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M.Besant E.Walter
Jerusalem, the city of Herod and Saladin
page 458
monasteries which the Mohammedans had destroyed. The Crusaders climbed the hill in the face of the enemy's arrows and stones, and would have carried the fortress easily by assault but for one of those panics which were always seizing the Christians at this period. They all turned and fled down the slope of the hill in the wildest confusion. On their return to camp the chiefs accused each other : the soldiers talked of treachery, and the patriarch refused any more to bring out the wood of the Cross—for this imposture had been started again. To revive the spirits of the' army, Andrew ordered a march into Phoenicia. The time was winter: cold, hail, and rain killed the troops : on Christmas Eve a furious tempest destroyed their camp and killed their horses. Dejected and discouraged, the Christians returned to Acre. Famine began again, and it was resolved to separate into four camps. John de Brienne, King of Jerusalem, with the Duke of Austria, commanded the first, which lay in the plains of Caesarea : the kings of Hungary and Cyprus the second, which was stationed at Tripoli : the Master of the Templars the third, at the foot of Mount Carmel : the fourth remained at Acre. The King of Cyprus died, and the King of Hungary went home again. He had got possession of the head of St. Peter, the right hand of St. Thomas, and one of the seven vessels in which the water had been turned into wine. His anxiety to put these treasures in a place of safety was the
chief cause that led him to forsake the Crusade.
After his departure the Crusaders changed all their plans, and—it is very curious to observe how persistently they avoided Jerusalem, the pretended object of their aims—embarked at Acre for the siege of Damietta, which they took after nearly two years of fighting. This taken, they advanced on Cairo: on the way, for we have no space to follow all their misfortunes, the Nile overflowed, they were cut off from all hope of succour, assailed on every side by the
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