Chapter IX · (continued 2)

[168] History of the Jews, vol. iii.

[169] "When the first light brought news of a morning, they on afresh; because they had intercepted a letter tied to the leg of a dove, wherein the Persian emperor promised present succours to the besieged. The Turks cased the outside of their walls with bags of chaff, straw, and such like pliable matter, which conquered the engines of the Christians by yielding unto them. As for one sturdy engine, whose force would not be tamed, they brought two old witches on the walls to enchant it; but the spirit thereof was too strong for their spells, so that both of them were miserably slain in the place.

"We must not think that the world was at a loss for war-tools before the brood of guns was hatched: it had the battering-ramme, first found out by Epeus at the taking of Troy; the balista to discharge great stones, invented by the Phenicians; the catapulta, being a sling of mighty strength, whereof the Syrians were authors; and perchance King Uzziah first made it, for we find him very dexterous and happy in devising such things. And although these bear-whelps were but rude and unshaped at the first, yet art did lick them afterward, and they got more teeth and sharper nails by degrees; so that every age set them forth in a new edition, corrected and amended. But these and many more voluminous engines are now virtually epitomized in the cannon. And though some say that the finding of guns hath been the losing of many men's lives, yet it will appear that battles now are fought with more expedition, and Victory standeth not so long a neuter, before she express herself on one side or other."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 41.

[170] Fuller remarks, that "this second massacre was no slip of an extemporary passion, but a studied and premeditated act. Besides, the execution was merciless upon sucking children whose not speaking spake for them; and on women whose weakness is a shield to defend them against a valiant man. To conclude, severity, hot in the fourth degree, is little better than poison, and becometh cruelty itself; and this act seemeth to be of the same nature."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 41.

[171] On this interesting subject we refer to the "Itinéraire" of Chateaubriand, and his "Génie du Christianisme;" the History of England by Sir James Mackintosh, volume first; and to Mills's History of the Crusades, volume first, chapter sixth. We may add Dr. Robertson's "Historical Disquisition concerning the Knowledge which the Ancients had of India."

[172] Mill's History of the Crusades, vol. ii. p. 48.

[173] Mills's History of the Crusades, vol. ii. p. 129. Michaud, Histoire des Croisades, tom. iii. p. 187.

[174] A curé at Paris, instead of reading the bull from the pulpit in the usual form, said to his parishioners, "You know, my friends, that I am ordered to fulminate an excommunication against Frederick. I know not the motive. All that I know is, that there has been a quarrel between that prince and the pope. God alone knows who is right. I excommunicate him who has injured the other, and I absolve the sufferer." The emperor sent a present to the preacher, but the pope and the king blamed this sally: le mauvais plaisant—the unhappy wit—was obliged to expiate his fault by a canonical penance.—Mills's History, vol. ii. p. 253.

[175] The address of the Pope to the Fourth Council of Lateran, as translated by Michaud, is not a little striking:—"O vous qui passez dans les chemins, disait Jérusalem par la bouche du Pontife, regardez et voyez si jamais il y eut une douleur semblable à la mienne! Accourez donc tous, vous qui me cherissez, pour me delivrer de l'excès de mes miseres! Moi, qui étais la reçue de toutes les nations, je suis maintenant asservie au tribut; moi, qui étais remplie de peuple, je suis restée presque seule. Les chemins de Sion sont en deuil, parceque personne ne vient à mes solemnités. Mes ennemis ont écrasé ma tête; tous les lieux saints sont profanés: le saint sépulchre, si rempli d'éclat, est couvert d'opprobre; on adore le fils de la perdition et de l'enfer, là où naguères on adorait le fils de Dieu. Les enfants de l'etranger m'accablent d'outrages, et montrant la croix de Jesus, ils me disent:—'Tu as mise toute la confiance dans un bois vil; nous verrons si ce bois te sauvera au jour de danger.'"—Histoire des Croisades, tom. iii. p. 394.

[176] "On se rappelait alors les vertus dont il avait donné l'exemple, et surtout sa bonté, envers les habitants de la Palestine, qu'il avait traités comme ses propres sujets. Les uns exprimaient leur reconnaissance par de vives acclamations, les autres par une morne silence; tout le peuple qu'affligeait son depart, les proclamait le père des Chrétiens, et conjurait le ciel de repandre ses benedictions sur la famille du vertueux monarque et sur la royaume de France. Louis montrait sur son visage, qu'il partageait les regrets des Chrétiens de la Terra-Sainte; il leur addressait des paroles consolantes, leur donnait d'utiles conseils, se reprochait de s'avoir fait assez pour leur cause, et témoignait le vif desir qu'un jour Dieu le jugeat digne d'achever l'ouvrage de leur delivrance."—Michaud, Histoire des Croisades, tom. iv. p. 299.

[177] Ibid. p. 302.

[178] It was during the siege of Tunis that Louis died. "Our Edward would needs have had the town beaten down, and all put to the sword; thinking the foulest quarter too fair for them. Their goods (because got by robbery) he would have sacrificed as an anathema to God, and burnt to ashes; his own share he execrated, and caused it to be burnt, forbidding the English to save any thing of it; because that coals stolen out of that fire would sooner burn their houses than warm their hands. It troubled not the consciences of other princes to enrich themselves herewith, but they glutted themselves with the stolen honie which they found in this hive of drones: and, which was worse, now their bellies were full, they would goe to bed, return home, and goe no farther. Yea, the young King of France, called Philip the Bold, was fearful to prosecute his journey to Palestine; whereas Prince Edward struck his breast, and swore, that though all his friends forsook him, yet he would enter Ptolemais though but only with Fowin his horsekeeper. By which speech he incensed the English to go on with him."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 217.

[179] "It is storied how Eleanor, his lady, sucked all the poison out of his wounds, without doing any harm to herself. So sovereign a remedy is a woman's tongue anointed with the virtue of loving affection! Pity it is that so pretty a story should not be true (with all the miracles in love's legends), and sure he shall get himself no credit who undertaketh to confute a passage so sounding to the honour of the sex. Yet can it not stand with what others have written."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 220.

[180] The motives for the massacre of Jaffa are given by Bourrienne in so impartial a manner, that we are inclined to believe he has given a true transcript of his master's mind. "Bonaparte sent his aids-de-camp, Beauharnais and Crosier, to appease as far as possible the fury of the soldiery, to examine what passed, and to report. They learned that a numerous detachment of the garrison had retired into a strong position, where large buildings surrounded a courtyard. This court they entered, displaying the scarfs which marked their rank. The Albanians and Arnauts, composing nearly the entire of these refugees, cried out from the windows that they wished to surrender, on condition their lives were spared; if not, threatening to fire upon the officers, and to defend themselves to the last extremity. The young men conceived they ought, and had power, to accede to the demand, in opposition to the sentence of death pronounced against the garrison of every place taken by assault. I was walking with General Bonaparte before his tent when these prisoners, in two columns, amounting to about four thousand men, were marched into the camp. When he beheld the mass of men arrive, and before seeing the aids-de-camp, he turned to me with an expression of consternation, 'What would they have me to do with these? Have I provisions to feed them; ships to transport them either to Egypt or France? How the devil could they play me this trick!' The two aids-de-camp, on their arrival and explanations, received the strongest reprimands. To their defence, namely, that they were alone amid numerous enemies, and that he had recommended to them to appease the slaughter, he replied, in the sternest tone, 'Yes, without doubt, the slaughter of women, children, old men, the peaceable inhabitants, but not of armed soldiers; you ought to have braved death, and not brought these to me. What would you have me do with them?' But the evil was done. Four thousand men were there—their fate must be determined. The prisoners were made to sit down, huddled together before the tents, their hands being bound behind them. A gloomy rage was depicted to every lineament. A council was held in the general's tent," &c.

On the third day an order was issued that the prisoners should be shot,—an order which was literally executed on four thousand men. "The atrocious crime," says M. Bourrienne, "makes me yet shudder when I think of it, as when it passed before me. All that can be imagined of fearful on this day of blood would fall short of the reality!"—Memoirs, vol i. p. 156.

[181] Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, vol. i. p. 163.

[182] Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, vol. i. p. 165.

[183] Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, vol. i. p. 168.

[184] Jowett's Christian Researches in Syria and the Holy Land, p. 315.

[185] Weimar, Geographical Ephemerides; and History of the Jews, vol. iii. p. 332.

[186] History of the Jews, vol. iii. p. 338.

[187] See Clarke's Travels, vol. iv. p. 191.

[188] Hasselquist's Voyages and Travels, p. 284.

[189] Clarke's Travels, vol. iv. p. 223 and 307.

[190] Travels or Observations relating to several parts of Barbary and the Levent, vol. ii. p. 153.

[191] Travels or Observations, vol. ii. p. 135.

[192] Travels through Syria and Egypt, vol. i. p. 313.

[193] 1 Kings, iv. 23.

[194] Shaw's Travels, vol. ii. p. 280.

[195] Job xxxix. ver. 9, 10, 11, 12.

[196] Job xxxix. 5, 6, 7, 8.

[197] Appendix to Bruce's Travels, p. 139.

[198] See an article in the sixth volume of the Wernerian Memoirs, by Dr. Scott, of Corstorphine, "On the Animal called Saphan in the Hebrew Scriptures."

[199] Daubenton, Calmet, vol. iv. p. 645. See also Shaw, Hasselquist and Dochart.

[200] Calmet's Dictionary, vol. iv. p. 659.

[201] See Calmet, vol. iv. p. 688.

[202] Churchill's Voyages, vol. ii, p. 296.

[203] Revelation ix. 3, 10.

[204] Calmet's Dictionary, vol. iv. p. 696.

[205] Malte Brun, vol. ii p. 130.

[206] Shaw's Travels, vol. ii p. 152.

[207] Isaiah, v. 4.

[208] Voyages and Travels in the Levant, p. 288.