Note 75 — BOOK XVII.

Some modern historians who have spoken of these vows of the knights, have exaggerated the fantasticalness of them. I find, among others, in one of these historians, this sentence: “In short, what gives the best idea of the devotion of these new Crusaders is, that one vowed that if, up to the moment of his departure, he could not obtain the favours of his mistress, he would marry the first demoiselle he should meet with having twenty thousand crowns.” We have found nothing like this in either Montstrelet or Olivier de la Marche, who are the only authors of the times who speak of this festival.