Walter Besant

“ Let us, at least, award them the meed of praise for a courage which has never been equalled. Let us acknowledge that, in all the history of the world, if there has been no siege more bloody and tragic, so there has been no city more fiercely contested, more obstinately defended; and though we may believe that the fall of Jerusalem had been distinctly prophesied by our Lord, we must not therefore look on the Jews as the blind and fated victims of prophecy. ”

“ It appears to us that Christianity might have had a chance in the East against Islam but for the Christians; and had men like Saladin been able to comprehend what was the religion which, like an ancient painting begrimed and overladen with dirt and dust, lay under all the vices and basenesses of the Christianity they witnessed, the world would at least have been spared some of the bitterness of its religious wars. ”

“ Nothing could be more out of harmony with all sacred associations than the interior appearance of modern Jerusalem. True, there is something picturesque and romantic about the narrow streets, the quaint old archways, and the ruins upon which you stumble at every turn; but the ruins are those of Saladin’s city not of Herod’s, while the Jerusalem of David and of Solomon lies crushed and buried twenty fathoms under ground. ”

“ Titus took Jerusalem, Barcochebas took it, Julius Severus took it, Chosroes, Heraclius, Omar, the Charezmians, Godfrey, Saladin, Frederick, all took it by turns,—all after hard fighting, and with much slaughter.
There is not a stone in the city but has been reddened with human blood; not a spot but where some hand-to-hand conflict has taken place; not an old wall but has echoed back the shrieks of despairing women. Jew, Pagan, Christian, Mohammedan, each has had his turn of triumph, occupation, and defeat ”

“ Jerusalem was fallen, and the kingdom of the Christians was at last at an end. It had lasted eighty-eight years. It had seen the exploits of six valiant, prudent, and chivalrous kings. It was supported during all its existence solely by the strength and ability of its kings; it fell to pieces at once when its king, a poor leper, lost his authority with his strength. Always corrupt, always self-seeking, the Christians of the East became a by-word and proverb at last for treachery, meanness, and cowardice. It was time that a realm so degraded from its high and lofty aims should perish ”

“ But the Mohammedans were divided amongst themselves, and the Sultan of Cairo offered the Kharezmians Palestine for their own, if they would conquer it. They accepted the offer with joy, and marched twenty thousand strong upon Jerusalem. All the people in the city abandoned it hastily, except the helpless poor and infirm. These the Kharezmians found in their beds, and after killing them, thirsting for more blood, they inveigled back the Christians by hoisting the flags of the Cross. The flying Christians, looking round from time to time, caught sight at last of the banner of victory. ”

“ The Crusaders had embarked upon an enterprise which rested on religious enthusiasm. Religion was the salt of the kingdom which they founded. While this lasted—it lasted till the reign of Baldwin the Third—there was hope. When this died—it died in the reign of Amaury—the kingdom was lost. Every baron and every soldier was in a sense a special soldier of Christ, a kind of lay priest of the altar. He had ever before his eyes those sacred places at sight of which his fathers had wept aloud. But the handling of sacred things is profitable only so long as the heart is open to their influences. ”

“ With the last of these three great armies died away the crusading spirit proper—that which Peter the Hermit had aroused. There could be no more any such universal enthusiasm. Once and only once again would all Europe thrill with rage and indignation. It had burned to wrest the city from the infidels; it was to burn once more, but this time with a feebler flame, and ineffectually, to wrest it a second time, when the frail and turbulent kingdom of Jerusalem should be at an end. ”

“ These fled to a fortress by the sea-shore. The bones of their comrades, whitened by the eastern sun, long stood as a monument of the disaster, pointing skeleton fingers on the road to Jerusalem—the road of death and defeat.
Only three thousand, out of all these hordes, certainly a quarter of a million in number, which flocked after Peter on his mule! We can hardly believe that all were killed. Some of the women and children at least might be spared, and without doubt their blood yet flows in the veins of many Hungarian and Bulgarian families. ”

“ Turning to look eastward, a scene no less grand and novel presents itself; before you, a little to the right, the mountains of Moab rise up high above the azure waters of the Dead Sea; the broad deep valley of the Jordan comes in from the left, the course of the stream just discernible by the thin fringe of verdure which lines its banks; while the blank dreary desert stretches almost to your very feet, making even the desolate hills of Jerusalem look green and fertile by the contrast. ”

“ There were no bounds to the cries and lamentations of these delicate women; the camp re-echoed with their groans; one had seen her husband perish, one had been left behind by hers. Some were beheaded after serving to gratify the lust of the Turks; some whose beauty had struck their eyes were reserved for a wretched captivity. After having taken so many women in the tents of the Christians, the Turks set off in pursuit of the foot-soldiers, the knights, the priests, and the monks; they struck them with the sword as a reaper cuts the wheat with his sickle ”

“ The Nile ceased for a time to overflow, and a fearful famine, a famine of which the records speak as dreadful beyond all comparison, set in; during this men kept themselves alive by eating the flesh of those who died, while the cities were filled with corpses, and the river bore down on its tide dead bodies as numerous as the lilies which bloom on its surface in spring. And before the famine, which extended over Syria as well, had ceased, an earthquake shook the country from end to end. Damascus, Tyre, Nablous, were heaps of ruins; the walls of Acre and Tripoli fell down ”

“ All day long the attack was carried on, but to little effect, and at nightfall, when the Crusaders returned to their camp, the tower of Raymond was in ruins; those of Tancred and Godfrey were so damaged that they could not be moved; and the princes were seen beating their hands in despair, and crying that God had abandoned them. “Miserable men that we are!” cried Robert of Normandy; “God judges us unworthy to enter into the Holy City, and worship at the tomb of His Son.” ”

“ There is no god but God alone; He hath no partner; His is the kingdom, and His the praise; He giveth life and death, for He is Almighty. Verily, God and His angels pray for the Prophet. Oh ye who believe, pray for him, and salute him with salutations of peace. Oh! ye who have received the Scriptures, exceed not the bounds in your religion, and speak not aught but truth concerning God. Verily, Jesus Christ, the son of Mary, is the Apostle of God, and His word which He cast over Mary, and a spirit from Him. Then believe in God and His apostles, and do not say there are three gods ”

“ One feels pity for Amaury, more than for any other of the Kings of Jerusalem. He was, at the same time, so long-headed and so unlucky; so capable, yet so unsuccessful; so patient under all his disasters; so active in spite of his corpulence; so careful of the kingdom, yet so unpopular; so harassed with doubts, yet so loyal to his oaths; and so hopeful in spite of all his disappointments, that one cannot help admiring and sympathising with him. He committed the 328most gross act of perjury in invading Egypt on pretence of Shawer’s disloyalty. ”

“ The heads of the people began the war with gloomy forebodings; the common masses with the wildest enthusiasm, which became the mere intoxication of success when they drove back Cestius from the walls of the city, on the very eve of his anticipated victory—for Cestius hastened southwards with an army of twenty thousand men, and besieged the city. The people, divided amongst themselves, were on the point of opening the gates to the Romans, when, to the surprise of everybody, Cestius suddenly broke up his camp and began to retreat. ”

“ In the north Simeon Stylites and his followers perched themselves on pillars, and soothed their sufferings with the adorations of those who came to look at them. In Palestine were hundreds of monasteries, while in every cave was a hermit, on every mountain-side the desolate dwelling of some recluse, and the air was heavy with the groans of those who tortured the flesh in order to save the soul. Moreover, the country was a great storehouse of relics. To manufacture them, or rather to find them, was a labour of love and of profit for the people. ”

“ Raymond alone managed to save the lives of those who capitulated to him from the tower of David. It took a week to kill the Saracens, and to take away their dead bodies. Every Crusader had a right to the first house he took possession of, and the city found itself absolutely cleared of its old inhabitants, and in the hands of a new population. The true Cross, which had been hidden by the Christians during the siege, was brought forth again, and carried in joyful procession round the city, and for ten days the soldiers gave themselves up to murder, plunder—and prayers! ”

“ Tancred, the bravest, if not the best, of all, was to follow within a very few years, and Baldwin found himself for the last six years of his reign without a single one of the old princes, except his cousin, Baldwin du Bourg, to quarrel with, to help, or to look to for help. And, still more to complicate matters, the crusade, which the ambition of Bohemond had directed against the Greek Empire for his own purposes, had alienated the sympathies, such as they were, and the assistance of the Greek Empire, and deprived the Christian Kingdom of every hope from that quarter. ”

“ About Easter time the city begins to swarm with Russian pilgrims. These are, perhaps, the only real religious enthusiasts among the crowds who annually come to worship at the Holy City, and no one who has seen the reverence with which they look upon everything in the place—even to the drunken monk who admits them into the church—or the genuine emotion and awe which they display when kneeling before the site of some absurd tradition, can doubt for one moment of their sincerity. ”

“ Whole villages came en masse, accompanied by their priests, bringing with them their children, their cattle, their stores of provision, their household utensils, their all; while the poorest came with nothing at all, trusting that miracles, similar to those which protected the Israelites in the Desert, would protect them also—that manna would drop from heaven, and the rocks would open to supply them with water. And such was their ignorance, that as the walls of town after town became visible on their march, they pressed forward, eagerly demanding if that was Jerusalem. ”

“ Many a weary mile must they tramp along in their native land, many an unheard of hardship must they encounter before they can toil up the sides of Mount Sinai, or reach the foot of Calvary; and yet they never seem to grow sick or faint-hearted, but plod on with a marvellous steadiness of purpose, and whenever you meet a Russian pilgrim, whether it be in the midst of the scorching desert or by the shady banks of Jordan, he will greet you with a respectful salutation and a bright contented face. ”

“ Palestine, during some centuries, enjoyed a period of profound peace, during which the sword was sheathed, and no voice of war, save that of a foray of Arabs, was heard in the land. Thither retreated all those who, like Saint Jerome, were indisposed altogether to quit the world, like the hermits of Egypt, but yet sought to find some quiet spot where they could study and worship undisturbed. Thither came the monks turned out of Africa by Genseric; and when Belisarius in his turn overcame the barbarians, thither were brought back the spoils of the Temple which Titus had taken from Jerusalem. ”

“ For every one Crusader, in the later expeditions, who was moved by a spirit of piety, there might be found ninety-nine who took the Cross for love of fighting, for the sake of their seigneurs, for sheer desire of change, for a release from serfdom, for getting away from the burden of wife and family, for the chance of plunder and license, and for every other unworthy excuse. Thus it was that the religious wars fostered and promoted vice; and the failure of army after army was looked on as a clear manifestation of God’s wrath against the sins of the camp. ”

“ The ladder was of pure gold, to signify that pilgrims must have pure hearts, and the gate to which it led was Jerusalem, the gate of heaven. Rothard, whose light went out half way, who came down in despair, was an image of those pilgrims who take the Cross but come back again in despair; and he who saw the vision and went up with Godfrey typified those Crusaders, a faithful few, who endured unto the end.
Stories are told to illustrate the prowess of this great and strong man. ”

“ This picture is a melancholy one; much as one may wish that it could have been painted in brighter colours, it is best to present truthfully the impression which the modern city makes upon most travellers whose eyes are not blinded by the associations clinging to its soil. Filled with abuses, its sacred shrines defiled, and their worshippers exposed to constant danger and insult, Jerusalem is indeed “trodden down of the Gentiles until the time of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” ”

“ No refuge remains against the woes that overpower us.... How can ye close your eyes, children of Islam, in the midst of troubles which would rouse the deepest sleeper? Will the chiefs of the Arabs resign themselves to such evils? and will the warriors of Persia submit to such disgrace? Would to God, since they will not fight for their religion, that they would fight for the safety of their neighbours! And if they give up the rewards of heaven, will they not be induced to fight by the hope of booty? ”