese commercial colonies.

See GENOA: A. D. 1261-1299.

CRIMEA: 13th-14th Centuries. The khanate to Krim.

See MONGOLS: A. D. 1238-1391.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1475. Conquest by the Ottoman Turks.

See TURKS (THE OTTOMANS): A. D. 1451-1481.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1571. Expedition of the Khan to Moscow. The city stormed and sacked.

See RUSSIA: A. D. 1569-1571.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1735-1738. Russian invasions and fruitless conquests.

See RUSSIA: A. D. 1725-1739.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1774. The khanate declared independent of the Porte.

See TURKS: A. D. 1768-1774.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1776-1784. The process of acquisition by Russia. Final recognition of Russian sovereignty by the Sultan.

See TURKS: A. D. 1776-1792.

CRIMEA: A. D. 1853-1855. War of Russia with Turkey and her allies. Siege of Sebastopol.

See RUSSIA: A. D. 1853-1854, to 1854-1856.

—————CRIMEA: End—————

CRISIS OF 1837, The.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1835-1837.

CRISIS OF 1857.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1846-1861.

CRISSA. Crissæan or Sacred War.

See DELPHI.

CRITTENDEN COMPROMISE, The.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1860 (DECEMBER).

CROATANS, The.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1587-1590.

CROATIA: 7th Century. Sclavonic occupation and settlement.

See BALKAN AND DANUBIAN STATES, 7TH CENTURY (SERVIA, CROATIA, BOSNIA, ETC.)

CROATIA: A. D. 1102. Subjection and annexation to Hungary.

See HUNGARY: A. D. 972-1114.

CROATIA: A. D. 1576. Transferred to the Duke of Styria. Military colonization.

See HUNGARY: A. D. 1567-1604.

—————CROATIA: End—————

CROIA, Turkish massacre at.

See GREECE: A. D. 1454-1479.

CROMLECHS.

Rude stone monuments found in many parts of the British Islands, France, and elsewhere, usually formed by three or more huge, rough, upright stones, with a still larger stone lying flatly upon them. In France these are called Dolmens. They were formerly thought to be "Druids altars," to which notion they owe the name Cromlechs; but it is now very generally concluded by archæologists that they were constructed for burial chambers, and that originally, in most cases, they were covered with mounds of earth, forming the well known barrows, or grave mounds, or tumuli.

L. Jewett, Grave Mounds.

ALSO IN: T. Wright, The Celt, the Roman and the Saxon.

Sir J. Lubbock, Prehistoric Times, chapter 5.

See, also, AMORITES.

CROMPTON'S MULE, The invention of.

See COTTON MANUFACTURES.

CROMWELL, Oliver. Campaigns and Protectorate.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1644 to 1658-1660; and IRELAND: A. D. 1649-1650.

CROMWELL, Thomas, The suppression of the Monasteries.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1535-1539.

CROMWELLIAN SETTLEMENT OF IRELAND.

See IRELAND: A. D. 1653.

CROMWELL'S IRONSIDES.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1643 (MAY).

CROSS, The "True." Its capture by the Persians and recovery by Heraclius.

See ROME: A. D. 565-628; And JERUSALEM: A. D. 615.

CROSS KEYS, Battle of.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1862 (MAY-JUNE: VIRGINIA).

CROTON. KROTON.

See SYBARIS.

CROTONA, Battle of (A. D. 983).

See ITALY (SOUTHERN): A. D. 800-1016.

CROWN, The iron.

See LOMBARDY, THE IRON CROWN OF.

CROWN OF INDIA, The Order of the.

An order, for women, instituted by Queen Victoria in 1878.

{626}

CROWN POINT: A. D. 1727. Fort built by the French.

See CANADA (NEW FRANCE): A. D. 1700-1735.

CROWN POINT: A. D. 1755. English Expedition against.

See CANADA (NEW FRANCE): A. D. 1755 (SEPTEMBER).

CROWN POINT: A. D: 1759. Abandoned to the English by the French.

See CANADA (NEW FRANCE): A. D. 1759 (JULY-AUGUST).

CROWN POINT: A. D. 1775. Surprise and capture by the Americans.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1775 MAY.

—————CROWN POINT: End—————

CROWS, OR UPSAROKAS, The.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: SIOUAN FAMILY.

CRUITHNIGH.-CRUITHNIANS.

The Irish name of the Picts and Scots of ancient Ireland and Scotland.

See SCOTLAND: THE PICTS AND SCOTS.

CRUSADES: Causes and introductory events.

"Like all the great movements of mankind, the Crusades must be traced to the coincidence of many causes which influenced men of various nations and discordant feelings, at the same period of time, to pursue one common end with their whole heart. Religious zeal, the fashion of pilgrimages, the spirit of social development, the energies that lead to colonisation or conquest, and commercial relations, only lately extended so widely as to influence public opinion, all suddenly received a deep wound. Every class of society felt injured and insulted, and unity of action was created as if by a divine impulse. The movement was facilitated by the circumstance that Europe began to adopt habits of order just at the time when Asia was thrown into a state of anarchy by the invasions of the Seljouk Turks. Great numbers of pilgrims had always passed through the Byzantine empire to visit the holy places in Palestine. We still possess an itinerary of the road from Bordeaux to Jerusalem, by the way of Constantinople, written in the fourth century for the use of pilgrims. Though the disturbed and impoverished state of Europe, after the fall of the Western Empire, diminished the number of pilgrims, still, even in times of the greatest anarchy, many passed annually through the Eastern Empire to Palestine. The improvement which dawned on the western nations during the eleventh century, and the augmented commerce of the Italians, gave additional importance to the pilgrimage to the East. About the year 1064, during the reign of Constantine X., an army or caravan of seven thousand pilgrims passed through Constantinople, led by the Archbishop of Mentz and four bishops. They made their way through Asia Minor, which was then under the Byzantine government; but in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem they were attacked by the Bedouins, and only saved from destruction by the Saracen emir of Ramla, who hastened to their assistance. These pilgrims are reported to have lost 3,000 of their number, without being able to visit either the Jordan or the Dead Sea. The invasions of the Seljouks [see TURKS (THE SELJUKS): A. D. 1073-1092] increased the disorders in Palestine. … In the year 1076 the Seljouk Turks took possession of Jerusalem, and immediately commenced harassing the pilgrims with unheard-of exactions. The Saracens had in general viewed the pilgrims with favour, as men engaged in fulfilling a pious duty, or pursuing lawful gain with praiseworthy industry, and they had levied only a reasonable toll on the pilgrims, and a moderate duty on their merchandise; while in consideration of these imposts, they had established guards to protect them on the roads by which they approached the holy places. The Turks, on the contrary, acting like mere nomads, uncertain of retaining possession of the city, thought only of gratifying their avarice. They plundered the rich pilgrims, and insulted the poor. The religious feelings of the Christians were irritated, and their commerce ruined; a cry for vengeance arose throughout all Europe, and men's minds were fully prepared for an attempt to conquer Palestine, when Peter the Hermit began to preach that it was a sacred duty to deliver the tomb of Christ from the hands of the Infidels."

G. Finlay, History of the Byzantine and Greek Empires, book 3, chapter 2, section 1.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1091. The Council of Clermont.

Pope Urban II., one of two rival pontiffs then contending for recognition by the Church, entered with great eagerness into the movement stirred by Peter the Hermit, and gave it a powerful impulse through his support, while obtaining for himself, at the same time, a decisive advantage over his competitor, by the popularity of the agitation. A great Council was convened at Piacenza, A. D. 1094, and a second at Clermont, in the autumn of the same year, to deliberate upon the action to be taken. The city of Clermont could not contain the vast multitude of bishops, clergy and laity which assembled, and an army of many thousands was tented in the surrounding country. To that excited congregation, at a meeting in the great square of Clermont, Pope Urban addressed a speech which is one of the notable utterances of History. "He began by detailing the miseries endured by their brethren in the Holy Land; how the plains of Palestine were desolated by the outrageous heathen, who with the sword and the firebrand carried wailing into the dwellings and flames into the possessions of the faithful; how Christian wives and daughters were defiled by pagan lust; how the altars of the true God were desecrated, and the relics of the saints trodden under foot. 'You,' continued the eloquent pontiff (and Urban II. was one of the most eloquent men of the day), 'you, who hear me, and who have received the true faith, and been endowed by God with power, and strength, and greatness of soul,—whose ancestors have been the prop of Christendom, and whose kings have put a barrier against the progress of the infidel,—I call upon you to wipe off these impurities from the face of the earth, and lift your oppressed fellow-Christians from the depths into which they have been trampled.' … The warmth of the pontiff communicated itself to the crowd, and the enthusiasm of the people broke out several times ere he concluded his address. He went on to portray, not only the spiritual but the temporal advantages that would accrue to those who took up arms in the service of the cross. Palestine was, he said, a land flowing with milk and honey, and precious in the sight of God, as the scene of the grand events which had saved mankind. That land, he promised, should be divided among them. Moreover, they should have full pardon for all their offences, either against God or man. 'Go, then,' he added, 'in expiation of your sins; and go assured, that after this world shall have passed away, imperishable glory shall be yours in the world which is to come.' The enthusiasm was no longer to be restrained, and loud shouts interrupted the speaker; the people exclaiming as if with one voice, 'Dieu le veult! Dieu le veult!' … The news of this council spread to the remotest parts of Europe in an incredibly short space of time. Long before the fleetest horseman could have brought the intelligence, it was known by the people in distant provinces; a fact which was considered as nothing less than supernatural. But the subject was in everybody's mouth, and the minds of men were prepared for the result. The enthusiastic merely asserted what they wished, and the event tallied with their prediction."

C. Mackay, Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions: The Crusades, (volume 2).

ALSO IN: H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, book 7, chapter 6.

{627}

CRUSADES: A. D. 1094-1095, Peter the Hermit and his appeal.

"About twenty years after the conquest of Jerusalem by the Turks, the holy sepulchre was visited by an hermit of the name of Peter, a native of Amiens, in the province of Picardy in France. His resentment and sympathy were excited by his own injuries, and the oppression of the Christian name; he mingled his tears with those of the patriarch, and earnestly inquired, if no hopes of relief could be entertained from the Greek emperors of the East. The patriarch exposed the vices and weakness of the successors of Constantine. 'I will rouse,' exclaimed the hermit, 'the martial nations of Europe in your cause;' and Europe was obedient to the call of the hermit. The astonished patriarch dismissed him with epistles of credit and complaint, and no sooner did he land at Bari, than Peter hastened to kiss the feet of the Roman pontiff. His stature was small, his appearance contemptible; but his eye was keen and lively, and he possessed that vehemence of speech which seldom fails to impart the persuasion of the soul. He was born of a gentleman's family (for we must now adopt a modern idiom), and his military service was under the neighbouring counts of Boulogne, the heroes of the first crusade. Invigorated by the approbation of the pontiff, this zealous missionary traversed, with speed and success, the provinces of Italy and France. His diet was abstemious, his prayers long and fervent, and the alms which he received with one hand, he distributed with the other; his head was bare, his feet naked, his meagre body was wrapt in a coarse garment; he bore and displayed a weighty crucifix; and the ass on which he rode was sanctified in the public eye by the service of the man of God. He preached to innumerable crowds in the churches, the streets, and the highways. … When he painted the sufferings of the natives and pilgrims of Palestine, every heart was melted to compassion; every breast glowed with indignation, when he challenged the warriors of the age to defend their brethren and rescue their Saviour: his ignorance of art and language was compensated by sighs and tears, and ejaculations; and Peter supplied the deficiency of reason by loud and frequent appeals to Christ and his Mother, to the saints and angels of paradise, with whom he had personally conversed. The most perfect orator of Athens might have envied the success of his eloquence; the rustic enthusiast inspired the passions which he felt, and Christendom expected with impatience the counsels and decrees of the supreme pontiff."

ALSO IN: J. C. Robertson, History of the Christian Church, book 6, chapter 4 (volume 4).

CRUSADES: A. D. 1096-1099. The First Great Movement.

The first army of Crusaders to set out on the long march to Jerusalem was a mob of men, women and children which had not patience to wait for the organized movement of the military leaders. They gathered in vast numbers on the banks of the Moselle and the Meuse, in the spring of 1096, with Peter the Hermit for their chosen chief. There were nine knights, only, in the swarm, and but few who had horses to ride, or efficient arms to bear, or provisions to feed upon. Knowing nothing, and therefore fearing nothing, they marched away, through France, Germany, Hungary and beyond, begging food where they could and subsisting by pillage when it needed. A knight called Walter the Penniless led the van, and Peter followed, with his second division, by a somewhat different route. Walter escaped serious trouble until he reached the country of the savage Bulgarians. Peter's senseless mob provoked the just wrath of the Hungarians by storming the small city of Semlin and slaying 4,000 of its inhabitants. The route of both was lined with the bones of thousands who perished of hunger, of exposure, of disease, and by the swords of Hungarians and Bulgarians. A third and a fourth host of like kind followed in their wake, led by a monk, Gotschalk, a priest named Volkmar, and a Count Emicon. These terrorized even more all the countries through which they passed,—especially where Jews were to be hunted and killed,—and were destroyed in Hungary to almost the last man. Peter and Walter reached Constantinople with 100,000 followers, it is said, even yet, after all who had fallen by the way. Still refusing to wait for the better appointed expeditions that were in progress, and still appalling eastern Christendom by their lawless barbarities, they passed into Asia Minor, and their miserable career soon came to an end. Attacking the Turks in the city of Nicæa,—which had become the capital of the Seljouk sultan of Roum,—they were beaten, routed, scattered, slaughtered, until barely 3,000 of the great host escaped. "Of the first Crusaders," says Gibbon, "300,000 had already perished before a single city was rescued from the infidels,—before their graver and more noble brethren had completed the preparations of their enterprise." Meantime the knights and princes of the crusade had gathered their armies and were now (in the summer of 1096) beginning to move eastward, by different routes. Not one of the greater sovereigns of Europe had enlisted in the undertaking. The chiefs of one armament were Godfrey de Bouillon, duke of the Lower Lorraine, or Brabant; his brothers, Eustace, count of Boulogne, and Baldwin; his cousin, Baldwin de Bourg, with Baldwin, count of Hainaut, Dudon de Contz, and other knights celebrated in the "Jerusalem Delivered" of Tasso. This expedition followed nearly the route of Peter the Hermit, through Hungary and Bulgaria, giving hostages for its orderly conduct and winning the good-will of those countries, even maddened as they were by the foregoing mobs. {628} Another larger following from France was led by Hugh, count of Vermandois, brother of the king of France; Robert, duke of Normandy, eldest son of William the Conqueror; Stephen, count of Blois, the Conqueror's son-in-law, and Robert, count of Flanders. These took the road into Italy, and to Bari, whence, after spending the winter, waiting for favorable weather, they were transported by ships to Greece, and pursued their march to Constantinople. They were followed by a contingent from southern Italy, under Bohemond, the Norman prince of Tarentum, son of Robert Guiscard, and his knightly cousin, Tancred. A fourth army, gathered in southern France by count Raymond of Toulouse and Bishop Adhemer, the appointed legate and representative of the pope, chose still another route, through Lombardy, Dalmatia and Macedonia, into Thrace. On passing through the territories of the Byzantine emperor (Alexius I.), all the crusaders experienced his distrust, his duplicity, and his cautious ill-will—which, under the circumstances were natural enough. Alexius managed so well that he extorted from each of the princes an acknowledgment of his rights of sovereignty over the region of their expected conquests, with an oath of fealty and homage, and he pushed them across the Bosphorus so adroitly that no two had the opportunity to unite their forces under the walls of Constantinople. Their first undertaking in Asia [May and June, A. D. 1097] was the siege of Nicæa, and they beleaguered it with an army which Gibbon believes to have been never exceeded within the compass of a single camp. Here, again, they were mastered by the cunning diplomacy of the Greek emperor. When the sultan of Roum yielded his capital, he was persuaded to surrender it to Alexius, and the imperial banner protected it from the rage of the discomfited crusaders. But they revenged themselves on the Turk at Dorylæum, where he attacked them during their subsequent march, and where he suffered a defeat which ended all fighting in Asia Minor. Baldwin, brother of Godfrey, now improved his opportunities by stealing away from the army, with a few hundred knights and men, to make conquests on his own account; with such success that he won the city of Edessa, with a sweep of country around it, and founded a principality which subsisted for half a century. The rest fared on, meeting no opposition from infidel swords, but sickening and dying by thousands, from heat and from want of water and food, until they came to Antioch. There, the Turkish emir in command, with a stout garrison of horse and foot, had prepared for a stubborn defence, and he held the besiegers at bay for seven months, while they starved in their ill-supplied camps. The city was delivered to them by a traitor, at length, but prince Bohemond, the crafty Norman, secured the benefit of the treason to himself, and forced his compatriots to concede to him the sovereignty of Antioch. The sufferings of the crusaders did not end with the taking of the city. They brought famine and pestilence upon themselves anew by their greedy and sensual indulgence, and they were soon under siege in their own turn, by a great army which the Turks had brought against them. Death and desertion were in rivalry to thin their wasted ranks. The survivors were in gloom and despair, when an opportune miracle occurred to excite them afresh. A lance, which visions and apparitions certified to be the very spear that pierced the Redeemer's side, was found buried in a church at Antioch. Under the stimulus of this amazing discovery they sallied from the town and dispersed the great army of the Turks in utter rout. Still the quarrels of the leaders went on, and ten months more were consumed before the remains of the Latin army advanced to Jerusalem. It was June, A. D. 1099, when they saw the Holy City and assailed its formidable walls. Their number was now reduced to 40,000, but their devotion and their ardor rose to frenzy, and after a siege of little more than a month they forced an entrance by storm. Then they spared neither age nor sex until they had killed all who denied the Savior of mankind—the Prince of Peace.

ALSO IN: J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, book 1.

W. Besant and E. H. Palmer, Jerusalem, chapter 6.

C. Mills, History of the Crusades, chapters 2-6.

See also, JERUSALEM: A. D. 1099.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1099-1144. The Latin conquests in the east. The Kingdom of Jerusalem.

See JERUSALEM: A. D. 1099-1144.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1101-1102. The after-wave of the first movement.

"The tales of victory brought home by the pilgrims excited the most extravagant expectations in the minds of their auditors, and nothing was deemed capable of resisting European valour. The pope called upon all who had taken the cross to perform their vow, the emperor Henry IV. had the crusade preached, in order to gain favour with the clergy and laity. Many princes now resolved to visit in person the new empire founded in the East. Three great armies assembled: the first in Italy under the archbishop of Milan, and the two counts of Blandrate; the second in France under Hugh the Great and Stephen of Blois [who had deserted their comrades of the first expedition at Antioch, and] whom shame and remorse urged to perform their vow, William, duke of Guienne and count of Poitou, who mortgaged his territory to William Rufus of England to procure funds, the count of Nevers, the duke of Burgundy, the bishops of Laon and Soissons; the third in Germany, under the bishop of Saltzburg, the aged duke Welf of Bavaria, Conrad the master of the horse to the emperor, and many other knights and nobles. Ida also, the margravine of Austria, declared her resolution to share the toils and dangers of the way, and pay her vows at the tomb of Christ. Vast numbers of women of all ranks accompanied all these armies,—nay, in that of the duke of Guienne, who was inferior to none in valour, but united to it the qualities of a troubadour and glee-man, there appeared whole troops of young women. The Italian pilgrims were the first to arrive at Constantinople. They set out early in the spring, and took their way through Carinthia, Hungary, and Bulgaria. Though the excesses committed by them were great, the emperor gave them a kind reception, and the most prudent and friendly advice respecting their future progress. While they abode at Constantinople, Conrad and the count of Blois, and the duke of Burgundy, arrived, and at Whitsuntide they all passed over, and encamped at Nicomedia." {629} With ignorant fatuity, and against all experienced advice, the new Crusaders resolved to direct their march to Bag-dad and to overthrow the caliphate. The first body which advanced was cut to pieces by the Turks on the banks of the Halys, and only a few thousands, out of more than one hundred thousand, are said to have made their escape by desperate flight. The second and third armies were met successively by the victorious Moslems, before they had advanced so far, and were even more completely annihilated. The latter body contained, according to the chroniclers of the time, 150,000 pilgrims, of whom scarcely one thousand were saved from slavery or death. The men fell under the swords of the Turks; the women and girls, in great numbers, finished out their days in the harems of the East. Out of the wreck of the three vast armaments a slender column of 10,000 men was got together after some weeks at Antioch and led to Jerusalem (A. D. 1102). Most of these perished in subsequent battles, and very few ever saw Europe again. "Such was the fruitless termination of this second great movement of the West, in which perhaps a third of a million of pilgrims left their homes, never to revisit them."

T. Keightley, The Crusaders, chapter 2.

ALSO IN: J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, book 4.

Crusades: A. D. 1104-1111. Conquest of maritime cities of Syria and Palestine. Destruction of the Library of Tripoli.

"The prosperity and the safety of Jerusalem appeared closely connected with the conquest of the maritime cities of Syria and Palestine; it being by them alone that it could receive succour, or establish prompt and easy communications with the West. The maritime nations of Europe were interested in seconding, in this instance, the enterprises of the king of Jerusalem. … From the period of the first crusades, the Pisans and the Genoese had constantly sent vessels to the seas of the East; and their fleets had aided the Christians in several expeditions against the Mussulmans. A Genoese fleet had just arrived in the seas of Syria when Baldwin undertook the siege of Ptolemaïs [Acre]. The Genoese were invited to assist in this conquest; but as religion was not the principle to bring them into action, they required, in return for their assistance and their labour, that they should have a third of the booty; they likewise stipulated to have a separate church for themselves, and a national factory and tribunal in the conquered city. Ptolemaïs was besieged by land and sea, and after a bloody resistance of twenty days, the inhabitants and the garrison proposed to surrender, and implored the clemency of the conquerors. The city opened its gates to the Christians, and the inhabitants prepared to depart, taking with them whatever they deemed most valuable; but the Genoese, at the sight of such rich booty, paid no respect to the capitulation, and massacred without pity a disarmed and defenceless people. … In consequence of this victory, several places which the Egyptians still held on the coasts of Syria fell into the hands of the Christians." Among those was the city of Tripoli. "Raymond, Count de St. Gilles and of Thoulouse, one of the companions of Godfrey, after having wandered for a long time about Asia, had died before this place, of which he had commenced the siege. In memory of his exploits in the first crusade, the rich territory of Tripoli was created a county, and became the inheritance of his family. This territory was celebrated for its productions. … A library established in this city, and celebrated through all the East, contained the monuments of the ancient literature of the Persians, the Arabians, the Egyptians, and the Greeks. A hundred copyists were there constantly employed in transcribing manuscripts. … After the taking of the city, a priest attached to Count Bernard de St. Gilles, entered the room in which were collected a vast number of copies of the Koran, and as he declared the library of Tripoli contained only the impious books of Mahomet, it was given up to the flames. … Bibles, situated on the smiling and fertile shores of Phoenicia, Sarepta, where St. Jerome saw still in his day the tower of Isaiah; and Berytus, famous in the early days of the church for its school of eloquence, shared the fate of Tripoli, and became baronies bestowed upon Christian knights. After these conquests, the Pisans, the Genoese, and several warriors who had followed Baldwin in his expeditions, returned into Europe; and the king of Jerusalem, abandoned by these useful allies, was obliged to employ the forces which remained in repulsing the invasions of the Saracens."

J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, volume 1, book 5.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1147-1149. The Second Great Movement.

During the reign of Fulk, the fourth king of Jerusalem, the Latin power in Palestine and its neighboring territories began to be seriously shaken by a vigorous Turkish prince named Zenghi, on whom the sultan Mahmoud had conferred the government of all the country west of the Tigris. It was the first time since the coming of the Christians of the West that the whole strength of Islam in that region had been so nearly gathered into one strong hand, to be used against them, and they felt the effect speedily, being themselves weakened by many quarrels. In 1143 King Fulk died, leaving the crown to a young son, Baldwin III.,—a boy of thirteen, whose mother governed in his name. The next year Zenghi captured the important city of Edessa, and consternation was produced by his successes. Europe was then appealed to for help against the advancing Turk, and the call from Jerusalem was taken up by St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the irresistible enthusiast, whose influence accomplished, in his time, whatever he willed to have done. Just half a century after Peter the Hermit, St. Bernard preached a Second Crusade, and with almost equal effect, notwithstanding the better knowledge now possessed of all the hardships and perils of the expedition. This time, royalty took the lead. King Conrad of Germany commanded a great army from that country, and another host followed King Louis VII. from France. "Both armies marched down the Danube, to Constantinople, in the summer of 1147. At the same moment King Roger [of Naples], with his fleet, attacked, not the Turks, but the Greek seaport towns of the Morea. Manuel [the Byzantine emperor] thereupon, convinced that the large armies were designed for the destruction of his empire in the first place, with the greatest exertions, got together troops from all his provinces, and entered into a half-alliance with the Turks of Asia Minor. The mischief and ill-feeling was increased by the lawless conduct of the German hordes; the Greek troops attacked them more than once; whereupon numerous voices were raised in Louis's headquarters to demand open war against the faithless Greeks. {630} The kings were fully agreed not to permit this, but on arriving in Constantinople they completely fell out, for, while Louis made no secret of his warm friendship for Roger, Conrad promised the Emperor of Constantinople to attack the Normans as soon as the Crusade should be ended. This was a bad beginning for a united campaign in the East, and moreover, at every step eastward, new difficulties arose. The German army, broken up into several detachments, and led without ability or prudence, was attacked in Asia Minor by the Emir of Iconium, and cut to pieces, all but a few hundred men. The French, though better appointed, also suffered severe losses in that country, but contrived nevertheless, to reach Antioch with a very considerable force, and from thence might have carried the project which the second Baldwin had conceived in vain, namely, the defence of the northeastern frontier, upon which, especially since Zenki [Zenghi] had made his appearance, the life or death of the Christian states depended. But in vain did Prince Raymond of Antioch try to prevail upon King Louis to take this view, and to attack without delay the most formidable of all their adversaries, Noureddin [son of Zenghi, now dead]. Louis would not hear or do anything till he had seen Jerusalem and prayed at the Holy Sepulchre. … In Jerusalem he [King Louis] was welcomed by Queen Melisende (now regent, during her son's minority, after Fulco's death), with praise and gratitude, because he had not taken part in the distant wars of the Prince of Antioch, but had reserved his forces for the defence of the holy city of Jerusalem. It was now resolved to lead the army against Damascus, the only Turkish town whose Emir had always refused to submit to either Zenki or Noureddin. Nevertheless Noureddin instantly collected all his available forces, to succour the besieged town." But he was spared further exertion by the jealous disagreement of the Christians, who began to take thought as to what should be done with Damascus when they took it. The Syrian barons concluded that they would prefer to leave the city in Turkish hands, and by treacherous manœuvres they forced king Louis to raise the siege. "The German king, long since tired of his powerless position, returned home in the autumn of 1148, and Louis, after much pressing, stayed a few months longer, and reached Europe in the following spring. The whole expedition … had been wrecked, without honour and without result, by the most wretched personal passions, and the most narrow and selfish policy."

H. Von Sybel, History and Literature of the Crusades, chapter 3.

"So ended in utter shame and ignominy the Second Crusade. The event seemed to give the lie to the glowing promises and prophecies of St. Bernard. So vast had been the drain of population to feed this holy war that, in the phrase of an eye-witness, the cities and castles were empty, and scarcely one man was left to seven women; and now it was known that the fathers, the husbands, the sons, or the brothers of these miserable women would see their earthly homes no more. The cry of anguish charged Bernard with the crime of sending them forth on an errand in which they had done absolutely nothing and had reaped only wretchedness and disgrace. For a time Bernard himself was struck dumb: but he soon remembered that he had spoken with the authority of God and his vicegerent, and that the guilt or failure must lie at the door of the pilgrims."

G. W. Cox, The Crusades, chapter 5.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1187. The loss of Jerusalem.

See JERUSALEM: A. D. 1149-1187.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1188-1192. The Third Great Movement.

When the news reached Europe that Saladin, the redoubtable new champion of Islam had expelled the Christians and the Cross from Jerusalem, polluting once more the precincts of the Holy Sepulchre, the effect produced was something not easily understood at the present day. If we may believe historians of the time, the pope (Urban III.) died of grief; "Christians forgot all the ills of their own country to weep over Jerusalem. … Luxury was banished from cities; injuries were forgotten and alms were given abundantly, Christians slept upon ashes, clothed themselves in haircloth, and expiated their disorderly lives by fasting and mortification. The clergy set the example; the morals of the cloister were reformed, and cardinals, condemning themselves to poverty, promised to repair to the Holy Land, supported on charity by the way. These pious reformations did not last long; but men's minds were not the less prepared for a new crusade by them, and all Europe was soon roused by the voice of Gregory VIII., who exhorted the faithful to assume the cross and take up arms."

J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, book 7.

"The emperor Frederic Barbarossa and the kings of France and England assumed the cross; and the tardy magnitude of their armaments was anticipated by the maritime states of the Mediterranean and the ocean. The skilful and provident Italians first embarked in the ships of Genoa, Pisa, and Venice. They were speedily followed by the most eager pilgrims of France, Normandy and the Western Isles. The powerful succour of Flanders, Frise, and Denmark filled near a hundred vessels; and the northern warriors were distinguished in the field by a lofty stature and a ponderous battle-axe. Their increasing multitudes could no longer be confined within the walls of Tyre [which the Latins still held], or remain obedient to the voice of Conrad [Marquis of Montferrat, who had taken command of the place and repelled the attacks of Saladin]. They pitied the misfortunes and revered the dignity of Lusignan [the nominal king of Jerusalem, lately captive in Saladin's hands], who was released from prison, perhaps to divide the army of the Franks. He proposed the recovery of Ptolemais, or Acre, thirty miles to the south of Tyre; and the place was first invested [July, 1189] by 2,000 horse and 30,000 foot under his nominal command. I shall not expatiate on the story of this memorable siege, which lasted near two years, and consumed, in a narrow space, the forces of Europe and Asia. … At the sound of the holy trumpet the Moslems of Egypt, Syria, Arabia, and the Oriental provinces assembled under the servant of the prophet: his camp was pitched and removed within a few miles of Acre; and he laboured, night and day, for the relief of his brethren and the annoyance of the Franks. … In the spring of the second year, the royal fleets of France and England cast anchor in the bay of Acre, and the siege was more vigorously prosecuted by the youthful emulation of the two kings, Philip Augustus and Richard Plantagenet. {631} After every resource had been tried, and every hope was exhausted, the defenders of Acre submitted to their fate. … By the conquest of Acre the Latin powers acquired a strong town and a convenient harbour; but the advantage was most dearly purchased. The minister and historian of Saladin computes, from the report of the enemy, that their numbers, at different periods, amounted to 500,000 or 600,000; that more than 100, 000 Christians were slain; that a far greater number was lost by disease or shipwreck." On the reduction of Acre, king Philip Augustus returned to France, leaving only 500 knights and 10,000 men behind him. Meantime, the old emperor, Frederick Barbarossa, coming by the landward route, through the country of the Greeks and Asia Minor, with a well-trained army of 20,000 knights and 50,000 men on foot, had perished by the way, drowned in a little Cilician torrent, and only 5,000 of his troops had reached the camp at Acre. Old as he was, (he was seventy when he took the cross) Barbarossa might have changed the event of the Crusade if he had reached the scene of conflict; for he had brains with his valor and character with his ferocity, which Richard Cœur de Lion had not. The latter remained another year in the Holy Land; recovered Cæsarea and Jaffa; threatened Saladin in Jerusalem seriously, but to no avail; and stirred up more and fiercer quarrels among the Christians than had been customary, even on the soil which was sacred to them. In the end, a treaty was arranged which displeased the more devout on both sides. "It was stipulated that Jerusalem and the holy sepulchre should be open, without tribute or vexation, to the pilgrimage of the Latin Christians; that, after the demolition of Ascalon, they should inclusively possess the sea-coast from Jaffa to Tyre; that the count of Tripoli and the prince of Antioch should be comprised in the truce; and that, during three years and three months, all hostilities should cease. … Richard embarked for Europe, to seek a long captivity and a premature grave; and the space of a few months concluded the life and glories of Saladin."

"A halo of false glory surrounds the Third Crusade from the associations which connect it with the lion-hearted king of England. The exploits of Richard I. have stirred to enthusiasm the dullest of chroniclers, have furnished themes for jubilant eulogies, and have shed over his life that glamour which cheats even sober-minded men when they read the story of his prototype Achilleus in the tale of Troy. … When we turn from the picture to the reality, we shall see in this Third Crusade an enterprise in which the fiery zeal which does something towards redeeming the savage brutalities of Godfrey and the first crusaders is displaced by base and sordid greed, by intrigues utterly of the earthy, by wanton crimes from which we might well suppose that the sun would hide away its face; and in the leaders of this enterprise we shall see men in whom morally there is scarcely a single quality to relieve the monotonous blackness of their infamy; in whom, strategically, a very little generalship comes to the aid of a blind brute force."

G. W. Cox, The Crusades, chapter 7.

ALSO IN: Mrs. W. Busk, Mediaeval Popes, Emperors, Kings and Crusaders, book 2, chapter 12, and book 3, chapters 1-2.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1196-1197. The Fourth Expedition.

A crusading expedition of German barons and their followers, which went to the Holy Land, by way of Italy, in 1196, is generally counted as the Fourth Crusade, though some writers look upon it as a movement supplementary to the Third Crusade. The Germans, who numbered some 40,000, do not seem to have been welcomed by the Christians of Palestine. The latter preferred to maintain the state of peace then prevailing; but the new crusaders forced hostilities at once. Saladin was dead; his brother Saphadin accepted the challenge to war with prompt vigor and struck the first hard blow, taking Jaffa, with great slaughter, and demolishing its fortifications. But Saphadin was presently defeated in a battle fought between Tyre and Sidon, and Jaffa was recovered, together with other towns and most of the coast. But, a little later, the Germans suffered, in their turn, a most demoralizing reverse at the castle of Thoron, which they besieged, and were further disturbed, in the midst of their depression, by news of the death of their emperor, Henry VI. A great part of them, thereupon, returned home. Those who remained, or many of them, occupied Jaffa, where they were attacked, a few months later, and cut to pieces.

G. W. Cox, The Crusades, chapter 8.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1201-1203. The Fifth Movement.- Treachery of the Venetians. Conquest of Constantinople.

"Every traveller returning from Syria brought a prayer for immediate help from the survivors of the Third Crusade. It was necessary to act at once if any portion even of the wreck of the kingdom of Jerusalem were to be saved. Innocent the Third, and some, at least, of the statesmen of the West were fully alive to the progress which Islam had made since the departure of the Western kings. In 1197, however, after five years of weary waiting, the time seemed opportune for striking a new blow for Christendom. Saladin, the great Sultan, had died in 1193, and his two sons were already quarreling about the partition of his empire. The contending divisions of the Arab Moslems were at this moment each bidding for the support of the Christians of Syria. The other great race of Mahometans which had threatened Europe, the Seljukian Turks, had made a halt in their progress through Asia Minor. … Other special circumstances which rendered the moment favourable for a new crusade, combined with the profound conviction of the statesmen of the West of the danger to Christendom from the progress of Islam, urged Western Europe to take part in the new enterprise. The reigning Pope, Innocent III., was the great moving spirit of the Fourth Crusade." The popular preacher of the Crusade was found in an ignorant priest named Fulk, of Neuilly, whose success in kindling public enthusiasm was almost equal to that of Peter the Hermit. Vast numbers took the cross, with Theobald, count of Champagne, Louis, count of Blois and Chartres, Simon de Montfort, Walter of Brienne, Baldwin, count of Flanders, Hugh of St. Pol, Geoffrey de Villehardouin, marshal of Champagne and future historian of the Crusade, and many other prominent knights and princes among the leaders. The young count of Champagne was the chosen chief; but he sickened and died and his place was taken by Boniface, marquis of Montferrat. {632} It was the decision of the leaders that the expedition should be directed in the first instance against the Moslem power in Egypt, and that it should be conveyed to the attack of Egypt by sea. Venice, alone, seemed to be able to furnish ships, sailors and supplies for so great a movement, and a contract with Venice for the service was concluded in the spring of 120l. But Venice was mercenary, unscrupulous and treacherous, caring for nothing but commercial gains. Before the crusaders could gather at her port for embarkation, she had betrayed them to the Moslems. By a secret treaty with the sultan of Egypt, the fact of which is coming more and more conclusively to light, she had undertaken to frustrate the Crusade, and to receive important commercial privileges at Alexandria as compensation for her treachery. When, therefore, in the early summer of 1202, the army of the Crusade was collected at Venice to take ship, it encountered difficulties, discouragements and ill-treatments which thickened daily. The number assembled was not equal to expectation. Some had gone by sea from Flanders; some by other routes. But Venice had provided transport for the whole, and inflexibly demanded pay for the whole. The money in hand was not equal to this claim. The summer was lost in disputes and attempted compromises. Many of the crusaders withdrew in disgust and went home. At length, in defiance of the censures of the pope and of the bitter opposition of many leaders and followers of the expedition, there was a bargain struck, by the terms of which the crusaders were to assist the Venetians in taking and plundering the Christian city of Zara, a dreaded commercial rival on the Dalmatian coast of the Adriatic, belonging to the king of Hungary, himself one of the promoters of the very crusade which was now to be turned against him. The infamous compact was carried out. Zara was taken, and in the end it was totally destroyed by the Venetians. In the meantime, the doomed city was occupied by the crusading army through the winter, while a still more perfidious plot was being formed. Old Dandolo, the blind doge of Venice, was the master spirit of it. He was helped by the influence of Philip, one of the two rivals then fighting for the imperial crown in Germany and Italy. Philip had married a daughter of Isaac II. (Angelos), made emperor at Constantinople on the fall of the dynasty of Comnenus, and that feeble prince had lately been dethroned by his brother. The son and heir of Isaac, named Alexius, had escaped from Constantinople and had made his way to Philip imploring help. Either Philip conceived the idea, or it was suggested to him, that the armament of the Crusade might be employed to place the young Alexius on the throne of his father. To the Venetians the scheme was more than acceptable. It would frustrate the Crusade, which they had pledged themselves to the sultan of Egypt to accomplish; it would satisfy their ill-will towards the Byzantines, and, more important than all else, it would give them an opportunity to secure immeasurable advantages over their rivals in the great trade which Constantinople held at command. The marquis of Montferrat, commander of the Crusade, had some grievances of his own and some ambitions of his own, which made him favorable to the new project, and he was easily won to it. The three influences thus combined—those of Philip, of Dandolo, and of Montferrat—overcame all opposition. Some who opposed were bribed, some were intimidated, some were deluded by promises, some deserted the ranks. Pope Innocent remonstrated, appealed and threatened in vain. The pilgrim host, "changed from a crusading army into a filibustering expedition," set sail from Zara in the spring of the year 1203, and was landed, the following June, not on the shores of Egypt or Syria, but under the walls of Constantinople. Its conquest, pillage and brutally destructive treatment of the great city are described in another place.

E. Pears, The Fall of Constantinople, chapters 8-13.

ALSO IN: G. Finlay, History of the Byzantine and Greek Empires, 716-1453, book 3, chapter 3.

See, also, BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D. 1203-1204

CRUSADES: A. D. 1201-1283. Against the heathen Sclavonians on the Baltic.

See LIVONIA: 12TH-13TH CENTURIES; and PRUSSIA: 13TH CENTURY.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1209-1242. Against the Albigenses.

See ALBIGENSES.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1212. The Children's Crusade.

"The religious wars fostered and promoted vice; and the failure of army after army was looked on as a clear manifestation of God's wrath against the sins of the camp. This feeling was roused to its highest pitch when, in the year 1212, certain priests—Nicolas was the name of one of these mischievous madmen—went about France and Germany calling on the children to perform what the fathers, through their wickedness, had been unable to effect, promising that the sea should be dry to enable them to march across; that the Saracens would be miraculously stricken with a panic at the sight of them; that God would, through the hands of children only, whose lives were yet pure, work the recovery of the Cross and the Sepulchre. Thousands—it is said fifty thousand—children of both sexes responded to the call. They listened to the impassioned preaching of the monks, believed their lying miracles, their visions, their portents, their references to the Scriptures, and, in spite of all that their parents could do, rushed to take the Cross, boys and girls together, and streamed along the roads which led to Marseilles and Genoa, singing hymns, waving branches, replying to those who asked whither they were going, 'We go to Jerusalem to deliver the Holy Sepulchre,' and shouting their rallying cry, 'Lord Jesus, give us back thy Holy Cross.' They admitted whoever came, provided he took the Cross; the infection spread, and the children could not be restrained from joining them in the towns and villages along their route. Their miserable parents put them in prison; they escaped; they forbade them to go; the children went in spite of prohibition. They had no money, no provisions, no leaders; but the charity of the towns they passed through supported them. At their rear streamed the usual tail of camp followers. … There were two main bodies. One of these directed its way through Germany, across the Alps, to Genoa. On the road they were robbed of all the gifts which had been presented them; they were exposed to heat and want, and very many either died on the march or wandered away from the road and so became lost to sight; when they reached Italy they dispersed about the country, seeking food, were stripped by the villagers, and in some cases were reduced to slavery. {633} Only seven thousand out of their number arrived at Genoa. Here they stayed for some days. They looked down upon the Mediterranean, hoping that its bright waves would divide to let them pass. But they did not; there was no miracle wrought in their favour; a few of noble birth were received among the Genoese families, and have given rise to distinguished houses of Genoa; among them is the house of Vivaldi. The rest, disappointed and disheartened, made their way back again, and got home at length, the girls with the loss of their virtue, the boys with the loss of their belief, all barefooted and in rags, laughed at by the towns they went through, and wondering why they had ever gone at all. This was the end of the German army. That of the French was not so fortunate, for none of them ever got back again at all. When they arrived at Marseilles, thinned probably by the same causes as those which had dispersed the Germans, they found, like their brethren, that the sea did not open a path for them, as had been promised. Perhaps some were disheartened and went home again. But fortune appeared to favour them. There were two worthy merchants at Marseilles, named Hugh Ferrens, and William Porcus, Iron Hugh and Pig William, who traded with the East, and had in port seven ships, in which they proposed to convey the children to Palestine. With a noble generosity they offered to take them for nothing, all for love of religion, and out of the pure kindness of their hearts. Of course this offer was accepted with joy, and the seven vessels laden with the happy little Crusaders, singing their hymns and flying their banners, sailed out from Marseilles, bound for the East, accompanied by William the Good and Hugh the Pious. It was not known to the children, of course, that the chief trade of these merchants was the lucrative business of kidnapping Christian children for the Alexandrian market. It was so, however, and these respectable tradesmen had never before made so splendid a coup. Unfortunately, off the Island of St. Peter, they encountered bad weather, and two ships went down with all on board. What must have been the feelings of the philanthropists, Pig William and Iron Hugh, at this misfortune? They got, however, five ships safely to Alexandria, and sold all their cargo, the Sultan of Cairo buying forty of the boys, whom he brought up carefully and apart, intending them, doubtless, for his best soldiers. A dozen refusing to change their faith were martyred. None of the rest ever came back. Nobody in Europe seems to have taken much notice of this extraordinary episode."

W. Besant and E. H. Palmer, Jerusalem, chapter 18.

ALSO IN: J. H. Michaud, History of the Crusades, appendix number 28.

G. Z. Gray, The Children's Crusade.

CRUSADE: A. D. 1212. Against the Moors in Spain.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1146-1232.

CRUSADE: A. D. 1216-1229. The Sixth Movement. Frederic II. in Jerusalem.

For six years after the betrayal of the vows of the crusaders of 1202-1204—who sacked Constantinople instead of rescuing Jerusalem—the Christians of Palestine were protected by a truce with Saphadin, the brother of Saladin, who had succeeded the latter in power. Hostilities were then rashly provoked by the always foolish Latins, and they soon found themselves reduced to sore straits, calling upon Europe for fresh help. Pope Innocent III. did not scruple to second their appeal. A new crusade was preached with great earnestness, and a general Council of the Church—the Fourth of Lateran—was convened for the stimulation of it. "The Fifth Crusade [or the Sixth, as more commonly numbered], the result of this resolution, was divided in the sequel into three maritime expeditions: the first [A. D. 1216] consisting principally of Hungarians under their king, Andrew; the second [A. D. 1218] composed of Germans, Italians, French and English nobles and their followers; and the third [A. D. 1228] led by the Emperor Frederic II. in person. … Though the King of Hungary was attended by the flower of a nation which, before its conversion to Christianity, had been the scourge and terror of Western Europe, the arms of that monarch, even aided by the junction of numerous German crusaders under the dukes of Austria and Bavaria, performed nothing worthy of notice: and after a single campaign in Palestine, in which the Mussulman territories were ineffectually ravaged, the fickle Andrew deserted the cause and returned with his forces to Europe. His defection did not prevent the duke of Austria, with the German crusaders, from remaining, in concert with the King of Jerusalem, his barons, and the knights of the three religious orders, for the defence of Palestine; and, in the following year, the constancy of these faithful champions of the Cross was rewarded by the arrival of numerous reinforcements from Germany. … It was resolved to change the scene of warfare from the narrow limits of the Syrian shore to the coast of Egypt, … and the situation of Damietta, at the mouth of the Nile, pointed out that city as the first object of attack." After a siege of seventeen months, during which both the besieged and the besiegers suffered horribly, from famine and from pestilence, Damietta was taken (A. D. 1219), Nine-tenths of its population of 80,000 had perished. "Both during the siege and after the capture of Damietta, the invasion of Egypt had filled the infidels with consternation; and the alarm which was betrayed in their counsels proved that the crusaders, in choosing that country for the theatre of operations, had assailed the Mussulman power in its most vital and vulnerable point. Of the two sons of Saphadin, Coradinus and Camel, who were now uneasily seated on the thrones of Damascus and Cairo, the former, in despair of preserving Jerusalem, had already demolished its fortifications; and the brothers agreed in repeatedly offering the cession of the holy city and of all Palestine to the Christians, upon the single condition of their evacuating Egypt. Every object which had been ineffectually proposed in repeated Crusades, since the fatal battle of Tiberias, might now have been gloriously obtained by the acceptance of these terms, and the King of Jerusalem, the French and English leaders, and the Teutonic knights, all eagerly desired to embrace the offer of the Sultans. But the obstinate ambition and cupidity of the surviving papal legate, Cardinal Pelagius, of the Italian chieftains, and of the knights of the other two religious orders, by holding out the rich prospect of the conquest and plunder of Egypt, overruled every wise and temperate argument in the Christian councils, and produced a rejection of all compromise with the infidels. {634} After a winter of luxurious inaction, the legate led the crusading host from Damietta toward Cairo (A. D. 1220)." The expedition was as disastrous in its result as it was imbecile in its leadership. The whole army, caught by the rising of the Nile, was placed in so helpless a situation that it was glad to purchase escape by the surrender of Damietta and the evacuation of Egypt. The retreat of the greater part of these crusaders did not end until they had reached home. Pope Honorius III. (who had succeeded Innocent III. in 1216) strove to shift responsibility for the failure from his wretched legate to the Emperor Frederic II., who had thus far evaded the fulfilment of his crusading promises and vows, being occupied in struggles with the papacy. At length, in 1228, Frederic embarked for Palestine with a small force, pursued by the maledictions of the pope, who denounced him for daring to assume the Cross while under the ban of the church, as much as he had denounced him before for neglecting it. But the free-thinking Hohenstauffen cared little, apparently, and went his way, shunned scrupulously by all pious souls, including the knights of Palestine, except those of the Teutonic order. With the help of the latter he occupied and refortified Jaffa and succeeded in concluding a treaty with the Sultan which restored Jerusalem to the Christians, reserving certain rights to the Mahometans; giving up likewise Bethlehem, Nazareth and some other places to the Christians, and securing peace for ten years. Frederic had married, a few years before, for his second empress, Iolante, daughter and heiress of the titular king of Jerusalem, John de Brienne. With the hand of this princess, he received from her father a solemn transfer of all his rights to that shadowy throne. He now claimed those rights, and, entering Jerusalem, with the Teutonic knights (A. D. 1229), he crowned himself its king. The patriarch, the Templars and the Hospitallers refused to take part in the ceremony; the pope denounced Frederic's advantageous treaty as soon as he had news of it, and all that it gained for the Christians of Palestine was thrown away by them as speedily as possible.

Major Procter, History of the Crusades, chapter 5, section 2.

"No Crusader, since Godfrey de Bouillon, had effected so much as Frederick the Second. What would he not have obtained, had the Pope, the Patriarch and the Orders given him their hearty cooperation?"

T. L. Kington, History of Frederick II., chapter 8.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1238-1280. Against the Bogomiles.

See BALKAN AND DANUBIAN STATES: 9TH-16TH CENTURIES (BOSNIA, ETC.)

CRUSADES: A. D. 1242. The Invasion of Palestine by the Carismians.

See JERUSALEM: A. D. 1242.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1248-1254. The Seventh Movement. Expedition of Saint Louis to Egypt.

The Seventh Crusade was undertaken, with little aid from other countries, by the devout and wonderfully Christian-like young king of France, Louis IX., afterwards canonized, and known in history as St. Louis. "He carried it out with a picked army, furnished by the feudal chivalry and by the religious and military orders dedicated to the service of the Holy Land. The Isle of Cyprus was the trysting-place appointed for all the forces of the expedition. Louis arrived there on the 12th of September, 1248, and reckoned upon remaining there only a few days; for it was Egypt that he was in a hurry to reach. The Christian world was at that time of opinion that, to deliver the Holy Land, it was necessary first of all to strike a blow at Islamism in Egypt, wherein its chief strength resided. But scarcely had the crusaders formed a junction in Cyprus, when the vices of the expedition and the weaknesses of its chief began to be manifest. Louis, unshakable in his religious zeal, was wanting in clear ideas and fixed resolves as to the carrying out of his design. … He did not succeed in winning a majority in the council of chiefs over to his opinion as to the necessity for a speedy departure for Egypt; it was decided to pass the winter in Cyprus. … At last a start was made from Cyprus in May, 1249, and, in spite of violent gales of wind which dispersed a large number of vessels, they arrived on the 4th of June before Damietta. … Having become masters of Damietta, St. Louis and the crusaders committed the same fault there as in the Isle of Cyprus: they halted there for an indefinite time. They were expecting fresh crusaders; and they spent the time of expectation in quarreling over the partition of the booty taken in the city. They made away with it, they wasted it blindly. … Louis saw and deplored these irregularities, without being in a condition to stop them. At length, on the 20th of November, 1249, after more than five months' inactivity at Damietta, the crusaders put themselves once more in motion, with the determination of marching upon Babylon, that outskirt of Cairo, now called Old Cairo, which the greater part of them, in their ignorance, mistook for the real Babylon, and where they flattered themselves they would find immense riches, and avenge the olden sufferings of the Hebrew captives. The Mussulmans had found time to recover from their first fright, and to organize, at all points, a vigorous resistance. On the 8th of February, 1250, a battle took place twenty leagues from Damietta, at Mansourah ('the city of victory'), on the right bank of the Nile. … The battle-field was left that day to the crusaders; but they were not allowed to occupy it as conquerors, for, three days afterwards, on the 11th of February, 1250, the camp of St. Louis was assailed by clouds of Saracens, horse and foot, Mamelukes and Bedouins. All surprise had vanished, the Mussulmans measured at a glance the numbers of the Christians, and attacked them in full assurance of success, whatever heroism they might display; and the crusaders themselves indulged in no more self·illusion, and thought only of defending themselves. Lack of provisions and sickness soon rendered defence almost as impossible as attack; every day saw the Christian camp more and more encumbered with the famine-stricken, the dying, and the dead; and the necessity for retreating became evident." An attempt to negotiate with the enemy failed, because they insisted on the surrender of the king as hostage,—which none would concede. "On the 5th of April, 1250, the crusaders decided upon retreating. This was the most deplorable scene of a deplorable drama; and at the same time it was, for the king, an occasion for displaying, in their most sublime and attractive traits, all the virtues of the Christian. Whilst sickness and famine were devastating the camp, Louis made himself visitor, physician and comforter; and his presence and his words exercised upon the worst cases a searching influence. … {635} When the 5th of April, the day fixed for the retreat, had come, Louis himself was ill and much enfeebled. He was urged to go aboard one of the vessels which were to descend the Nile, carrying the wounded and the most suffering; but he refused absolutely, saying, 'I don't separate from my people in the hour of danger.' He remained on land, and when he had to move forward he fainted away. When he came to himself, he was amongst the last to leave the camp. … At four leagues distance from the camp it had just left, the rear-guard of the crusaders, harassed by clouds of Saracens, was obliged to halt. Louis could no longer keep on his horse. 'He was put up at a house,' says Joinville, 'and laid, almost dead, upon the lap of a tradeswoman from Paris; and it was believed that he would not last till evening.'" The king, in this condition, with the whole wreck of his army,—only 10,000 in number remaining to him,—were taken prisoners. Their release from captivity was purchased a month later by the surrender of Damietta and a ransom-payment of 500,000 livres. They made their way to St. Jean d' Acre, in Palestine, whence many of them returned home. But King Louis, with some of his knights and men-at-arms—how many is not known—stayed yet in the Holy Land for four years, striving and hoping against hope to accomplish something for the deliverance of Jerusalem, and expending "in small works of piety, sympathy, protection, and care for the future of the Christian population in Asia, his time, his strength, his pecuniary resources, and the ardor of a soul which could not remain idly abandoned to sorrowing over great desires unsatisfied." The good and pious but ill-guided king returned to France in the summer of 1254, and was received with great joy.

ALSO IN: Sire De Joinville, Memoirs of Saint Louis, part 2.

J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, books 13-14.

Crusades: A. D. 1252. The movement of "the Pastors."

On the arrival in France of the news of the disastrous failure of Saint Louis's expedition to Egypt, there occurred an outbreak of fanaticism as insensate as that of the children's crusade of forty years before. It was said to have originated with a Hungarian named Jacob, who began to proclaim that Christ rejected the great ones of the earth from His service, and that the deliverance of the Holy City must be accomplished by the poor and humble. "Shepherds left their flocks, labourers laid down the plough, to follow his footsteps. … The name of Pastors was given to these village crusaders. … At length, assembled to the number of more than 100,000, these redoubtable pilgrims left Paris and divided themselves into several troops, to repair to the coast, whence they were to embark for the East. The city of Orleans, which happened to be in their passage, became the theatre of frightful disorders. The progress of their enormities at length created serious alarm in the government and the magistracy; orders were sent to the provinces to pursue and disperse these turbulent and seditious bands. The most numerous assemblage of the Pastors was fixed to take place at Bourges, where the 'master of Hungary' [Jacob] was to perform miracles and communicate the will of Heaven. Their arrival in that city was the signal for murder, fire and pillage. The irritated people took up arms and marched against these disturbers of the public peace; they overtook them between Mortemer and Villeneuve-sur-le-Cher, where, in spite of their numbers, they were routed, and received the punishment due to their brigandages. Jacob had his head cut off by the blow of an axe; many of his companions and disciples met with death on the field of battle, or were consigned to punishment; the remainder took to flight."

J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, book 14.

Crusades: A. D. 1256-1259. Against Eccelino di Romano.

See VERONA: A. D. 1236-1259.

Crusades: A. D. 1270-1271. The last undertakings. Saint Louis at Tunis. Prince Edward in Palestine.

"For seven years after his return to France, from 1254 to 1261, Louis seemed to think no more about them [the crusades], and there is nothing to show that he spoke of them even to his most intimate confidants; but, in spite of his apparent calmness, he was living, so far as they were concerned, in a continual ferment of imagination and internal fever, even flattering himself that some favorable circumstance would call him back to his interrupted work. … In 1261, Louis held, at Paris, a Parliament, at which, without any talk of a new crusade, measures were taken which revealed an idea of it. … In 1263 the crusade was openly preached. … All objections, all warnings, all anxieties came to nothing in the face of Louis's fixed idea and pious passion. He started from Paris on the 16th of March, 1270, a sick man almost already, but with soul content, and probably the only one without misgiving in the midst of all his comrades. It was once more at Aigues-Mortes that he went to embark. All was as yet dark and undecided as to the plan of the expedition. … Steps were taken at hap-hazard with full trust in Providence and utter forgetfulness that Providence does not absolve men from foresight. … It was only in Sardinia, after four days' halt at Cagliari, that Louis announced to the chiefs of the crusade, assembled aboard his ship, the 'Mountjoy,' that he was making for Tunis, and that their Christian work would commence there. The king of Tunis (as he was then called), Mohammed Mostanser, had for some time been talking of his desire to become a Christian, if he could be efficiently protected against the seditions of his subjects. Louis welcomed with transport the prospect of Mussulman conversions. … But on the 17th of July, when the fleet arrived before Tunis, the admiral, Florent de Varennes, probably without the king's orders, and with that want of reflection which was conspicuous at each step of the enterprise, immediately took possession of the harbor and of some Tunisian vessels as prize, and sent word to the king 'that he had only to support him and that the disembarkation of the troops might be effected with perfect safety.' Thus war was commenced at the very first moment against the Mussulman prince whom there had been promise of seeing before long a Christian. At the end of a fortnight, after some fight between the Tunisians and the crusaders, so much political and military blindness produced its natural consequences. The re-enforcements promised to Louis by his brother Charles of Anjou, king of Sicily, had not arrived; provisions were falling short; and the heats of an African summer were working havoc amongst the army with such rapidity that before long there was no time to bury the dead; but they were cast pell-mell into the ditch which surrounded the camp, and the air was tainted thereby. {636} On the 3d of August Louis was attacked by the epidemic fever." On the 25th of August he died. His son and successor, Philip III., held his ground before Tunis until November, when he gladly accepted a payment of money from the Tunisian prince for withdrawing his army. Disaster followed him. A storm destroyed part of his fleet, with 4,000 or 5,000 men, and sunk all the treasure he had received from the Moslems. On the journey home through Italy his wife met with an accident which ended her life and that of her prematurely born child. The young king arrived at Paris, May, 1271, bringing the remains of five of his family for burial at St. Denis: his wife, his son, his father, his brother, and his brother-in-law,—all victims of the fatal crusade. While France was thus burying the last of her crusaders, Prince Edward (afterwards King Edward I.) of England, landed in Syria at the head of a few hundred knights and men at arms. Joined by the Templars and Hospitallers, he had an army of 6,000 or 7,000 men, with which he took Nazareth and made there a bloody sacrifice to the memory of the gentle Nazarene. He did nothing more. Being wounded by an assassin, he arranged a truce with the Sultan of Egypt and returned home. His expedition was the last from Europe which strove with the Moslems for the Holy Land. The Christians of Palestine, who still held Acre and Tyre, Sidon and a few other coast cities, were soon afterwards overwhelmed, and the dominion of the Crescent in Syria was undisputed any more by force of arms, though many voices cried vainly against it. The spirit of the Crusades had expired.

ALSO IN: J. F. Michaud, History of the Crusades, book 15.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1291. The end of the Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem.

See JERUSALEM: A. D. 1291.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1299. The last campaign of the Templars.

"After the fall of Acre [A. D. 1291] the headquarters of the Templars were established at Limisso in the island of Cyprus, and urgent letters were sent to Europe for succour." In 1295, James de Molay, the head of the English province, became Grand Master, and soon after his arrival in Palestine he entered into an alliance with Ghazan Khan, the Mongol ruler of Persia, who had married a Christian princess of Armenia and was not unfriendly to the Christians, as against the Mamelukes of Egypt, with whom he was at war. The Mongol Khan invited the Templars to join him in an expedition against the Sultan of Egypt, and they did so in the spring of 1299, at Antioch. "An army of 30,000 men was placed by the Mogul emperor under the command of the Grand Master, and the combined forces moved up the valley of the Orontes towards Damascus. In a great battle fought at Hems, the troops of the sultans of Damascus and Egypt were entirely defeated and pursued with great slaughter until nightfall. Aleppo, Hems, Damascus, and all the principal cities, surrendered to the victorious arms of the Moguls, and the Templars once again entered Jerusalem in triumph, visited the Holy Sepulchre and celebrated Easter on Mount Zion." The khan sent ambassadors to Europe, offering the possession of Palestine to the Christian powers if they would give him their alliance and support, but none responded to the call. Ghazan Khan fell ill and withdrew from Syria; the Templars retreated to Cyprus once more and their military career, as the champions of the Cross, was at an end.

C. G. Addison, The Knights Templars, chapter 6.

ALSO IN: H. H. Howarth, History of the Mongols, part 3, chapter 8.

CRUSADES: Effects and consequences of the Crusades, in Europe.

"The principle of the crusades was a savage fanaticism; and the most important effects were analogous to the cause. Each pilgrim was ambitious to return with his sacred spoils, the relics of Greece and Palestine; and each relic was preceded and followed by a train of miracles and visions. The belief of the Catholics was corrupted by new legends, their practice by new superstitions; and the establishment of the inquisition, the mendicant orders of monks and friars, the last abuse of indulgences, and the final progress of idolatry, flowed from the baleful fountain of the holy war. The active spirit of the Latins preyed on the vitals of their reason and religion; and if the ninth and tenth centuries were the times of darkness, the thirteenth and fourteenth were the age of absurdity and fable. … Some philosophers have applauded the propitious influence of these holy wars, which appear to me to have checked rather than forwarded the maturity of Europe."

"The crusades may be considered as material pilgrimages on an enormous scale, and their influence upon general morality seems to have been altogether pernicious. Those who served under the cross would not indeed have lived very virtuously at home; but the confidence in their own merits which the principle of such expeditions inspired must have aggravated the ferocity and dissoluteness of their ancient habits. Several historians attest the depravation of morals which existed, both among the crusaders and in the states formed out of their conquests."

H. Hallam, The Middle Ages, chapter 9, part 1.

"It was not possible for the crusaders to travel through so many countries, and to behold their various customs and institutions, without acquiring information and improvement. Their views enlarged; their prejudices wore off; new ideas crowded into their minds; and they must have been sensible, on many occasions, of the rusticity of their own manners when compared with those of a more polished people. … Accordingly, we discover, soon after the commencement of the crusades, greater splendour in the courts of princes, greater pomp in public ceremonies, a more refined taste in pleasure and amusements, together with a more romantic spirit of enterprise spreading gradually over Europe; and to these wild expeditions, the effect of superstition and folly, we owe the first gleams of light which tended to dispel barbarism and ignorance. But the beneficial consequences of the crusades took place slowly; their influence upon the state of property, and, consequently, of power, in the different kingdoms of Europe, was more immediate as well as discernible."

W. Robertson, View of the Progress of Society in Europe, section 1.

{637}

"The crusades are not, in my mind, either the popular delusions that our cheap literature has determined them to be, nor papal conspiracies against kings and peoples, as they appear to the Protestant controversialist; nor the savage outbreaks of expiring barbarism, thirsting for blood and plunder, nor volcanic explosions of religious intolerance. I believe them to have been, in their deep sources, and in the minds of their best champions, and in the main tendency of their results, capable of ample justification. They were the first great effort of mediæval life to go beyond the pursuit of selfish and isolated ambitions; they were the trial-feat of the young world, essaying to use, to the glory of God and the benefit of man, the arms of its new knighthood. … That in the end they were a benefit to the world no one who reads can doubt; and that in their course they brought out a love for all that is heroic in human nature, the love of freedom, the honour of prowess, sympathy with sorrow, perseverance to the last and patient endurance without hope, the chronicles of the age abundantly prove; proving, moreover, that it was by the experience of those times that the forms of those virtues were realized and presented to posterity."

William Stubbs, Seventeen Lectures on the Study of Mediæval and Modern History, lecture 8.

"Though begun under the name and influence of religious belief, the crusades deprived religious ideas, I shall not say of their legitimate share of influence, but of their exclusive and despotic possession of the human mind. This result, though undoubtedly unforeseen, arose from various causes. The first was evidently the novelty, extent, and variety of the scene which displayed itself to the crusaders; what generally happens to travellers happened to them. It is mere common-place to say, that travelling gives freedom to the mind; that the habit of observing different nations, different manners and different opinions, enlarges the ideas, and disengages the judgment from old prejudices. The same thing happened to those nations of travellers who have been called the crusaders; their minds were opened and raised by having seen a multitude of different things, of having become acquainted with other manners than their own. They found themselves also placed in connexion with two states of civilization, not only different from their own, but more advanced—the Greek state of society on the one hand, and the Mussulman on the other. … It is curious to observe in the chronicles the impression made by the crusaders on the Mussulmans, who regarded them at first as the most brutal, ferocious, and stupid barbarians they had ever seen. The crusaders, on their part, were struck with the riches and elegance of manners which they observed among the Mussulmans. These first impressions were succeeded by frequent relations between the Mussulmans and Christians. These became more extensive and important than is commonly believed. … There is another circumstance which is worthy of notice. Down to the time of the crusades, the court of Rome, the centre of the Church, had been very little in communication with the laity, unless through the medium of ecclesiastics; either legates sent by the court of Rome, or the whole body of the bishops and clergy. There were always some laymen in direct relation with Rome; but upon the whole, it was by means of churchmen that Rome had any communication with the people of different countries. During the crusades, on the contrary, Rome became a halting-place for a great portion of the crusaders, either in going or returning. A multitude of laymen were spectators of its policy and its manners, and were able to discover the share which personal interest had in religious disputes. There is no doubt that this newly-acquired knowledge inspired many minds with a boldness hitherto unknown. When we consider the state of the general mind at the termination of the crusades, especially in regard to ecclesiastical matters, we cannot fail to be struck with a singular fact: religious notions underwent no change, and were not replaced by contrary or even different opinions. Thought, notwithstanding, had become more free; religious creeds were not the only subject on which the human mind exercised its faculties; without abandoning them, it began occasionally to wander from them, and to take other directions. … The social state of society had undergone an analogous change. … Without entering into the details … we may collect into a few general facts the influence of the crusades on the social state of Europe. They greatly diminished the number of petty fiefs, petty domains, and petty proprietors; they concentrated property and power in a smaller number of hands. It is from the time of the crusades that we may observe the formation and growth of great fiefs—the existence of feudal power on a large scale. … This was one of the most important results of the crusades. Even in those cases where small proprietors preserved their fiefs, they did not live upon them in such an insulated state as formerly. The possessors of great fiefs became so many centres around which the smaller ones were gathered, and near which they came to live. During the crusades, small proprietors found it necessary to place themselves in the train of some rich and powerful chief, from whom they received assistance and support. They lived with him, shared his fortune, and passed through the same adventures that he did. When the crusaders returned home, this social spirit, this habit of living in intercourse with superiors continued to subsist, and had its influence on the manners of the age. … The extension of the great fiefs, and the creation of a number of central points in society, in place of the general dispersion which previously existed, were the two principal effects of the crusades, considered with respect to their influence upon feudalism. As to the inhabitants of the towns, a result of the same nature may easily be perceived. The crusades created great civic communities. Petty commerce and petty industry were not sufficient to give rise to communities such as the great cities of Italy and Flanders. It was commerce on a great scale—maritime commerce, and, especially, the commerce of the East and West, which gave them birth; now it was the crusades which gave to the maritime commerce the greatest impulse it had yet received. On the whole, when we survey the state of society at the end of the crusades, we find that the movement tending to dissolution and dispersion, the movement of universal localization (if I may be allowed such an expression), had ceased, and had been succeeded by a movement in the contrary direction, a movement of centralization. All things tended to mutual approximation; small things were absorbed in great ones, or gathered round them. Such was the direction then taken by the progress of society."

{638}

CRUSADES: A. D. 1383. The Bishop of Norwich's Crusade in Flanders.

See FLANDERS: A. D. 1383.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1420-1431. Crusade against the Hussites.

See BOHEMIA: A. D. 1419-1434.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1442-1444. Christian Europe against the Turks.

See TURKS (THE OTTOMANS): A. D. 1402-1451.

CRUSADES: A. D. 1467-1471. Crusade Instigated by the Pope against George Podiebrad, king of Bohemia.

See BOHEMIA: A. D. 1458-1471.

—————CRUSADES: End—————

CRYPTEIA, The.

See KRYPTEIA.

CTESIPHON.

"The Parthian monarchs, like the Mogul sovereigns of Hindostan, delighted in the pastoral life of their Scythian ancestors, and the imperial camp was frequently pitched in the plain of Ctesiphon, on the eastern banks of the Tigris, at the distance of only three miles from Seleucia. The innumerable attendants on luxury and despotism resorted to the court, and the little village of Ctesiphon insensibly swelled into a great city. Under the reign of Marcus, the Roman generals penetrated as far as Ctesiphon and Seleucia. They were received as friends by the Greek colony; they attacked as enemies the seat of the Parthian kings; yet both cities experienced the same treatment. The sack and conflagration of Seleucia, with the massacre of 300,000 of the inhabitants, tarnished the glory of the Roman triumph, Seleucia, already exhausted by the neighborhood of a too powerful rival, sunk under the fatal blow; but Ctesiphon, in about thirty-three years, had sufficiently recovered its strength to maintain an obstinate siege against the emperor Severus. The city was, however, taken by assault; the king, who defended it in person, escaped with precipitation; 100,000 captives and a rich booty rewarded the fatigues of the Roman soldiers. Notwithstanding these misfortunes, Ctesiphon succeeded to Babylon and to Seleucia as one of the great capitals of the East."

In 637 A. D. Ctesiphon passed into the possession of the Saracens.

See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST AND EMPIRE: A. D. 632-651.

ALSO IN: G. Rawlinson, Sixth Great Oriental Monarchy, chapter 6.

See, also, MEDAIN.

CUATOS, The.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: PAMPAS TRIBES.

CUBA: A. D. 1492-1493. Discovery by Columbus.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1492; and 1493-1496.

CUBA: A. D. 1511. Spanish conquest and occupation of the island.

"Of the islands, Cuba was the second discovered; but no attempt had been made to plant a colony there during the lifetime of Columbus; who, indeed, after skirting the whole extent of its southern coast, died in the conviction that it was part of the continent. At length, in 1511, Diego, the son and successor of the 'admiral,' who still maintained the seat of government in Hispaniola, finding the mines much exhausted there, proposed to occupy the neighbouring island of Cuba, or Fernandina, as it is called, in compliment to the Spanish monarch. He prepared a small force for the conquest, which he placed under the command of Don Diego Velasquez. … Velasquez, or rather his lieutenant Narvaez, who took the office on himself of scouring the country, met with no serious opposition from the inhabitants, who were of the same family with the effeminate natives of Hispaniola." After the conquest, Velasquez was appointed governor, and established his seat of government at St. Jago, on the southeast corner of the island.

W. H. Prescott, Conquest of Mexico, book 2, chapter 1.

ALSO IN: Sir A. Helps, Spanish Conquest in America, book 7.

CUBA: A. D. 1514-1851. Slow development of the island. Capture of Havana by the English. Discontent with Spanish rule. Conspiracies of revolution.

"Velasquez founded many of the towns of the island, the first of which was Baracoa, then Bayamo, and in 1514 Trinidad, Santo Espiritu, Puerto Principe; next, in 1515, Santiago de Cuba, as also, in the same year, the town of Habana. … This period (1511-1607) is particularly interesting to the general reader from the fact that in it the explorations of Hernandez de Cadoba and Grijalva to Darien, Yucatan, etc., were inaugurated,—events which had so much to do with the spread of Spanish rule and discovery, paving the way as they did for the exploration of Mexico under Hernando Cortes, who, in the early history of Cuba, figures largely as the lieutenant of the Governor Velasquez. … In 1524, Diego Velasquez died, —his death hastened, it is said, by the troubles brought upon him by his disputes with his insubordinate lieutenant, Cortes. … In the history of the improvement of the island, his government will bear favorable comparison with many of the later governments; and while that great evil, slavery, was introduced into the island in his time, so also was the sugar cane. … Up to 1538, there seems to be nothing specially striking in the general history of the island, if we except the constant attacks with fire and sword of the 'filibusteros,' or pirates of all nations, from which most all the sea-coast towns suffered more or less; but in that year there arrived at Santiago de Cuba a man destined to play an important part in the history and discovery of the new world, and named as Provincial Governor of Florida as well as of Cuba,—I allude to Hernando de Soto, who brought with him 10 large vessels, prepared and fitted out expressly for the conquest of the new Spanish territory of Florida. After much care and preparation, this expedition started out from the city of Habana, the 12th of May [see FLORIDA: A. D. 1528-1542]. … In this period, also, was promulgated that order, secured, it is believed, by the noble efforts of Padre Las Casas, prohibiting the enslaving of the aborigines; while, also, such had become its importance as a town, all vessels directed to and from Mexico were ordered to stop at Havana. In the period of years that elapsed from 1607 to 1762, the island seems to have been in a perfect state of lethargy, except the usual changes of its many Governors, and the raids made upon it by pirates, or by more legalized enemies in the form of French and English men-of-war. In this latter year, however, occurred an event of much import, from the fact that after it, or upon its occurrence, the Government of Spain was led to see the great importance of Cuba, and particularly Havana, as the 'Key to the New World,'—this event was the taking of Havana by the English. {639} On the 6th of June, 1762, there arrived off the port of Havana an English squadron of 32 ships and frigates, with some 200 transports, bringing with them a force of nearly 20,000 men of all arms, under command of the Duke of Albemarle. This formidable armament, the largest that America had ever seen, laid siege to the city of Havana, whose garrison consisted at that time of only about 2,700 regulars and the volunteers that took up arms immediately for the defense of the place. … The garrison, however, made a very gallant and prolonged defense, notwithstanding the smallness of their numbers, and finally, surrendering, were permitted to march out with the honors of war, the English thus coming into possession of the most important defences on the coast, and, subsequently, taking possession of the town of Matanzas. Remaining in possession of this portion of the Island of Cuba for many months (until July 6, 1763), the English, by importing negro labor to cultivate the large tracts of wild land, and by shipping large quantities of European merchandize, gave a start to the trade and traffic of the island that pushed it far on its way to the state of prosperity it has now reached; but by the treaty of peace, at Paris, in February, 1763 [see Seven Years War], was restored to Spain the portion of the island wrested from her by the English. … In this period (1762-1801) the island made rapid advances in improvement and civilization, many of the Captains-General of this period doing much to improve the towns and the people, beautifying the streets, erecting buildings, etc. In 1763, a large emigration took place from Florida, and in 1795 the French emigrants from Santo Domingo came on to the island in large numbers. … From 1801, rapid increase in the prosperity of the island has taken place. … At various times insurrections, some of them quite serious in their nature, have shown what the natural desire of the native population is for greater privileges and freedom. … In 1823, there was a society of 'soles,' as it was called, formed for the purpose of freeing the island, having at its head young D. Francisco Lemus, and having for its pretext that the island was about to be sold to England. In 1829, there was discovered the conspiracy of the Black Eagle, as it was called (Aguila Negra), an attempt on the part of the population to obtain their freedom, some of the Mexican settlers in the island being prominent in it. The insurrection, or attempt at one, by the blacks in 1844, was remarkable for its wide-spread ramifications among the slaves of the island, as well as its thorough organization,—the intention being to murder all the whites on the island. Other minor insurrections there were, but it remained for Narciso Lopez, with a force of some 300 men, to make the most important attempt [1851], in which he lost his life, to free the island."

S. Hazard, Cuba with Pen and Pencil, pages 547-550.

ALSO IN: M. M. Ballou, History of Cuba, chapters 1-3.

Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope), History of England, 1713-1783, chapter 38 (volume 4).

J. Entick, History of the Late War, volume 5, pages 363-386.

D. Turnbull, Cuba, chapters 22-24.

CUBA: A. D. 1845-1860. Acquisition coveted by the slave-power in the United States. Attempted purchase. Filibustering schemes. The Ostend Manifesto.

"When the Spanish colonies in America became independent, they abolished slavery. Apprehensive that the republics of Mexico and Columbia would be anxious to wrest Cuba and Porto Rico from Spain, secure their independence, and introduce into those islands the idea, if they did not establish the fact, of freedom, the slave-masters [of the United States] at once sought to guard against what they deemed so calamitous an event. … But after the annexation of Texas, there was a change of feeling and purpose, and Cuba, from being an object of dread, became an object of vehement desire. The propagandists, strengthened and emboldened by that signal triumph, now turned their eyes towards this beautiful 'isle of the sea,' as the theatre of new exploits; and they determined to secure the 'gem of the Antilles' for the coronet of their great and growing power. During Mr. Polk's administration an attempt was made to purchase it, and the sum of $100,000,000 was offered therefor. But the offer was promptly declined. What, however, could not be bought it was determined to steal, and filibustering movements and expeditions became the order of the day. For no sooner was President Taylor inaugurated than he found movements on foot in that direction; and, in August, 1849, he issued a proclamation, affirming his belief that an 'armed expedition' was being fitted out 'against Cuba or some of the provinces of Mexico,' and calling upon all good citizens' to discountenance and prevent any such enterprise.' In 1851 an expedition, consisting of some 500 men, sailed from New Orleans under Lopez, a Cuban adventurer. But though it effected a landing, it was easily defeated, and its leader and a few of his followers were executed. Soon afterward, a secret association, styling itself the Order of the Lone Star, was formed in several of the Southern cities, having a similar object in view; but it attracted little notice and accomplished nothing. … In August, 1854, President Pierce instructed Mr. Marcy, his Secretary of State, to direct Buchanan, Mason and Soulé, ministers respectively at the courts of London, Paris and Madrid, to convene in some European city and confer with each other in regard to the matter of gaining Cuba to the United States. They met accordingly, in October, at Ostend. The results of their deliberations were published in a manifesto, in which the reasons are set forth for the acquisition; and the declaration was made that the Union could never enjoy repose and security 'as long as Cuba is not embraced within its boundaries.' But the great source of anxiety, the controlling motive, was the apprehension that, unless so annexed, she would 'be Africanized and become a second San Domingo,' thus 'seriously to endanger' the Union. This paper attracted great attention and caused much astonishment. It was at first received with incredulity, as if there had been some mistake or imposition practised. … But there was no mistake. … It was the deliberate utterance of the conference, and it received the indorsement of Mr. Pierce and his administration. The Democratic national conventions of 1856 and of 1860 were quite as explicit as were the authors of the Ostend manifesto 'in favor of the acquisition of Cuba.'"