volume one

HISTOllY OF THE CRUSADES. 501
tcD. Gruy de Lusignan alone was not named in tlie treaty.
This prince enjoyed a momentary importance from tlie dissensions
he had given birth to, and sunk into oblivion as
soon as fresh subjects of discord arose among the Crusaders.
Despoiled of his kingdom, he obtained that of Cyprus, a far
more real possession, but for which he was obliged to pay
the Templars, to whom Eichard had sold it. Palestine was
ceded to Henry, count of Champagne, the new husband of
that Isabella who appeared to be promised to all the pretenders
to the crown of Jerusalem, and who, by a singular
destiny, had married three kings, without being able to
ascend a throne.
The conclusion of the peace was celebrated by tournaments
and festivities, inwhicli the Mussulmans and Christians
laid aside the fanaticism and hatred which had led them to
shed so much blood. Most of the warriors of the West, by
the invitation of Saladin, visited the holy places they had been
unable to deliver, and then embarked for Europe. At the
moment of departure, the French lost the duke of Burgundy,
who fell sick and died in the city of Tyre, as he was preparing
to leave Palestine.
Thus. finished this third crusade, in which all the western
powers in arms obtained no greater advantages than the
taking of Ptolemais and the demolition of Ascalon ; in it
Germany lost, without glory, one of the greatest of its
emperors and the finest of its armies. If we may believe
Arabian authors, six hundred thousand Crusaders appeared
before Ptolemais, and scarcely one hundred thousand of
these warriors saw their native country again. Europe had
the greater reason to deplore the losses of this war, from the
fact of her armies having been so much better composed than
in preceding expeditions ; criminals, adventurers, and vagabonds,
had been strictly excluded from the ranks. All that
the West could boast of the most noble and illustrious of its
warriors had taken up arms.
The Crusaders that contended mth Saladin were better
armed and better disciplined than any that preceded them in
Palestine ; the foot-soldiers employed the cross-bow, which
had been neglected or prohibited in the second crusade.
* Gibbon says,— " A personal interview with Richard was declined by
Saladin, who alleged their mutual ignorance of each other's language."
Vol. viii. p. 429. —Trans.
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