the other three put together. This terrible horde, consisting of about 200,000 wretches from France, England, Flanders, and Lorraine, had swept along through Germany, committing horrible ravages, especially against the Jews, whom they murdered without mercy in many of the towns through which they directed their route. Of the character of this savage multitude, and the views of those who led it, we know little, except that they declared their intention to be to rescue the Holy Sepulchre, and that they were accused of blasphemously worshipping a goat and a goose, which they carried with them, asserting that they were filled with the Divine Spirit. As the rabble advanced, the Hungarians gave themselves up for lost; the king and his nobles were preparing to fly; when the mass fell asunder of its own accord, and the panic-stricken fragments were hewn to pieces by the enraged people whose country they were invading. Some escaped to the north, and a few of the stragglers ultimately joined the succeeding bands of the Crusaders; but the vast majority perished.

Thus, within a few months, upwards of a quarter of a million of human beings had been swept out of existence. Of the 20,000 who had marched under Walter the Pennyless, the 40,000 who had followed under Peter the Hermit, the 15,000 Germans whom the priest Gottschalk had led, and the 200,000 savages who had composed the fourth and last division, making in all 275,000, certainly not 25,000 survived. And this quarter of a million of individuals had spent their lives without one important result having been accomplished, without one glorious feat having been achieved.

These multitudes, however, were the mere dregs and refuse of the age-poor wretches who had been hurried on by a kind of mania into the enterprise, without forethought or preparation of any sort, and whose main anxiety had been to be the first to reach the Holy Land. In the meantime the real chivalry of Europe was mustering for the Crusade; not mere fanatical masses under the influence of priests and unknown adventurers, but the gentry, yeomanry, and serfs of feudal Europe, under chiefs of the first rank and renown. These were the true Crusaders. Drawn together from all parts, from city and country, from the islands and coasts of northern Europe, as well as from France and Germany, they ranged themselves individually under the banners of the particular chief whom they preferred, or whom they considered themselves feudally bound to follow. Altogether they formed six armies, marching separately, and at considerable intervals of time. First came the army of Godfrey of Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine, the pride of his age for all noble and knightly virtues; immortalised by the poet Tasso, and in speaking of whom even the chroniclers become poetical. He had risen from a sickbed to join the Crusade, had sold his lordship to raise the necessary money; and the fame of his character had assembled many

of the best knights of the age around his standard, exclusive of his brother Baldwin, and many other relations. In the month of August 1096 he commenced his march at the head of a great army. Not long after his departure, there set out, by a different route, the second army of Crusaders under Hugh the Great, Count of Vermandois, brother of Philip I., king of France—a brave and accomplished leader, inferior, however, to Godfrey of Bouillon in piety and those peculiar qualities summed up by the old romancists in the word "gentle." After Hugh of Vermandois, and probably acknowledging him as their feudal chief, came the potent French baron, Stephen, Count of Blois, a shrewd and sagacious, commander; and the boisterous and good-tempered, but weak and irresolute, Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, the son of William the Conqueror, and brother of William Rufus, king of England, to whom he had mortgaged his duchy in order to raise money for the Crusade. Under the duke's banners were ranged most of the Norman and English Crusaders, among whom were Stephen, Earl of Albemarle, and Odo of Bayeux, Earl of Kent. Next followed Count Robert of Flanders, who also, though marching at the head of a separate army, acknowledged the brother of the French king as his chief. The fifth band of Crusaders consisted of 10,000 horse and an immense multitude of foot, who marched from Italy under the command of Bohemond, Prince of Tarentum, the son of the famous Guiscard. Bohemond was able, ambitious, enterprising, and, withal, wary and crafty— the Ulysses of the Crusade. With him, and second in command in the army, came Tancred, the favourite hero of all the historians of the Crusade-so young, so valiant, so enthusiastic, so modest. "There was not among them all," says Tasso, “a greater warrior, nor any one of more courteous behaviour or finer countenance, or of loftier and more intrepid heart: if any shadow of a fault dimmed the lustre of his fame, it was only his folly in love." The sixth and last crusading army consisted of the flower of the gay chivalry of Provence, Gascony, and Auvergne, led by the haughty and resolute Count Raimond of Toulouse.

To detail the progress of the various armies on their way to Constantinople is unnecessary. Suffice it to say, that, pursuing the route through Hungary and Bulgaria, Godfrey of Bouillon and his army reached Philippopoli, a city in the Greek emperor's dominions, where they were holding their quarters, when they heard that Hugh of Vermandois, who, preceding the main body of his army, had set sail from an Italian port, and landed with a small train at Durazzo, also in the Greek emperor's dominions, had been arrested by the emperor's orders, and carried a prisoner to Constantinople. This insult offered by Alexius to so prominent a chief of the Crusaders requires some explanation. The Greek emperor, it may be remembered, had been so anxious to receive assistance from the Latin powers against the Turks, that he had sent ambassadors to the Council of Placentia to

solicit it. He had not calculated, however, on such assistance as was now offered. Here was army after army mustering in the west of Europe, all proposing to march through Thrace. Unless something could be done to stop their progress, the corn-fields of his country would be trampled under foot, his subjects impoverished by having to supply food to hordes of strangers, and his capital, Constantinople, itself would become a mere porch for the Latins into Asia Minor. Scarcely knowing what to do, Alexius conceived the project of demanding the feudal homage of the chiefs of the Crusade, as a condition of permitting them to pass through his dominions. It was with this view, apparently, that he had given orders for the arrest of Hugh of Vermandois, arguing that, if he could prevail on the brother of the French king to yield him homage, the other Crusading chiefs would have less scruple in doing so. Godfrey of Bouillon, however, on hearing of the apprehension of his fellow-Crusader, hurried on through the Greek territory to Constantinople. For six days he ravaged the country round the capital, till at length the emperor was obliged to yield. Hugh of Vermandois was released, and the Latin armies were received with respect and kindness. The aim of Alexius was now to persuade Godfrey to yield him that homage voluntarily which he could not exact from him. With Hugh of Vermandois he had experienced little difficulty; but for a long time Godfrey of Bouillon peremptorily refused to accede to the proposal. At length, however-convinced, probably, that to continue obstinate would be to delay the progress of the Crusade on account of a mere punctilio-he gave his consent, and a meeting took place, where Godfrey declared himself the liegeman of Alexius, and engaged to restore to him whatever Greek places he should recapture from the Turks; while in return, the emperor, by a curious ceremony of honour, adopted Godfrey as his son. Thus an alliance was formally concluded between the Crusaders and the Greek emperor; and after several days spent in feasting and relaxation at Constantinople, the Latin armies crossed the Hellespont, and encamped at Chalcedon, where they waited for the arrival of the other Crusading troops.

By pursuing the same policy as he had adopted in the case of Hugh of Vermandois and Godfrey of Bouillon-that is, by harassing the armies as they marched through his dominions, at the same time corresponding with their leaders-the Greek emperor obtained an acknowledgment of feudal allegiance from the other commanders as they successively came up. Tancred and Count Raimond of Toulouse were the only leaders who escaped without having come under the obligation. Raimond was so resolute in his opposition, that Alexius was glad to accept from him a mere oath of friendship: Tancred crossed the Hellespont before the emperor was aware of his intentions, and thus eluded a submission which was repugnant to his chivalrous soul. Alexius, seeing that the Crusades were inevitable, and that he would be obliged

to perform a part in them, consoled himself by thinking that he had at least established a nominal influence over the crusading chiefs before sending them into Asia; and that, while they bore all the toil and hardships of the enterprise, fighting their way through the Turks to the Holy Land, he, remaining safe in his own capital, would be able, by his skill and prudence, to reap for himself and his subjects all the advantages resulting from the victories of the Latin armies, or even from their disasters.

And now the Crusade was fairly on foot. Upwards of 600,000 warriors of the west, besides a multitude of priests, women, and children, were actually encamped on the Asiatic soil. It was literally a moving nation, in which all languages were spoken, and all costumes worn. There was the fair-haired son of the north, with_broad open forehead, mild blue eyes, sanguine complexion, and large frame; there the dark-visaged southern, with his flashing glance and fiery soul; there was the knight in his armour, the priest in his robes, the foot soldier in his tough jerkin, the unkempt serf with his belt of rope. There were pawing horses, swearing grooms, carts full of provision sacks, groups of gossipping women, and crowds of merry children. Under the bright sun of Asia all was gaudy and brilliant. Spear points glittered; breastplates and helmets gleamed; thousands of targes displayed their painted glories; pennons of blue, purple, and white streamed from every tent, while heavier flags flapped their sullen folds; and everywhere, on shield, flag, helmet, tunic, and coat of mail, was seen blazoned the holy sign of the red cross. Walking through all these, threading his way through groups of soldiers and crowds of playing children, heedless of the looks cast upon him, and hearing not the oft-repeated bugle-blasts from all parts of the camp, might be seen a man of small stature, thin, emaciated, and coarsely clad, with downcast face, wild, unsettled eye, and timid nervous gait. It was the man who had created it allPeter the Hermit. He had crossed from Constantinople with Godfrey of Bouillon; and now, walking once more on the Asiatic soil, over the bones of those whom he had already led to perish there, he could look around and see in the hundreds of thousands of human beings who surrounded him the creatures and implements of his own enthusiasm, the monster-result of that grief and rage of soul which had filled him as, but a few short months before, he found himself creeping along, a solitary and derided pilgrim, in the streets of Jerusalem. His revenge was near! He, a poor and feeble monk, was about to hurl such a thunderbolt against the power of the Moslem as no potentate on earth had ever handled; these myriads of enthusiasts whom he had brought from their homes he would dash against the walls of Jerusalem; and every groan of his own spirit under Turkish insult would be repaid by the dying shrieks of a hundred infidels— every Turkish laugh at the expense of his religion by a huzza from the Christian armies. On-on, then, to the Holy City!

Alas! the Holy City was yet far distant. Not much more than half their journey, in point of space, had been accomplished, and, in point of peril and difficulty, their march had little more than begun; for they had just entered on the countries inhabited by the infidel. Months had to roll over, and many a bloody field had to be fought, ere the pinnacles of the Holy City should greet their longing eyes.

The route of the crusading armies lay in a south-easterly direction through Asia Minor, and then southward to Jerusalem, along the shores of the Levant. Their march along this route-counting from the time of their crossing from Constantinople into Asia Minor (May 1097), to the time when they came in sight of Jerusalem and laid siege to it (June 1099)-occupied upwards of two years; including of course their various halts and encampments, and the time spent in fighting battles and besieging towns on the way. We must leave it to the imagination of our readers to conceive all the toils and distresses to which the Crusaders were subject in this two years' march through the countries of the Mussulman. Two actions only deserve particular notice—the siege of Nice, and that of Antioch.

The siege of Nice, the capital of the provinces of Bithynia and of the Turkish kingdom of Roum, was the first exploit in which the crusading armies were engaged. The siege began on the 8th of May 1097, and terminated on the 24th of June. During these six weeks the slaughter of the Christians by the arrows of the Turkish garrison, and the bolts and large stones which they discharged from mangonels and catapults, was immense. Nothing was to be seen on the highways, in the woods and the fields," says an eye-witness, "but a crowd of tombs, where our brethren lay buried." The city surrendered at last; not, however, to the Latin chiefs, but to an envoy whom the Greek emperor, Álexius, maintained in the crusading camp, and who contrived to enter into communication with the besieged, and induce them to capitulate. Angry and dissatisfied at this conduct of Alexius, the Crusaders left their encampment under the walls of Nice, and resumed their march, not in one mass, but in various bodies—the armies of Soliman or Kilidge Arslan, the sultan of Roum, hovering on their track. A terrible battle took place at Doryleum between Soliman's forces and those of Bohemond and Tancred, assisted at the close by Godfrey of Bouillon; and the Christians gained a great victory. The march was then continued through Phrygia and Lycaonia. On and still on they toiled, their numbers diminishing every day-thinned by famine, thirst, fatigue, disease, and the attacks of the Turks. Variety and adventure, even pleasure and enjoyment, were not, however, wanting. Deviating from the main line of march, the various chiefs led their forces hither and thither in quest of plunder and fame. One of them, Baldwin, the brother of Godfrey, even crossed the Euphrates, and pushed into Mesopotamia, where he obtained the