volume one

338 HiSTOET or the ceusades.
out : " I Jcnoio icliat I owe to Jesus Christ, and I swear to go
icherever he shall call me'"' Then the nobles and the people
who believed thev had been witnesses of a miracle, threw
themselves on their knees and returned thanks to God for
his blessings. Conrad received from the hands of the abbot
of Clairvaux the emblem of the Crusaders, together with a
flag which was placed upon the altar, and which Heaven
itself had blessed. A great number of barons and knights
assumed the cross in imitation of Conrad, and the diet which
had been assembled to deHberate upon the interests of the
empire, was occupied entirely with the safety of the Christian
colonies in Asia.
A new diet was convoked in Bavaria, where the letters of
St. Bernard determined a great number of bishops and German
nobles to take the cross. Ladislas, duke of Bohemia,
Odoacer, marquis of Svria, Bernard, count of Carinthia,
Amadeus, duke of Tiu-in, and the marquis de Montferrat
took the oath to go into the East to fight the Saracens.
Among the prelates who enrolled themselves under the banners
of the Cross, history names the bishop of Passau, the
bishop of Eatisbon, and the ^ise Otho of Frisingen, brother
of the emperor, to whom posterity owes a relation
principal events of this war.
of the
The most dear interests, the most tender affections had
no power to detain the knights and princes in their countries
and homes. Frederick, nephew of the emperor, who
had taken the cross, allowed himself not to be moved by the
teai's of his aged father, the duke of Suabia, who died Tvitli
grief, in spite of the consolations of St. Bernard. A warcrv
was heard from the Bhine to the Danube ; Germanv,
althoug:h so lon^ asdtated bv its o\nti troubles, found in all
parts warriors for the holy expedition. Men of all conditions
obeyed the voice of the preacher of the holy war, and
followed the example of kings and princes : a thing to be
wondered at, says Otho of Frisingen, thieves and robbers
were seen performing penance, and swearing to shed their
blood for Jesus Cluist. "Everv reasonable man," adds the
same historian, '•'
a witness of the changes that were operated
in them, plainly perceived the work of God, and was
not the less astonished at it."
The Germans were so easily persuaded, that they came