Note 739 — Chapter III · THE FALL OF ACRE 1191.

See the curious statement in a letter written about this time by El-Fadhel, one of Saladin’s secretaries, to the Divan at Bagdad: “The number of barbaric tongues among these people from the west is outrageous, and outdoes everything that can be imagined. Sometimes, when we take a prisoner, we can only communicate with him through a series of interpreters—one translates the Frank’s words to another, who translates them again to a third.” Abu Shama, Hist. des Crois., iv. 15.