even the Sarassins, who knew him, were loud in lamenting his death. The inscription on his tomb was: Rex Balduinus, Judas alter Machabæus, Godefrey appeared on the frontiers of Palestine in the year 1099. He was accompanied by Baldwin, Eustache, Tancred, Raimond of Toulouse, the Counts of Flanders and Normandy. L'Etolde was the first to leap upon the walls of Jerusalem, followed by Guichen, already celebrated for having cut a lion in two; then followed Godefrey, Gaston de Foix, Gerard de Roussillon, Raimbaud d'Orange, Saint Paul, and Lambert. Previously Godefrey is described as raging round the walls, and looking more terrible than when he fought with the giant on the bridge of Antioch, that huge Sarrassin, whom he cut in two with one blow of his sword. Others say that two brothers out of Flanders, Ludolf and Engelbert, were the first to mount the walls of Jerusalem, followed by Godefrey and his brother Eustache.1 Again, the house of Croton, or D'Estourmel, in Picardy, claims its descent from Reimbold Croton; "qui primus in expugnatione Jerusalem ingressus est,' as Orderic Vitalis says. Their motto is, "Vaillant sur la Crete." The standard of the Cross floated upon the walls of Jerusalem on Friday, the 15th, or, according to others, the 12th of July, 1099, at three o'clock in the afternoon. To proceed with the portraits. Baldwin II. is described by William of Tyre: "He was remarkable for beauty of person, being of a lively and sanguine complexion, expert in arms and in the management of horses, having great experience in war, prudent in all his actions, happy in his expeditions, pious in all his works, clement and pitiful, religious, and fearing God."2 His successor, Fulcus, was "faithful and humane, affable, kind-hearted, and full of mercy, liberal in works of piety and in the distribution of alms, experienced in war, and patient of fatigue." When Baldwin II. had been elected King of Jerusalem, on 1 Raumer, Geschichte der Hohenstaufen, i. 213. 3 Ibid. p. 855. the suggestion of Joscelin, Count of Edessa, who had been before his personal enemy, Eustathius was, at the same time, authorised by the other powers to accept the crown. After repeatedly refusing the offer, he at length consented; and when he had proceeded as far as Apulia, he received intelligence of the election of Baldwin. Notwithstand ing all attempts to convince him that this election was illegal and void, he refused to proceed with his claim. "Far be it from me," said he, "to kindle a war in that kingdom which my brother and my brethren in the faith acquired by the offering up of their lives, and where Christ shed his blood for the peace of the world." When Baldwin III. died, Nureddin refused to avail himself of the grief of the Christians and the favourable opportunity for falling on them, and nobly answered, "We must pity and honour their grief; for they have lost a king who had not his fellow on the earth." The Saracens do more justice to the Crusaders than many of their ungrateful and degenerate descendants. In the reign of our Henry IV. Lord Beauchamp, travelling into the East, was received at Jerusalem by the Sultan's lieutenant, who, hearing that he was descended from Guy, Earl of Warwick, invited him to his palace, and royally feasted him, presenting him with precious stones, and giving to his servants divers clothes of silk and gold. The valour of the Crusaders was the astonishment of the East. Saladin, indeed, told the Bishop of Salisbury, that King Richard exposed his person too much for a general. Joinville bears testimony to the personal heroism of Saint Louis :- "Soiez certains, que le bon Roy eut celle journée des plus grans faiz d'armes que jamais j'aye veu faire en toutes les batailles ou je fu oncq. Et dit-on, que si n'eust esté sa personne, en celle journée nous eussions esté tous perduz et destruiz. Mais je croy que la vertu et puissance qu'il avoit luy doubla lors de moitié par la puissance de Dieu. Car il se boutoit ou meilleu, la ou il veoit ses gens en destresse, et donnoit de masses et d'espée des grans coups à merveilles. Et me conterent ung jour le sirè de Courtenay et Messire Jehan de Salenay, que six Turcs vindrent au Roy celuy jour et le prendrent par le frain de son cheval, et l'emmenoient à Raumer, i. 457. force. Mais le vertueux Prince s'esvertue de tout son povoir et de si grant courage frappoit sur ces six Turcs, que lui seul se delivra." The astonishment of the infidels at the valour of the Christian knights gave rise to the most surprising relations. Thus we read in the German Chronicle of Ebendorfferus de Haselbach: " Sicque Soldanus quadraginta diebus et noctibus acies dirigit in civitatem, in quorum intervallo Soldano quondam magnam admirationem movit cur Christiani crebro pauci numero magnum in bello devincunt et prosternunt Sarracenorum exercitum? Cui quidam paganus respondit, non mirum : quia ego quodam prospexi die, quando Christiani ceciderunt in prælio quod in uno corpore duo latuerunt homines, et uno moriente adstiterint eidem decori juvenes, qui ex ejus ore susceperunt venustum puerulum." The heroic action of Guillaume de Clermont has been recorded in the History of the Capture of Ptolemais, though it does little but illustrate the common spirit of the ancient heroes. In the midst of the general ruin, he alone defied the enemy. At the gate of St. Anthony he met the charge of the Saracens, and fought them till he had retreated to the centre of the city. "Son dextrier," says an old historian, "fut molt las et lui-meme aussi; le dextrier résista en contre les espérons, et s'arresta dans le rue comme qui n'en peut plus. Les Sarrasins, à coups de fleches, tuerent à terre frere Guillaume. Ainsi ce loyal champion de Jesus Christ rendit l'ame à son Createur." The castle of the Templars was the only place which held out against the Saracens. The Sultan having granted a capitulation, sent three hundred Mussulmen to execute the treaty. They had hardly entered one of the towers, when they insulted the women who had there taken refuge. The Christian warriors fell upon these wretches, and massacred them in a moment. The Sultan, in consequence, gave orders that the castle should be attacked, and that all within it should be put to the sword. The Templars defended themselves for many days, till at length the tower of the grand master being undermined, fell to the ground, at the moment when the Mussulmen were mounting to the assault, and both the assailants and the besieged were buried under the ruins. Let us delay a moment to contemplate the fate of the Templars, and to examine the charges which have been brought in different ages against that illustrious order. I need not enlarge upon the painful and shocking history of their punishment, which is too well known. It was on the morning of the 13th of October, 1307, the Friday after the festival of St. Denis, according to the Chronique de St. Denis, that the knights were arrested throughout France and cast into horrid dungeons. The same fate soon overtook them in England and Germany, though, to the honour of the latter nation, the Templars were less severely persecuted there than in any other country, the charges against them being there less generally believed. However, when I was in Hungary I saw the ruins of a house in which it was said that fifty Templars had been murdered in one night. In France there was no mercy shewn to them. It is said that one Templar remained concealed in the ruins of the monastery of Elagnols in Dauphiné, and by his nocturnal appearance used to terrify the inhabitants of the neighbourhood.2 The Templars had incurred the indignation of Philip-le-bel by being distinguished among the French clergy for preferring the spiritual authority of the Church to the pretensions of the King, by daring to hesitate when he gave orders, by shewing discontent at the frequent alterations and falsifications of the coin, and by resenting the outrages upon the person of the late Pope Boniface VIII. The charges against Pope Clement rest upon the authority of Alberic de Rosate, whom Vertot quotes. It is easier to believe that the pontiff was deceived by the artifices, or intimidated by the threats, of the French tyrant. Only one romance, Les Enfances d'Ogrir le Danois, written probably to gratify Philip, attributes an infamous character to the Templars. Guyot de Provins, in his satyr, speaks ill of all the religious orders but the Templars," of whom he says, Molt sont prud'hommes li Templiers. The proverb, "boire comme un Templier," is modern, and was first used by Rabelais. William of Tyre, and generally all the secular clergy, were prejudiced against the 1 Hist. des Templiers, ii, 250. 2 Tristan, vi. 452. Templars on account of their immunities. The Emperor Frederic II. carried his hatred of the Templars so far as to destroy a hospital built with the alms of the faithful at Caroleï, because it was governed by knight Templars; and with the materials he built a palace at Nocera, where it was said he introduced Mussulmen, after driving out the Christians. To suspect the entire innocence of the order is no novelty a vast number of historians were quick in remarking that all their enemies seemed to be visited with special judgment, Philip-le-bel, Pope Clement (whose deaths fulfilled the awful prediction of the grand master), Nogaret, Marigny, Pierre Flotte the governor of Cyprus, Burchard the Archbishop of Magdebourg, who first proceeded against them in Saxony, Albert of Austria, Hugues Giraldi, Bishop of Cahors, the pope's chaplain, who took an active part in the affair, Edward II. King of England; and they remarked also the accumulation of horrors which visited almost every part of Europe after the execution of Molai. Dante alludes to this tragedy: Lo! the new Pilate, of whose cruelty Nevertheless some learned men among the moderns have been inclined to doubt the innocence of the order. The late learned Bishop Milner says, in his History of Winchester,5 "It is possible that the sensual poison of Manes, which spread itself from Persia into Bulgaria, and thence into the country of the Albigenses and others, might have crept into some at least of the preceptories of the Temple." However, a decided and very formidable adversary has arisen in the learned M. Hammer, whose most curious dissertation, entitled, Mysterium Baphometi revelatum,6 1 Hist. des Templiers, i. 61. 2 Scriptores Italici, tom. iii. col. 583. Hist. des Templiers, i. 3 Hist. des Templiers, ii. 361. 4 Purg. xx. 5 i. p. 277. 6 The whole theory of this learned man appears to me extremely visionary. The monuments to which he alludes bespeak more subtilty of invention than can be ascribed to the Templars. Possibly they might have adopted them from the Gnostics, but without know |