volume one

UlSTOKY OjT the CRUSADES. 247
and Jerusalem. A sliort time after their return to Le
Quercy, they both died in the same week, and were buried
in the same tomb. On their tomb may still be read an
epitaph which has transmitted to us the remembrance of
their exploits and of their touching affection. Graston de
Beam returned with them into Ein-ope but some years after,
;
having re-entered upon his estates, he again took up arms
against the infidels, and -died
Moors.
in Spain, fighting against the
Peter the Hermit, on his return to his country, concealed
himself from the eager ciu-iosity of the faithfid, and shut
himself up in a monastery he had founded at Huy.* He
lived there, in humility and penitence, and was buried among
the cenobites he had edified by his vii'tues. Eustace, the
brother of Godfrey and Baldwin, returned to take possession
of the moderate inheritance of the family, and gave no further
trouble to fame by his exploits. Alain Eergent, duke
of Brittany, and Eobert, coimt of Elanders, returned to their
states, repaired the evils caused by their absence, and died
regretted by their subjects.f
The duke of ISTormandy was less fortunate than his companions.
The sight of the holy places, or the long series of
labours and evils he had endured in the cause of religion,
had had no effect upon his indolent, undecided character.
On his return from the Holy Land, he passed through Italy,
where he fell in love with Sibylla, the daughter of the count
of Conversana, and allowed his passion to detain him from
* See the Life of Peter the Hermit, by le P. d'Oultremont. Peter
the Hermit was returning from the Holy Land in 1102, with a nobleman
of the country of Liege, named the count de Montaign, when he was
assailed by a violent tempest, during which he made a vow to build an
abbey. It was in performance of this vow that he founded the abhey
of Neufmontier at Huy, in Le Condrez, on the right bank of the
Meuse, in honour of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem. Alexander,
bishop of Liege, dedicated it in 1130. Peter died there at an advanced
age, and desired, from humility, to be buried outside the church. It was
not till a hundred and thirty years after his death that the abbot and
the chapter caused his relics to be removed to a coffin covered with marble
before the altar of the twelve apostles, in the year 1242, with a sufficiently
long epitaph, which M Morard, of the Academy of Sciences, read on
passing through Huy in 1761, which is reported in the 3rd vol. of the
MSS. of the Library of Lyon, by M. Delandine, p. 481.
f Robert, count of Flanders, was killed by a fall from his horse.