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DAVID HUME, ESQ.
THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND
page 4

Philip, who considered that place as his quarters, exclaimed against the insult, and ordered some of his troops to pull down the standard: but Richard informed him by a messenger, that though he himself would willingly remove that ground of offence, he would not permit it to be done by others; and if the French king attempted such an insult upon him, he should not succeed but by the utmost effusion of blood. Philip, First with this species of haughty submission, recalled his orders:(**)the difference was seemingly accommodated, but still left the remains of rancor and jealousy in the breasts of the two monarchs. Tancred, who for his own security desired to inflame their mutual hatred, employed an artifice which might have been attended with consequences still more fatal.

1191. He showed Richard a letter, signed by the French king, and delivered to him, as he pretended, by the duke of Burgundy; in which that monarch desired Tancred to fall upon the quarters of the English, and promised to assist him in putting them to the sword as common enemies. The unwary Richard gave credit to the information; but was too candid not to betray his disFirst to Philip, who absolutely denied the letter, and charged the Sicilian prince with forgery and falsehood. Richard either was, or pretended to be, entirely satisfied.(***)

[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 608.]
[** Hoveden, p. 674.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 688. Benedict. Abbas, p. 642, 643. Brompton, p. 1125]

Last these jealousies and complaints should multiply between them, it was proposed that they should, by a solemn treaty, obviate all future differences, and adjust every point that couid possibly hereafter become a controversy between them. But this expedient started a new dispute, which might have proved more dangerous than any of the foregoing, and which deeply concerned the honor of Philip's family. When Richard, in every treaty with the late king, insisted so strenuously on being allowed to marry Alice of France, he had only sought a pretence for quarrelling, and never meant to take to his bed a princess suspected of a criminal amour with his own father. After he became master, he no longer spake of that alliance: he even took measures for espousing Berengaria, daughter of Sanchez, king of Navarre, with whom he had become enamored during his abode in Guienne.(*) Queen Eleanor was daily expected with that princess at Messina;(**)and when Philip renewed to him his applications for espousing his sister Alice, Richard was obliged to give him an absolute refusal. It is pretended by Hoveden and other historians,(***) that he was able to produce such convincing proofs of Alice's infidelity, and even of her having borne a child to Henry, that her brother desisted from his applications, and chose to wrap up the dishonor of his family in silence and oblivion. It is certain, from the treaty itself which remains,(****) that, whatever were his motives, he permitted Richard to give his hand to Berengaria; and having settled all other controversies with that prince, he immediately set sail for the Holy Land. Richard awaited some time the arrival of his mother and bride, and when they joined him, he separated his fleet into two squadrons, and set forward on his enterprise. Queen Eleanor returned to England; but Berengaria, and the queen dowager of Sicily, his sister, attended him on the expedition.(*****)

[* Vinisauf, p. 316.]
[** M. Paris, p. 112. Trivet, p. 102. W. Heming. p. 519.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 688.]
[**** Bymer, vol. i. p. 69. Chron. Dunst. p. 44.]

The English fleet, on leaving the port of Messina, met with a furious tempest; and the squadron on which the two princesses were embarked was driven on the coast of Cyprus, and some of the vessels were wrecked near Limisso, in that island. Isaac, prince of Cyprus, who assumed the magnificent title of emperor, pillaged the ships that were stranded, brew the seamen and passengers into prison, and even refused to the princesses liberty, in their dangerous situation, of entering the harbor of Limisso. But Richard, who arrived soon after, took ample vengeance on him for the injury. He disembarked his troops; defeated the tyrant, who opposed his landing; entered Limisso by storm; gained next day a second victory; obliged Isaac to surrender at discretion; and established governors over the island. The Greek prince, being thrown into prison and loaded with irons, complained of the little regard with which he was treated; upon which Richard ordered silver fetters to be made for him; and this emperor, pleased with the distinction, expressed a sense of the generosity of his conqueror.(*) The king here espoused Berengaria, who, immediately embarking, carried along with her to Palestine the daughter of the Cypriot prince; a dangerous rival, who was believed to have seduced the affections of her husband. Such were the libertine character and conduct of the heroes engaged in this pious enterprise! The English army arrived in time to partake in the glory of the siege of Acre or Ptolemais, which had been attacked for above two years by the united force of all the Christians in Palestine, and had been defended by the utmost efforts of Saladin and the Saracens. The remains of the German army, conducted by the emperor Frederic, and the separate bodies of adventurers who continually poured in from the west, had enabled the king of Jerusalem to form this important enterprise;(**) but Saladin having thrown a strong garrison into the place under the command of Caracos, his own master in the art of war, and molesting the besiegers with continual attacks and sallies, had protracted the success of the enterprise, and wasted the force of his enemies.

[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 650 Ann. Waverl. p. 164.Vinisauf, p 328 W. Heming. p. 523.]
[** Vinisauf. p 269, 271, 279]

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