volume one

HISTORY or THE CRUSADES. 201
"want of provisions ; but the route to Jerusalem was mueli
more easy tliaii that to Alexandria or Cairo. The Crusaders
coidd pursue no wiser plan than to continue their march,
and prosecute the enterprise they had begun, leaving it to
Providence to provide for their wants, and protect them
from thirst and famine."
This latter opinion was adopted, and the army received
the signal for departure. The cities which lay in the route
of the Crusaders were all abandoned by the infidels. The
greater part of the pilgrims endeavoured to get in advance
of each other, that they miglit be the first to obtain possession
of the places and castles that were thus left without
inhabitants. The Crusaders, says Eaymond d'Agiles, had
agreed among themselves, that when one of the leaders had
planted his standard upon a city, or had placed any mark
whatever on the door of a house, he should become the
legitimate possessor of it. This imprudent agreement had
given birth to ambition and covetousness in the soldiers as
well as the barons. Many, in the hope of obtaining rich
possessions, abandoned their colours, wandered about the
country, and spread themselves even as far as the banks of
the Jordan. In the mean time, those to whom, according
to the expression of the historians, nothing ivas more dear
than the commandments of God, advanced, barefooted, under
the standard of the cross, lamenting the error of their bre-
thren. When they arrived at Emmaus, a considerable city
in the times of the Maccabees, and which was then no more
than a large village, known under the name of jNTicopolis,
some Christians of Bethlehem came to implore their assistance.
Touched with their prayers, Tancred set out in the
middle of the night with a detachment of three hundred
men, and planted the flag of the Crusaders upon the walls of
the city, at the same hoar in which Christ was born and was
announced to the shepherds of Judea.
During this same night a phenomenon appeared in the
heaven, which powerfully affected the imagination of the
pilgrims. An eclipse of the moon produced all at once the
most profound darkness, and when she at length re-appeared
she was covered with a blood-red veil. Many of the Cru-
saders were seized with terror at this spectacle ; but tliose
who were acquainted with the march and movements of the