volume one

HISTOST OF TKE CEUSADES.
'
491
"Whilst the Christian armj Avas in this dissatisfied state,
the marquis of Tyre, who had been ill-treated by Eichard,
courted the alliance of the sultan, and promised to restore
Ptolemais to him, if the Mussubnans would agree to protect
him against his enemies. The king of England, warned of
this perfidious negotiation, became only anxious to defeat
the projects of Com-ad, and himself made propositions to
Saladin. He renewed the promise he had made to Malek-
Adel to return into Europe if Jerusalem and the wood of the
true cross were restored to the Christians. " Jerusalem,"
replied Saladin, '" never belonged to you ; we cannot without
a crime abandon it to you, for in it were accomplished the
mysteries of our religion," As to the wood of the true cross,
Saladin considered it as an obiect of scandal, as an insult to
divinity. He had refused to give it up to the king of
Georgia or the emperor of Constantinople, both of whom had
offered him considerable sums for it. " All the advantages'
to be procured by peace," said he, " cannot bring me to
restore this disgracel'ul monument of their idolatrj^ to the
Christians."
Eichard, who really considered the restitution of the true
cross of very little importance, did not reiterate his demand ;
but as he was desirous of peace, he made other proposals, in
which he adroitly interested the ambition of Malek-Adel, the
brother of the sultan. The widow of AVilliam of Sicily, the
sister of Richard, was offered in marriage to the Mussulman
prince ; under the auspices of Saladin and Eichard, they
mio-ht reign together over Mussulmans and Christians, and
govern the kingdom of Jerusalem. The historian Omad was
charged by Malek-Adel with the task of communicating this
proposition to Saladin, who appeared to adopt it without
repugnance.* The project of this singular union created
great surprise among the imauns and doctors of the law ; and
* This negotiation is related by the principal Arabian historians, Bohaeddin
and the author of the Phatah. Although Christian writers have
not spoken of it, it would be diffic;ult to cast doubt upon, or weaken the
evidence of Arabian authors, w^ho were ocular witnesses, and were themselves
mixed up with the affair. It is this negotiation that gave Madame
Cottin the idea of her romance of Mathilda, or the Crusades; a work
full of eloquent pictures and heroic sentiments, drawn from the history
of chivalry.