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Chapter LII: More Conquests By The Arabs. -- Part II.

Constantinople and the Greek fire might exclude the Arabs from the
eastern entrance of Europe; but in the West, on the side of the
Pyrenees, the provinces of Gaul were threatened and invaded by the
conquerors of Spain.  The decline of the French monarchy invited the
attack of these insatiate fanatics. The descendants of Clovis had lost
the inheritance of his martial and ferocious spirit; and their
misfortune or demerit has affixed the epithet of lazyto the last kings
of the Merovingian race.  They ascended the throne without power, and
sunk into the grave without a name. A country palace, in the
neighborhood of Compiegne  was allotted for their residence or prison:
but each year, in the month of March or May, they were conducted in a
wagon drawn by oxen to the assembly of the Franks, to give audience to
foreign ambassadors, and to ratify the acts of the mayor of the palace.
That domestic officer was become the minister of the nation and the
master of the prince. A public employment was converted into the
patrimony of a private family: the elder Pepin left a king of mature
years under the guardianship of his own widow and her child; and these
feeble regents were forcibly dispossessed by the most active of his
bastards. A government, half savage and half corrupt, was almost
dissolved; and the tributary dukes, and provincial counts, and the
territorial lords, were tempted to despise the weakness of the monarch,
and to imitate the ambition of the mayor. Among these independent
chiefs, one of the boldest and most successful was Eudes, duke of
Aquitain, who in the southern provinces of Gaul usurped the authority,
and even the title of king. The Goths, the Gascons, and the Franks,
assembled under the standard of this Christian hero: he repelled the
first invasion of the Saracens; and Zama, lieutenant of the caliph, lost
his army and his life under the walls of Thoulouse. The ambition of his
successors was stimulated by revenge; they repassed the Pyrenees with
the means and the resolution of conquest. The advantageous situation
which had recommended Narbonne  as the first Roman colony, was again
chosen by the Moslems: they claimed the province of Septimania or
Languedoc as a just dependence of the Spanish monarchy: the vineyards of
Gascony and the city of Bourdeaux were possessed by the sovereign of
Damascus and Samarcand; and the south of France, from the mouth of the
Garonne to that of the Rhone, assumed the manners and religion of
Arabia.

But these narrow limits were scorned by the spirit of Abdalraman, or
Abderame, who had been restored by the caliph Hashem to the wishes of
the soldiers and people of Spain. That veteran and daring commander
adjudged to the obedience of the prophet whatever yet remained of France
or of Europe; and prepared to execute the sentence, at the head of a
formidable host, in the full confidence of surmounting all opposition
either of nature or of man. His first care was to suppress a domestic
rebel, who commanded the most important passes of the Pyrenees: Manuza,
a Moorish chief, had accepted the alliance of the duke of Aquitain; and
Eudes, from a motive of private or public interest, devoted his
beauteous daughter to the embraces of the African misbeliever. But the
strongest fortresses of Cerdagne were invested by a superior force; the
rebel was overtaken and slain in the mountains; and his widow was sent a
captive to Damascus, to gratify the desires, or more probably the
vanity, of the commander of the faithful. From the Pyrenees, Abderame
proceeded without delay to the passage of the Rhone and the siege of
Arles. An army of Christians attempted the relief of the city: the tombs
of their leaders were yet visible in the thirteenth century; and many
thousands of their dead bodies were carried down the rapid stream into
the Mediterranean Sea. The arms of Abderame were not less successful on
the side of the ocean. He passed without opposition the Garonne and
Dordogne, which unite their waters in the Gulf of Bourdeaux; but he
found, beyond those rivers, the camp of the intrepid Eudes, who had
formed a second army and sustained a second defeat, so fatal to the
Christians, that, according to their sad confession, God alone could
reckon the number of the slain. The victorious Saracen overran the
provinces of Aquitain, whose Gallic names are disguised, rather than
lost, in the modern appellations of Perigord, Saintonge, and Poitou: his
standards were planted on the walls, or at least before the gates, of
Tours and of Sens; and his detachments overspread the kingdom of
Burgundy as far as the well-known cities of Lyons and Besancon. The
memory of these devastations (for Abderame did not spare the country or
the people) was long preserved by tradition; and the invasion of France
by the Moors or Mahometans affords the groundwork of those fables, which
have been so wildly disfigured in the romances of chivalry, and so
elegantly adorned by the Italian muse. In the decline of society and
art, the deserted cities could supply a slender booty to the Saracens;
their richest spoil was found in the churches and monasteries, which
they stripped of their ornaments and delivered to the flames: and the
tutelar saints, both Hilary of Poitiers and Martin of Tours, forgot
their miraculous powers in the defence of their own sepulchres.  A
victorious line of march had been prolonged above a thousand miles from
the rock of Gibraltar to the banks of the Loire; the repetition of an
equal space would have carried the Saracens to the confines of Poland
and the Highlands of Scotland; the Rhine is not more impassable than the
Nile or Euphrates, and the Arabian fleet might have sailed without a
naval combat into the mouth of the Thames. Perhaps the interpretation of
the Koran would now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and her pulpits
might demonstrate to a circumcised people the sanctity and truth of the
revelation of Mahomet.

From such calamities was Christendom delivered by the genius and fortune
of one man. Charles, the illegitimate son of the elder Pepin, was
content with the titles of mayor or duke of the Franks; but he deserved
to become the father of a line of kings. In a laborious administration
of twenty-four years, he restored and supported the dignity of the
throne, and the rebels of Germany and Gaul were successively crushed by
the activity of a warrior, who, in the same campaign, could display his
banner on the Elbe, the Rhone, and the shores of the ocean. In the
public danger he was summoned by the voice of his country; and his
rival, the duke of Aquitain, was reduced to appear among the fugitives
and suppliants. "Alas!" exclaimed the Franks, "what a misfortune! what
an indignity! We have long heard of the name and conquests of the Arabs:
we were apprehensive of their attack from the East; they have now
conquered Spain, and invade our country on the side of the West. Yet
their numbers, and (since they have no buckler) their arms, are inferior
to our own." "If you follow my advice," replied the prudent mayor of the
palace, "you will not interrupt their march, nor precipitate your
attack. They are like a torrent, which it is dangerous to stem in its
career. The thirst of riches, and the consciousness of success, redouble
their valor, and valor is of more avail than arms or numbers. Be patient
till they have loaded themselves with the encumbrance of wealth. The
possession of wealth will divide their councils and assure your
victory." This subtile policy is perhaps a refinement of the Arabian
writers; and the situation of Charles will suggest a more narrow and
selfish motive of procrastination -- the secret desire of humbling the
pride and wasting the provinces of the rebel duke of Aquitain. It is yet
more probable, that the delays of Charles were inevitable and reluctant.
A standing army was unknown under the first and second race; more than
half the kingdom was now in the hands of the Saracens: according to
their respective situation, the Franks of Neustria and Austrasia were to
conscious or too careless of the impending danger; and the voluntary
aids of the Gepidæand Germans were separated by a long interval from the
standard of the Christian general. No sooner had he collected his
forces, than he sought and found the enemy in the centre of France,
between Tours and Poitiers. His well-conducted march was covered with a
range of hills, and Abderame appears to have been surprised by his
unexpected presence. The nations of Asia, Africa, and Europe, advanced
with equal ardor to an encounter which would change the history of the
world. In the six first days of desultory combat, the horsemen and
archers of the East maintained their advantage: but in the closer onset
of the seventh day, the Orientals were oppressed by the strength and
stature of the Germans, who, with stout hearts and ironhands,  asserted
the civil and religious freedom of their posterity. The epithet of
Martel, the Hammer, which has been added to the name of Charles, is
expressive of his weighty and irresistible strokes: the valor of Eudes
was excited by resentment and emulation; and their companions, in the
eye of history, are the true Peers and Paladins of French chivalry.
After a bloody field, in which Abderame was slain, the Saracens, in the
close of the evening, retired to their camp. In the disorder and despair
of the night, the various tribes of Yemen and Damascus, of Africa and
Spain, were provoked to turn their arms against each other: the remains
of their host were suddenly dissolved, and each emirconsulted his safety
by a hasty and separate retreat. At the dawn of the day, the stillness
of a hostile camp was suspected by the victorious Christians: on the
report of their spies, they ventured to explore the riches of the vacant
tents; but if we except some celebrated relics, a small portion of the
spoil was restored to the innocent and lawful owners. The joyful tidings
were soon diffused over the Catholic world, and the monks of Italy could
affirm and believe that three hundred and fifty, or three hundred and
seventy-five, thousand of the Mahometans had been crushed by the hammer
of Charles,  while no more than fifteen hundred Christians were slain in
the field of Tours. But this incredible tale is sufficiently disproved
by the caution of the French general, who apprehended the snares and
accidents of a pursuit, and dismissed his German allies to their native
forests. The inactivity of a conqueror betrays the loss of strength and
blood, and the most cruel execution is inflicted, not in the ranks of
battle, but on the backs of a flying enemy. Yet the victory of the
Franks was complete and final; Aquitain was recovered by the arms of
Eudes; the Arabs never resumed the conquest of Gaul, and they were soon
driven beyond the Pyrenees by Charles Martel and his valiant race.  It
might have been expected that the savior of Christendom would have been
canonized, or at least applauded, by the gratitude of the clergy, who
are indebted to his sword for their present existence. But in the public
distress, the mayor of the palace had been compelled to apply the
riches, or at least the revenues, of the bishops and abbots, to the
relief of the state and the reward of the soldiers. His merits were
forgotten, his sacrilege alone was remembered, and, in an epistle to a
Carlovingian prince, a Gallic synod presumes to declare that his
ancestor was damned; that on the opening of his tomb, the spectators
were affrighted by a smell of fire and the aspect of a horrid dragon;
and that a saint of the times was indulged with a pleasant vision of the
soul and body of Charles Martel, burning, to all eternity, in the abyss
of hell.

The loss of an army, or a province, in the Western world, was less
painful to the court of Damascus, than the rise and progress of a
domestic competitor. Except among the Syrians, the caliphs of the house
of Ommiyah had never been the objects of the public favor. The life of
Mahomet recorded their perseverance in idolatry and rebellion: their
conversion had been reluctant, their elevation irregular and factious,
and their throne was cemented with the most holy and noble blood of
Arabia. The best of their race, the pious Omar, was dissatisfied with
his own title: their personal virtues were insufficient to justify a
departure from the order of succession; and the eyes and wishes of the
faithful were turned towards the line of Hashem, and the kindred of the
apostle of God. Of these the Fatimites were either rash or
pusillanimous; but the descendants of Abbas cherished, with courage and
discretion, the hopes of their rising fortunes. From an obscure
residence in Syria, they secretly despatched their agents and
missionaries, who preached in the Eastern provinces their hereditary
indefeasible right; and Mohammed, the son of Ali, the son of Abdallah,
the son of Abbas, the uncle of the prophet, gave audience to the
deputies of Chorasan, and accepted their free gift of four hundred
thousand pieces of gold. After the death of Mohammed, the oath of
allegiance was administered in the name of his son Ibrahim to a numerous
band of votaries, who expected only a signal and a leader; and the
governor of Chorasan continued to deplore his fruitless admonitions and
the deadly slumber of the caliphs of Damascus, till he himself, with all
his adherents, was driven from the city and palace of Meru, by the
rebellious arms of Abu Moslem.  That maker of kings, the author, as he
is named, of the callof the Abbassides, was at length rewarded for his
presumption of merit with the usual gratitude of courts. A mean, perhaps
a foreign, extraction could not repress the aspiring energy of Abu
Moslem. Jealous of his wives, liberal of his wealth, prodigal of his own
blood and of that of others, he could boast with pleasure, and possibly
with truth, that he had destroyed six hundred thousand of his enemies;
and such was the intrepid gravity of his mind and countenance, that he
was never seen to smile except on a day of battle. In the visible
separation of parties, the greenwas consecrated to the Fatimites; the
Ommiades were distinguished by the white; and the black, as the most
adverse, was naturally adopted by the Abbassides. Their turbans and
garments were stained with that gloomy color: two black standards, on
pike staves nine cubits long, were borne aloft in the van of Abu Moslem;
and their allegorical names of the night and the shadow obscurely
represented the indissoluble union and perpetual succession of the line
of Hashem. From the Indus to the Euphrates, the East was convulsed by
the quarrel of the white and the black factions: the Abbassides were
most frequently victorious; but their public success was clouded by the
personal misfortune of their chief. The court of Damascus, awakening
from a long slumber, resolved to prevent the pilgrimage of Mecca, which
Ibrahim had undertaken with a splendid retinue, to recommend himself at
once to the favor of the prophet and of the people. A detachment of
cavalry intercepted his march and arrested his person; and the unhappy
Ibrahim, snatched away from the promise of untasted royalty, expired in
iron fetters in the dungeons of Haran. His two younger brothers, Saffah
* and Almansor, eluded the search of the tyrant, and lay concealed at
Cufa, till the zeal of the people and the approach of his Eastern
friends allowed them to expose their persons to the impatient public. On
Friday, in the dress of a caliph, in the colors of the sect, Saffah
proceeded with religious and military pomp to the mosch: ascending the
pulpit, he prayed and preached as the lawful successor of Mahomet; and
after his departure, his kinsmen bound a willing people by an oath of
fidelity. But it was on the banks of the Zab, and not in the mosch of
Cufa, that this important controversy was determined. Every advantage
appeared to be on the side of the white faction: the authority of
established government; an army of a hundred and twenty thousand
soldiers, against a sixth part of that number; and the presence and
merit of the caliph Mervan, the fourteenth and last of the house of
Ommiyah. Before his accession to the throne, he had deserved, by his
Georgian warfare, the honorable epithet of the ass of Mesopotamia;  and
he might have been ranked amongst the greatest princes, had not, says
Abulfeda, the eternal order decreed that moment for the ruin of his
family; a decree against which all human fortitude and prudence must
struggle in vain. The orders of Mervan were mistaken, or disobeyed: the
return of his horse, from which he had dismounted on a necessary
occasion, impressed the belief of his death; and the enthusiasm of the
black squadrons was ably conducted by Abdallah, the uncle of his
competitor. After an irretrievable defeat, the caliph escaped to Mosul;
but the colors of the Abbassides were displayed from the rampart; he
suddenly repassed the Tigris, cast a melancholy look on his palace of
Haran, crossed the Euphrates, abandoned the fortifications of Damascus,
and, without halting in Palestine, pitched his last and fatal camp at
Busir, on the banks of the Nile.  His speed was urged by the incessant
diligence of Abdallah, who in every step of the pursuit acquired
strength and reputation: the remains of the white faction were finally
vanquished in Egypt; and the lance, which terminated the life and
anxiety of Mervan, was not less welcome perhaps to the unfortunate than
to the victorious chief. The merciless inquisition of the conqueror
eradicated the most distant branches of the hostile race: their bones
were scattered, their memory was accursed, and the martyrdom of Hossein
was abundantly revenged on the posterity of his tyrants. Fourscore of
the Ommiades, who had yielded to the faith or clemency of their foes,
were invited to a banquet at Damascus. The laws of hospitality were
violated by a promiscuous massacre: the board was spread over their
fallen bodies; and the festivity of the guests was enlivened by the
music of their dying groans. By the event of the civil war, the dynasty
of the Abbassides was firmly established; but the Christians only could
triumph in the mutual hatred and common loss of the disciples of
Mahomet.

Yet the thousands who were swept away by the sword of war might have
been speedily retrieved in the succeeding generation, if the
consequences of the revolution had not tended to dissolve the power and
unity of the empire of the Saracens. In the proscription of the
Ommiades, a royal youth of the name of Abdalrahman alone escaped the
rage of his enemies, who hunted the wandering exile from the banks of
the Euphrates to the valleys of Mount Atlas. His presence in the
neighborhood of Spain revived the zeal of the white faction. The name
and cause of the Abbassides had been first vindicated by the Persians:
the West had been pure from civil arms; and the servants of the
abdicated family still held, by a precarious tenure, the inheritance of
their lands and the offices of government. Strongly prompted by
gratitude, indignation, and fear, they invited the grandson of the
caliph Hashem to ascend the throne of his ancestors; and, in his
desperate condition, the extremes of rashness and prudence were almost
the same. The acclamations of the people saluted his landing on the
coast of Andalusia: and, after a successful struggle, Abdalrahman
established the throne of Cordova, and was the father of the Ommiades of
Spain, who reigned above two hundred and fifty years from the Atlantic
to the Pyrenees.  He slew in battle a lieutenant of the Abbassides, who
had invaded his dominions with a fleet and army: the head of Ala, in
salt and camphire, was suspended by a daring messenger before the palace
of Mecca; and the caliph Almansor rejoiced in his safety, that he was
removed by seas and lands from such a formidable adversary. Their mutual
designs or declarations of offensive war evaporated without effect; but
instead of opening a door to the conquest of Europe, Spain was
dissevered from the trunk of the monarchy, engaged in perpetual
hostility with the East, and inclined to peace and friendship with the
Christian sovereigns of Constantinople and France. The example of the
Ommiades was imitated by the real or fictitious progeny of Ali, the
Edrissites of Mauritania, and the more powerful Fatimites of Africa and
Egypt. In the tenth century, the chair of Mahomet was disputed by three
caliphs or commanders of the faithful, who reigned at Bagdad, Cairoan,
and Cordova, excommunicating each other, and agreed only in a principle
of discord, that a sectary is more odious and criminal than an
unbeliever.

Mecca was the patrimony of the line of Hashem, yet the Abbassides were
never tempted to reside either in the birthplace or the city of the
prophet. Damascus was disgraced by the choice, and polluted with the
blood, of the Ommiades; and, after some hesitation, Almansor, the
brother and successor of Saffah, laid the foundations of Bagdad,  the
Imperial seat of his posterity during a reign of five hundred years.
The chosen spot is on the eastern bank of the Tigris, about fifteen
miles above the ruins of Modain: the double wall was of a circular form;
and such was the rapid increase of a capital, now dwindled to a
provincial town, that the funeral of a popular saint might be attended
by eight hundred thousand men and sixty thousand women of Bagdad and the
adjacent villages. In this city of peace,  amidst the riches of the
East, the Abbassides soon disdained the abstinence and frugality of the
first caliphs, and aspired to emulate the magnificence of the Persian
kings. After his wars and buildings, Almansor left behind him in gold
and silver about thirty millions sterling:  and this treasure was
exhausted in a few years by the vices or virtues of his children. His
son Mahadi, in a single pilgrimage to Mecca, expended six millions of
dinars of gold. A pious and charitable motive may sanctify the
foundation of cisterns and caravanseras, which he distributed along a
measured road of seven hundred miles; but his train of camels, laden
with snow, could serve only to astonish the natives of Arabia, and to
refresh the fruits and liquors of the royal banquet.  The courtiers
would surely praise the liberality of his grandson Almamon, who gave
away four fifths of the income of a province, a sum of two millions four
hundred thousand gold dinars, before he drew his foot from the stirrup.
At the nuptials of the same prince, a thousand pearls of the largest
size were showered on the head of the bride,  and a lottery of lands and
houses displayed the capricious bounty of fortune. The glories of the
court were brightened, rather than impaired, in the decline of the
empire, and a Greek ambassador might admire, or pity, the magnificence
of the feeble Moctader. "The caliph's whole army," says the historian
Abulfeda, "both horse and foot, was under arms, which together made a
body of one hundred and sixty thousand men. His state officers, the
favorite slaves, stood near him in splendid apparel, their belts
glittering with gold and gems. Near them were seven thousand eunuchs,
four thousand of them white, the remainder black. The porters or
door-keepers were in number seven hundred. Barges and boats, with the
most superb decorations, were seen swimming upon the Tigris. Nor was the
palace itself less splendid, in which were hung up thirty-eight thousand
pieces of tapestry, twelve thousand five hundred of which were of silk
embroidered with gold. The carpets on the floor were twenty-two
thousand. A hundred lions were brought out, with a keeper to each lion.
Among the other spectacles of rare and stupendous luxury was a tree of
gold and silver spreading into eighteen large branches, on which, and on
the lesser boughs, sat a variety of birds made of the same precious
metals, as well as the leaves of the tree. While the machinery affected
spontaneous motions, the several birds warbled their natural harmony.
Through this scene of magnificence, the Greek ambassador was led by the
vizier to the foot of the caliph's throne."  In the West, the Ommiades
of Spain supported, with equal pomp, the title of commander of the
faithful. Three miles from Cordova, in honor of his favorite sultana,
the third and greatest of the Abdalrahmans constructed the city, palace,
and gardens of Zehra. Twenty-five years, and above three millions
sterling, were employed by the founder: his liberal taste invited the
artists of Constantinople, the most skilful sculptors and architects of
the age; and the buildings were sustained or adorned by twelve hundred
columns of Spanish and African, of Greek and Italian marble. The hall of
audience was incrusted with gold and pearls, and a great basin in the
centre was surrounded with the curious and costly figures of birds and
quadrupeds. In a lofty pavilion of the gardens, one of these basins and
fountains, so delightful in a sultry climate, was replenished not with
water, but with the purest quicksilver. The seraglio of Abdalrahman, his
wives, concubines, and black eunuchs, amounted to six thousand three
hundred persons: and he was attended to the field by a guard of twelve
thousand horse, whose belts and cimeters were studded with gold.

Chapter LII: More Conquests By The Arabs. -- Part III.

In a private condition, our desires are perpetually repressed by poverty
and subordination; but the lives and labors of millions are devoted to
the service of a despotic prince, whose laws are blindly obeyed, and
whose wishes are instantly gratified. Our imagination is dazzled by the
splendid picture; and whatever may be the cool dictates of reason, there
are few among us who would obstinately refuse a trial of the comforts
and the cares of royalty. It may therefore be of some use to borrow the
experience of the same Abdalrahman, whose magnificence has perhaps
excited our admiration and envy, and to transcribe an authentic memorial
which was found in the closet of the deceased caliph. "I have now
reigned above fifty years in victory or peace; beloved by my subjects,
dreaded by my enemies, and respected by my allies. Riches and honors,
power and pleasure, have waited on my call, nor does any earthly
blessing appear to have been wanting to my felicity. In this situation,
I have diligently numbered the days of pure and genuine happiness which
have fallen to my lot: they amount to Fourteen: -- O man! place not thy
confidence in this present world!"  The luxury of the caliphs, so
useless to their private happiness, relaxed the nerves, and terminated
the progress, of the Arabian empire. Temporal and spiritual conquest had
been the sole occupation of the first successors of Mahomet; and after
supplying themselves with the necessaries of life, the whole revenue was
scrupulously devoted to that salutary work. The Abbassides were
impoverished by the multitude of their wants, and their contempt of
conomy. Instead of pursuing the great object of ambition, their leisure,
their affections, the powers of their mind, were diverted by pomp and
pleasure: the rewards of valor were embezzled by women and eunuchs, and
the royal camp was encumbered by the luxury of the palace. A similar
temper was diffused among the subjects of the caliph. Their stern
enthusiasm was softened by time and prosperity. they sought riches in
the occupations of industry, fame in the pursuits of literature, and
happiness in the tranquillity of domestic life. War was no longer the
passion of the Saracens; and the increase of pay, the repetition of
donatives, were insufficient to allure the posterity of those voluntary
champions who had crowded to the standard of Abubeker and Omar for the
hopes of spoil and of paradise.

Under the reign of the Ommiades, the studies of the Moslems were
confined to the interpretation of the Koran, and the eloquence and
poetry of their native tongue. A people continually exposed to the
dangers of the field must esteem the healing powers of medicine, or
rather of surgery; but the starving physicians of Arabia murmured a
complaint that exercise and temperance deprived them of the greatest
part of their practice.  After their civil and domestic wars, the
subjects of the Abbassides, awakening from this mental lethargy, found
leisure and felt curiosity for the acquisition of profane science. This
spirit was first encouraged by the caliph Almansor, who, besides his
knowledge of the Mahometan law, had applied himself with success to the
study of astronomy. But when the sceptre devolved to Almamon, the
seventh of the Abbassides, he completed the designs of his grandfather,
and invited the muses from their ancient seats. His ambassadors at
Constantinople, his agents in Armenia, Syria, and Egypt, collected the
volumes of Grecian science at his command they were translated by the
most skilful interpreters into the Arabic language: his subjects were
exhorted assiduously to peruse these instructive writings; and the
successor of Mahomet assisted with pleasure and modesty at the
assemblies and disputations of the learned. "He was not ignorant," says
Abulpharagius, "that they are the elect of God, his best and most useful
servants, whose lives are devoted to the improvement of their rational
faculties. The mean ambition of the Chinese or the Turks may glory in
the industry of their hands or the indulgence of their brutal appetites.
Yet these dexterous artists must view, with hopeless emulation, the
hexagons and pyramids of the cells of a beehive:  these fortitudinous
heroes are awed by the superior fierceness of the lions and tigers; and
in their amorous enjoyments they are much inferior to the vigor of the
grossest and most sordid quadrupeds. The teachers of wisdom are the true
luminaries and legislators of a world, which, without their aid, would
again sink in ignorance and barbarism."  The zeal and curiosity of
Almamon were imitated by succeeding princes of the line of Abbas: their
rivals, the Fatimites of Africa and the Ommiades of Spain, were the
patrons of the learned, as well as the commanders of the faithful; the
same royal prerogative was claimed by their independent emirs of the
provinces; and their emulation diffused the taste and the rewards of
science from Samarcand and Bochara to Fez and Cordova. The vizier of a
sultan consecrated a sum of two hundred thousand pieces of gold to the
foundation of a college at Bagdad, which he endowed with an annual
revenue of fifteen thousand dinars. The fruits of instruction were
communicated, perhaps at different times, to six thousand disciples of
every degree, from the son of the noble to that of the mechanic: a
sufficient allowance was provided for the indigent scholars; and the
merit or industry of the professors was repaid with adequate stipends.
In every city the productions of Arabic literature were copied and
collected by the curiosity of the studious and the vanity of the rich. A
private doctor refused the invitation of the sultan of Bochara, because
the carriage of his books would have required four hundred camels. The
royal library of the Fatimites consisted of one hundred thousand
manuscripts, elegantly transcribed and splendidly bound, which were
lent, without jealousy or avarice, to the students of Cairo. Yet this
collection must appear moderate, if we can believe that the Ommiades of
Spain had formed a library of six hundred thousand volumes, forty-four
of which were employed in the mere catalogue. Their capital, Cordova,
with the adjacent towns of Malaga, Almeria, and Murcia, had given birth
to more than three hundred writers, and above seventy public libraries
were opened in the cities of the Andalusian kingdom. The age of Arabian
learning continued about five hundred years, till the great eruption of
the Moguls, and was coeval with the darkest and most slothful period of
European annals; but since the sun of science has arisen in the West, it
should seem that the Oriental studies have languished and declined.

In the libraries of the Arabians, as in those of Europe, the far greater
part of the innumerable volumes were possessed only of local value or
imaginary merit.  The shelves were crowded with orators and poets, whose
style was adapted to the taste and manners of their countrymen; with
general and partial histories, which each revolving generation supplied
with a new harvest of persons and events; with codes and commentaries of
jurisprudence, which derived their authority from the law of the
prophet; with the interpreters of the Koran, and orthodox tradition; and
with the whole theological tribe, polemics, mystics, scholastics, and
moralists, the first or the last of writers, according to the different
estimates of sceptics or believers. The works of speculation or science
may be reduced to the four classes of philosophy, mathematics,
astronomy, and physic. The sages of Greece were translated and
illustrated in the Arabic language, and some treatises, now lost in the
original, have been recovered in the versions of the East,  which
possessed and studied the writings of Aristotle and Plato, of Euclid and
Apollonius, of Ptolemy, Hippocrates, and Galen.  Among the ideal systems
which have varied with the fashion of the times, the Arabians adopted
the philosophy of the Stagirite, alike intelligible or alike obscure for
the readers of every age. Plato wrote for the Athenians, and his
allegorical genius is too closely blended with the language and religion
of Greece. After the fall of that religion, the Peripatetics, emerging
from their obscurity, prevailed in the controversies of the Oriental
sects, and their founder was long afterwards restored by the Mahometans
of Spain to the Latin schools.  The physics, both of the Academy and the
Lycæum, as they are built, not on observation, but on argument, have
retarded the progress of real knowledge. The metaphysics of infinite, or
finite, spirit, have too often been enlisted in the service of
superstition. But the human faculties are fortified by the art and
practice of dialectics; the ten predicaments of Aristotle collect and
methodize our ideas,  and his syllogism is the keenest weapon of
dispute. It was dexterously wielded in the schools of the Saracens, but
as it is more effectual for the detection of error than for the
investigation of truth, it is not surprising that new generations of
masters and disciples should still revolve in the same circle of logical
argument. The mathematics are distinguished by a peculiar privilege,
that, in the course of ages, they may always advance, and can never
recede. But the ancient geometry, if I am not misinformed, was resumed
in the same state by the Italians of the fifteenth century; and whatever
may be the origin of the name, the science of algebra is ascribed to the
Grecian Diophantus by the modest testimony of the Arabs themselves.
They cultivated with more success the sublime science of astronomy,
which elevates the mind of man to disdain his diminutive planet and
momentary existence. The costly instruments of observation were supplied
by the caliph Almamon, and the land of the Chaldæans still afforded the
same spacious level, the same unclouded horizon. In the plains of
Sinaar, and a second time in those of Cufa, his mathematicians
accurately measured a degree of the great circle of the earth, and
determined at twenty-four thousand miles the entire circumference of our
globe.  From the reign of the Abbassides to that of the grandchildren of
Tamerlane, the stars, without the aid of glasses, were diligently
observed; and the astronomical tables of Bagdad, Spain, and Samarcand,
correct some minute errors, without daring to renounce the hypothesis of
Ptolemy, without advancing a step towards the discovery of the solar
system. In the Eastern courts, the truths of science could be
recommended only by ignorance and folly, and the astronomer would have
been disregarded, had he not debased his wisdom or honesty by the vain
predictions of astrology.  But in the science of medicine, the Arabians
have been deservedly applauded. The names of Mesua and Geber, of Razis
and Avicenna, are ranked with the Grecian masters; in the city of
Bagdad, eight hundred and sixty physicians were licensed to exercise
their lucrative profession:  in Spain, the life of the Catholic princes
was intrusted to the skill of the Saracens,  and the school of Salerno,
their legitimate offspring, revived in Italy and Europe the precepts of
the healing art.  The success of each professor must have been
influenced by personal and accidental causes; but we may form a less
fanciful estimate of their general knowledge of anatomy,  botany,  and
chemistry,  the threefold basis of their theory and practice. A
superstitious reverence for the dead confined both the Greeks and the
Arabians to the dissection of apes and quadrupeds; the more solid and
visible parts were known in the time of Galen, and the finer scrutiny of
the human frame was reserved for the microscope and the injections of
modern artists. Botany is an active science, and the discoveries of the
torrid zone might enrich the herbal of Dioscorides with two thousand
plants. Some traditionary knowledge might be secreted in the temples and
monasteries of Egypt; much useful experience had been acquired in the
practice of arts and manufactures; but the scienceof chemistry owes its
origin and improvement to the industry of the Saracens. They first
invented and named the alembic for the purposes of distillation,
analyzed the substances of the three kingdoms of nature, tried the
distinction and affinities of alcalis and acids, and converted the
poisonous minerals into soft and salutary medicines. But the most eager
search of Arabian chemistry was the transmutation of metals, and the
elixir of immortal health: the reason and the fortunes of thousands were
evaporated in the crucibles of alchemy, and the consummation of the
great work was promoted by the worthy aid of mystery, fable, and
superstition.

But the Moslems deprived themselves of the principal benefits of a
familiar intercourse with Greece and Rome, the knowledge of antiquity,
the purity of taste, and the freedom of thought. Confident in the riches
of their native tongue, the Arabians disdained the study of any foreign
idiom. The Greek interpreters were chosen among their Christian
subjects; they formed their translations, sometimes on the original
text, more frequently perhaps on a Syriac version; and in the crowd of
astronomers and physicians, there is no example of a poet, an orator, or
even an historian, being taught to speak the language of the Saracens.
The mythology of Homer would have provoked the abhorrence of those stern
fanatics: they possessed in lazy ignorance the colonies of the
Macedonians, and the provinces of Carthage and Rome: the heroes of
Plutarch and Livy were buried in oblivion; and the history of the world
before Mahomet was reduced to a short legend of the patriarchs, the
prophets, and the Persian kings. Our education in the Greek and Latin
schools may have fixed in our minds a standard of exclusive taste; and I
am not forward to condemn the literature and judgment of nations, of
whose language I am ignorant. Yet I knowthat the classics have much to
teach, and I believethat the Orientals have much to learn; the temperate
dignity of style, the graceful proportions of art, the forms of visible
and intellectual beauty, the just delineation of character and passion,
the rhetoric of narrative and argument, the regular fabric of epic and
dramatic poetry.  The influence of truth and reason is of a less
ambiguous complexion. The philosophers of Athens and Rome enjoyed the
blessings, and asserted the rights, of civil and religious freedom.
Their moral and political writings might have gradually unlocked the
fetters of Eastern despotism, diffused a liberal spirit of inquiry and
toleration, and encouraged the Arabian sages to suspect that their
caliph was a tyrant, and their prophet an impostor.  The instinct of
superstition was alarmed by the introduction even of the abstract
sciences; and the more rigid doctors of the law condemned the rash and
pernicious curiosity of Almamon.  To the thirst of martyrdom, the vision
of paradise, and the belief of predestination, we must ascribe the
invincible enthusiasm of the prince and people. And the sword of the
Saracens became less formidable when their youth was drawn away from the
camp to the college, when the armies of the faithful presumed to read
and to reflect. Yet the foolish vanity of the Greeks was jealous of
their studies, and reluctantly imparted the sacred fire to the
Barbarians of the East.

In the bloody conflict of the Ommiades and Abbassides, the Greeks had
stolen the opportunity of avenging their wrongs and enlarging their
limits. But a severe retribution was exacted by Mohadi, the third caliph
of the new dynasty, who seized, in his turn, the favorable opportunity,
while a woman and a child, Irene and Constantine, were seated on the
Byzantine throne. An army of ninety-five thousand Persians and Arabs was
sent from the Tigris to the Thracian Bosphorus, under the command of
Harun,  or Aaron, the second son of the commander of the faithful. His
encampment on the opposite heights of Chrysopolis, or Scutari, informed
Irene, in her palace of Constantinople, of the loss of her troops and
provinces. With the consent or connivance of their sovereign, her
ministers subscribed an ignominious peace; and the exchange of some
royal gifts could not disguise the annual tribute of seventy thousand
dinars of gold, which was imposed on the Roman empire. The Saracens had
too rashly advanced into the midst of a distant and hostile land: their
retreat was solicited by the promise of faithful guides and plentiful
markets; and not a Greek had courage to whisper, that their weary forces
might be surrounded and destroyed in their necessary passage between a
slippery mountain and the River Sangarius. Five years after this
expedition, Harun ascended the throne of his father and his elder
brother; the most powerful and vigorous monarch of his race, illustrious
in the West, as the ally of Charlemagne, and familiar to the most
childish readers, as the perpetual hero of the Arabian tales. His title
to the name of Al Rashid(the Just) is sullied by the extirpation of the
generous, perhaps the innocent, Barmecides; yet he could listen to the
complaint of a poor widow who had been pillaged by his troops, and who
dared, in a passage of the Koran, to threaten the inattentive despot
with the judgment of God and posterity. His court was adorned with
luxury and science; but, in a reign of three-and-twenty years, Harun
repeatedly visited his provinces from Chorasan to Egypt; nine times he
performed the pilgrimage of Mecca; eight times he invaded the
territories of the Romans; and as often as they declined the payment of
the tribute, they were taught to feel that a month of depredation was
more costly than a year of submission. But when the unnatural mother of
Constantine was deposed and banished, her successor, Nicephorus,
resolved to obliterate this badge of servitude and disgrace. The epistle
of the emperor to the caliph was pointed with an allusion to the game of
chess, which had already spread from Persia to Greece. "The queen (he
spoke of Irene) considered you as a rook, and herself as a pawn. That
pusillanimous female submitted to pay a tribute, the double of which she
ought to have exacted from the Barbarians. Restore therefore the fruits
of your injustice, or abide the determination of the sword." At these
words the ambassadors cast a bundle of swords before the foot of the
throne. The caliph smiled at the menace, and drawing his cimeter,
samsamah, a weapon of historic or fabulous renown, he cut asunder the
feeble arms of the Greeks, without turning the edge, or endangering the
temper, of his blade. He then dictated an epistle of tremendous brevity:
"In the name of the most merciful God, Harun al Rashid, commander of the
faithful, to Nicephorus, the Roman dog. I have read thy letter, O thou
son of an unbelieving mother. Thou shalt not hear, thou shalt behold, my
reply." It was written in characters of blood and fire on the plains of
Phrygia; and the warlike celerity of the Arabs could only be checked by
the arts of deceit and the show of repentance. The triumphant caliph
retired, after the fatigues of the campaign, to his favorite palace of
Racca on the Euphrates:  but the distance of five hundred miles, and the
inclemency of the season, encouraged his adversary to violate the peace.
Nicephorus was astonished by the bold and rapid march of the commander
of the faithful, who repassed, in the depth of winter, the snows of
Mount Taurus: his stratagems of policy and war were exhausted; and the
perfidious Greek escaped with three wounds from a field of battle
overspread with forty thousand of his subjects. Yet the emperor was
ashamed of submission, and the caliph was resolved on victory. One
hundred and thirty-five thousand regular soldiers received pay, and were
inscribed in the military roll; and above three hundred thousand persons
of every denomination marched under the black standard of the
Abbassides. They swept the surface of Asia Minor far beyond Tyana and
Ancyra, and invested the Pontic Heraclea,  once a flourishing state, now
a paltry town; at that time capable of sustaining, in her antique walls,
a month's siege against the forces of the East. The ruin was complete,
the spoil was ample; but if Harun had been conversant with Grecian
story, he would have regretted the statue of Hercules, whose attributes,
the club, the bow, the quiver, and the lion's hide, were sculptured in
massy gold. The progress of desolation by sea and land, from the Euxine
to the Isle of Cyprus, compelled the emperor Nicephorus to retract his
haughty defiance. In the new treaty, the ruins of Heraclea were left
forever as a lesson and a trophy; and the coin of the tribute was marked
with the image and superscription of Harun and his three sons.  Yet this
plurality of lords might contribute to remove the dishonor of the Roman
name. After the death of their father, the heirs of the caliph were
involved in civil discord, and the conqueror, the liberal Almamon, was
sufficiently engaged in the restoration of domestic peace and the
introduction of foreign science.

Chapter LII: More Conquests By The Arabs. -- Part IV.

Under the reign of Almamon at Bagdad, of Michael the Stammerer at
Constantinople, the islands of Crete  and Sicily were subdued by the
Arabs. The former of these conquests is disdained by their own writers,
who were ignorant of the fame of Jupiter and Minos, but it has not been
overlooked by the Byzantine historians, who now begin to cast a clearer
light on the affairs of their own times.  A band of Andalusian
volunteers, discontented with the climate or government of Spain,
explored the adventures of the sea; but as they sailed in no more than
ten or twenty galleys, their warfare must be branded with the name of
piracy. As the subjects and sectaries of the whiteparty, they might
lawfully invade the dominions of the blackcaliphs. A rebellious faction
introduced them into Alexandria;  they cut in pieces both friends and
foes, pillaged the churches and the moschs, sold above six thousand
Christian captives, and maintained their station in the capital of
Egypt, till they were oppressed by the forces and the presence of
Almamon himself. From the mouth of the Nile to the Hellespont, the
islands and sea-coasts both of the Greeks and Moslems were exposed to
their depredations; they saw, they envied, they tasted the fertility of
Crete, and soon returned with forty galleys to a more serious attack.
The Andalusians wandered over the land fearless and unmolested; but when
they descended with their plunder to the sea-shore, their vessels were
in flames, and their chief, Abu Caab, confessed himself the author of
the mischief. Their clamors accused his madness or treachery. "Of what
do you complain?" replied the crafty emir. "I have brought you to a land
flowing with milk and honey. Here is your true country; repose from your
toils, and forget the barren place of your nativity." "And our wives and
children?" "Your beauteous captives will supply the place of your wives,
and in their embraces you will soon become the fathers of a new
progeny." The first habitation was their camp, with a ditch and rampart,
in the Bay of Suda; but an apostate monk led them to a more desirable
position in the eastern parts; and the name of Candax, their fortress
and colony, has been extended to the whole island, under the corrupt and
modern appellation of Candia. The hundred cities of the age of Minos
were diminished to thirty; and of these, only one, most probably
Cydonia, had courage to retain the substance of freedom and the
profession of Christianity. The Saracens of Crete soon repaired the loss
of their navy; and the timbers of Mount Ida were launched into the main.
During a hostile period of one hundred and thirty-eight years, the
princes of Constantinople attacked these licentious corsairs with
fruitless curses and ineffectual arms.

The loss of Sicily  was occasioned by an act of superstitious rigor. An
amorous youth, who had stolen a nun from her cloister, was sentenced by
the emperor to the amputation of his tongue. Euphemius appealed to the
reason and policy of the Saracens of Africa; and soon returned with the
Imperial purple, a fleet of one hundred ships, and an army of seven
hundred horse and ten thousand foot. They landed at Mazara near the
ruins of the ancient Selinus; but after some partial victories, Syracuse
was delivered by the Greeks, the apostate was slain before her walls,
and his African friends were reduced to the necessity of feeding on the
flesh of their own horses. In their turn they were relieved by a
powerful reënforcement of their brethren of Andalusia; the largest and
western part of the island was gradually reduced, and the commodious
harbor of Palermo was chosen for the seat of the naval and military
power of the Saracens. Syracuse preserved about fifty years the faith
which she had sworn to Christ and to Cæsar. In the last and fatal siege,
her citizens displayed some remnant of the spirit which had formerly
resisted the powers of Athens and Carthage. They stood above twenty days
against the battering-rams and catapult, the mines and tortoises of the
besiegers; and the place might have been relieved, if the mariners of
the Imperial fleet had not been detained at Constantinople in building a
church to the Virgin Mary. The deacon Theodosius, with the bishop and
clergy, was dragged in chains from the altar to Palermo, cast into a
subterraneous dungeon, and exposed to the hourly peril of death or
apostasy. His pathetic, and not inelegant, complaint may be read as the
epitaph of his country.  From the Roman conquest to this final calamity,
Syracuse, now dwindled to the primitive Isle of Ortygea, had insensibly
declined. Yet the relics were still precious; the plate of the cathedral
weighed five thousand pounds of silver; the entire spoil was computed at
one million of pieces of gold, (about four hundred thousand pounds
sterling,) and the captives must outnumber the seventeen thousand
Christians, who were transported from the sack of Tauromenium into
African servitude. In Sicily, the religion and language of the Greeks
were eradicated; and such was the docility of the rising generation,
that fifteen thousand boys were circumcised and clothed on the same day
with the son of the Fatimite caliph. The Arabian squadrons issued from
the harbors of Palermo, Biserta, and Tunis; a hundred and fifty towns of
Calabria and Campania were attacked and pillaged; nor could the suburbs
of Rome be defended by the name of the Cæsars and apostles. Had the
Mahometans been united, Italy must have fallen an easy and glorious
accession to the empire of the prophet. But the caliphs of Bagdad had
lost their authority in the West; the Aglabites and Fatimites usurped
the provinces of Africa, their emirs of Sicily aspired to independence;
and the design of conquest and dominion was degraded to a repetition of
predatory inroads.

In the sufferings of prostrate Italy, the name of Rome awakens a solemn
and mournful recollection. A fleet of Saracens from the African coast
presumed to enter the mouth of the Tyber, and to approach a city which
even yet, in her fallen state, was revered as the metropolis of the
Christian world. The gates and ramparts were guarded by a trembling
people; but the tombs and temples of St. Peter and St. Paul were left
exposed in the suburbs of the Vatican and of the Ostian way. Their
invisible sanctity had protected them against the Goths, the Vandals,
and the Lombards; but the Arabs disdained both the gospel and the
legend; and their rapacious spirit was approved and animated by the
precepts of the Koran. The Christian idolswere stripped of their costly
offerings; a silver altar was torn away from the shrine of St. Peter;
and if the bodies or the buildings were left entire, their deliverance
must be imputed to the haste, rather than the scruples, of the Saracens.
In their course along the Appian way, they pillaged Fundi and besieged
Gayeta; but they had turned aside from the walls of Rome, and by their
divisions, the Capitol was saved from the yoke of the prophet of Mecca.
The same danger still impended on the heads of the Roman people; and
their domestic force was unequal to the assault of an African emir. They
claimed the protection of their Latin sovereign; but the Carlovingian
standard was overthrown by a detachment of the Barbarians: they
meditated the restoration of the Greek emperors; but the attempt was
treasonable, and the succor remote and precarious.  Their distress
appeared to receive some aggravation from the death of their spiritual
and temporal chief; but the pressing emergency superseded the forms and
intrigues of an election; and the unanimous choice of Pope Leo the
Fourth  was the safety of the church and city. This pontiff was born a
Roman; the courage of the first ages of the republic glowed in his
breast; and, amidst the ruins of his country, he stood erect, like one
of the firm and lofty columns that rear their heads above the fragments
of the Roman forum. The first days of his reign were consecrated to the
purification and removal of relics, to prayers and processions, and to
all the solemn offices of religion, which served at least to heal the
imagination, and restore the hopes, of the multitude. The public defence
had been long neglected, not from the presumption of peace, but from the
distress and poverty of the times. As far as the scantiness of his means
and the shortness of his leisure would allow, the ancient walls were
repaired by the command of Leo; fifteen towers, in the most accessible
stations, were built or renewed; two of these commanded on either side
of the Tyber; and an iron chain was drawn across the stream to impede
the ascent of a hostile navy. The Romans were assured of a short respite
by the welcome news, that the siege of Gayeta had been raised, and that
a part of the enemy, with their sacrilegious plunder, had perished in
the waves.

But the storm, which had been delayed, soon burst upon them with
redoubled violence. The Aglabite,  who reigned in Africa, had inherited
from his father a treasure and an army: a fleet of Arabs and Moors,
after a short refreshment in the harbors of Sardinia, cast anchor before
the mouth of the Tyber, sixteen miles from the city: and their
discipline and numbers appeared to threaten, not a transient inroad, but
a serious design of conquest and dominion. But the vigilance of Leo had
formed an alliance with the vassals of the Greek empire, the free and
maritime states of Gayeta, Naples, and Amalfi; and in the hour of
danger, their galleys appeared in the port of Ostia under the command of
Cæsarius, the son of the Neapolitan duke, a noble and valiant youth, who
had already vanquished the fleets of the Saracens. With his principal
companions, Cæsarius was invited to the Lateran palace, and the
dexterous pontiff affected to inquire their errand, and to accept with
joy and surprise their providential succor. The city bands, in arms,
attended their father to Ostia, where he reviewed and blessed his
generous deliverers. They kissed his feet, received the communion with
martial devotion, and listened to the prayer of Leo, that the same God
who had supported St. Peter and St. Paul on the waves of the sea, would
strengthen the hands of his champions against the adversaries of his
holy name. After a similar prayer, and with equal resolution, the
Moslems advanced to the attack of the Christian galleys, which preserved
their advantageous station along the coast. The victory inclined to the
side of the allies, when it was less gloriously decided in their favor
by a sudden tempest, which confounded the skill and courage of the
stoutest mariners. The Christians were sheltered in a friendly harbor,
while the Africans were scattered and dashed in pieces among the rocks
and islands of a hostile shore. Those who escaped from shipwreck and
hunger neither found, nor deserved, mercy at the hands of their
implacable pursuers. The sword and the gibbet reduced the dangerous
multitude of captives; and the remainder was more usefully employed, to
restore the sacred edifices which they had attempted to subvert. The
pontiff, at the head of the citizens and allies, paid his grateful
devotion at the shrines of the apostles; and, among the spoils of this
naval victory, thirteen Arabian bows of pure and massy silver were
suspended round the altar of the fishermen of Galilee. The reign of Leo
the Fourth was employed in the defence and ornament of the Roman state.
The churches were renewed and embellished: near four thousand pounds of
silver were consecrated to repair the losses of St. Peter; and his
sanctuary was decorated with a plate of gold of the weight of two
hundred and sixteen pounds, embossed with the portraits of the pope and
emperor, and encircled with a string of pearls. Yet this vain
magnificence reflects less glory on the character of Leo than the
paternal care with which he rebuilt the walls of Horta and Ameria; and
transported the wandering inhabitants of Centumcellæto his new
foundation of Leopolis, twelve miles from the sea-shore.  By his
liberality, a colony of Corsicans, with their wives and children, was
planted in the station of Porto, at the mouth of the Tyber: the falling
city was restored for their use, the fields and vineyards were divided
among the new settlers: their first efforts were assisted by a gift of
horses and cattle; and the hardy exiles, who breathed revenge against
the Saracens, swore to live and die under the standard of St. Peter. The
nations of the West and North who visited the threshold of the apostles
had gradually formed the large and populous suburb of the Vatican, and
their various habitations were distinguished, in the language of the
times, as the schools of the Greeks and Goths, of the Lombards and
Saxons. But this venerable spot was still open to sacrilegious insult:
the design of enclosing it with walls and towers exhausted all that
authority could command, or charity would supply: and the pious labor of
four years was animated in every season, and at every hour, by the
presence of the indefatigable pontiff. The love of fame, a generous but
worldly passion, may be detected in the name of the Leonine city, which
he bestowed on the Vatican; yet the pride of the dedication was tempered
with Christian penance and humility. The boundary was trod by the bishop
and his clergy, barefoot, in sackcloth and ashes; the songs of triumph
were modulated to psalms and litanies; the walls were besprinkled with
holy water; and the ceremony was concluded with a prayer, that, under
the guardian care of the apostles and the angelic host, both the old and
the new Rome might ever be preserved pure, prosperous, and impregnable.

The emperor Theophilus, son of Michael the Stammerer, was one of the
most active and high-spirited princes who reigned at Constantinople
during the middle age. In offensive or defensive war, he marched in
person five times against the Saracens, formidable in his attack,
esteemed by the enemy in his losses and defeats. In the last of these
expeditions he penetrated into Syria, and besieged the obscure town of
Sozopetra; the casual birthplace of the caliph Motassem, whose father
Harun was attended in peace or war by the most favored of his wives and
concubines. The revolt of a Persian impostor employed at that moment the
arms of the Saracen, and he could only intercede in favor of a place for
which he felt and acknowledged some degree of filial affection. These
solicitations determined the emperor to wound his pride in so sensible a
part. Sozopetra was levelled with the ground, the Syrian prisoners were
marked or mutilated with ignominious cruelty, and a thousand female
captives were forced away from the adjacent territory. Among these a
matron of the house of Abbas invoked, in an agony of despair, the name
of Motassem; and the insults of the Greeks engaged the honor of her
kinsman to avenge his indignity, and to answer her appeal. Under the
reign of the two elder brothers, the inheritance of the youngest had
been confined to Anatolia, Armenia, Georgia, and Circassia; this
frontier station had exercised his military talents; and among his
accidental claims to the name of Octonary,  the most meritorious are the
eightbattles which he gained or fought against the enemies of the Koran.
In this personal quarrel, the troops of Irak, Syria, and Egypt, were
recruited from the tribes of Arabia and the Turkish hordes; his cavalry
might be numerous, though we should deduct some myriads from the hundred
and thirty thousand horses of the royal stables; and the expense of the
armament was computed at four millions sterling, or one hundred thousand
pounds of gold. From Tarsus, the place of assembly, the Saracens
advanced in three divisions along the high road of Constantinople:
Motassem himself commanded the centre, and the vanguard was given to his
son Abbas, who, in the trial of the first adventures, might succeed with
the more glory, or fail with the least reproach. In the revenge of his
injury, the caliph prepared to retaliate a similar affront. The father
of Theophilus was a native of Amorium  in Phrygia: the original seat of
the Imperial house had been adorned with privileges and monuments; and,
whatever might be the indifference of the people, Constantinople itself
was scarcely of more value in the eyes of the sovereign and his court.
The name of Amorium was inscribed on the shields of the Saracens; and
their three armies were again united under the walls of the devoted
city. It had been proposed by the wisest counsellors, to evacuate
Amorium, to remove the inhabitants, and to abandon the empty structures
to the vain resentment of the Barbarians. The emperor embraced the more
generous resolution of defending, in a siege and battle, the country of
his ancestors. When the armies drew near, the front of the Mahometan
line appeared to a Roman eye more closely planted with spears and
javelins; but the event of the action was not glorious on either side to
the national troops. The Arabs were broken, but it was by the swords of
thirty thousand Persians, who had obtained service and settlement in the
Byzantine empire. The Greeks were repulsed and vanquished, but it was by
the arrows of the Turkish cavalry; and had not their bowstrings been
damped and relaxed by the evening rain, very few of the Christians could
have escaped with the emperor from the field of battle. They breathed at
Dorylæum, at the distance of three days; and Theophilus, reviewing his
trembling squadrons, forgave the common flight both of the prince and
people. After this discovery of his weakness, he vainly hoped to
deprecate the fate of Amorium: the inexorable caliph rejected with
contempt his prayers and promises; and detained the Roman ambassadors to
be the witnesses of his great revenge. They had nearly been the
witnesses of his shame. The vigorous assaults of fifty-five days were
encountered by a faithful governor, a veteran garrison, and a desperate
people; and the Saracens must have raised the siege, if a domestic
traitor had not pointed to the weakest part of the wall, a place which
was decorated with the statues of a lion and a bull. The vow of Motassem
was accomplished with unrelenting rigor: tired, rather than satiated,
with destruction, he returned to his new palace of Samara, in the
neighborhood of Bagdad, while the unfortunateTheophilus implored the
tardy and doubtful aid of his Western rival the emperor of the Franks.
Yet in the siege of Amorium about seventy thousand Moslems had perished:
their loss had been revenged by the slaughter of thirty thousand
Christians, and the sufferings of an equal number of captives, who were
treated as the most atrocious criminals. Mutual necessity could
sometimes extort the exchange or ransom of prisoners:  but in the
national and religious conflict of the two empires, peace was without
confidence, and war without mercy. Quarter was seldom given in the
field; those who escaped the edge of the sword were condemned to
hopeless servitude, or exquisite torture; and a Catholic emperor
relates, with visible satisfaction, the execution of the Saracens of
Crete, who were flayed alive, or plunged into caldrons of boiling oil.
To a point of honor Motassem had sacrificed a flourishing city, two
hundred thousand lives, and the property of millions. The same caliph
descended from his horse, and dirtied his robe, to relieve the distress
of a decrepit old man, who, with his laden ass, had tumbled into a
ditch. On which of these actions did he reflect with the most pleasure,
when he was summoned by the angel of death?

With Motassem, the eighth of the Abbassides, the glory of his family and
nation expired. When the Arabian conquerors had spread themselves over
the East, and were mingled with the servile crowds of Persia, Syria, and
Egypt, they insensibly lost the freeborn and martial virtues of the
desert. The courage of the South is the artificial fruit of discipline
and prejudice; the active power of enthusiasm had decayed, and the
mercenary forces of the caliphs were recruited in those climates of the
North, of which valor is the hardy and spontaneous production. Of the
Turks  who dwelt beyond the Oxus and Jaxartes, the robust youths, either
taken in war or purchased in trade, were educated in the exercises of
the field, and the profession of the Mahometan faith. The Turkish guards
stood in arms round the throne of their benefactor, and their chiefs
usurped the dominion of the palace and the provinces. Motassem, the
first author of this dangerous example, introduced into the capital
above fifty thousand Turks: their licentious conduct provoked the public
indignation, and the quarrels of the soldiers and people induced the
caliph to retire from Bagdad, and establish his own residence and the
camp of his Barbarian favorites at Samara on the Tigris, about twelve
leagues above the city of Peace.  His son Motawakkel was a jealous and
cruel tyrant: odious to his subjects, he cast himself on the fidelity of
the strangers, and these strangers, ambitious and apprehensive, were
tempted by the rich promise of a revolution. At the instigation, or at
least in the cause of his son, they burst into his apartment at the hour
of supper, and the caliph was cut into seven pieces by the same swords
which he had recently distributed among the guards of his life and
throne. To this throne, yet streaming with a father's blood, Montasser
was triumphantly led; but in a reign of six months, he found only the
pangs of a guilty conscience. If he wept at the sight of an old tapestry
which represented the crime and punishment of the son of Chosroes, if
his days were abridged by grief and remorse, we may allow some pity to a
parricide, who exclaimed, in the bitterness of death, that he had lost
both this world and the world to come. After this act of treason, the
ensigns of royalty, the garment and walking-staff of Mahomet, were given
and torn away by the foreign mercenaries, who in four years created,
deposed, and murdered, three commanders of the faithful. As often as the
Turks were inflamed by fear, or rage, or avarice, these caliphs were
dragged by the feet, exposed naked to the scorching sun, beaten with
iron clubs, and compelled to purchase, by the abdication of their
dignity, a short reprieve of inevitable fate.  At length, however, the
fury of the tempest was spent or diverted: the Abbassides returned to
the less turbulent residence of Bagdad; the insolence of the Turks was
curbed with a firmer and more skilful hand, and their numbers were
divided and destroyed in foreign warfare. But the nations of the East
had been taught to trample on the successors of the prophet; and the
blessings of domestic peace were obtained by the relaxation of strength
and discipline. So uniform are the mischiefs of military despotism, that
I seem to repeat the story of the prætorians of Rome.

While the flame of enthusiasm was damped by the business, the pleasure,
and the knowledge, of the age, it burnt with concentrated heat in the
breasts of the chosen few, the congenial spirits, who were ambitious of
reigning either in this world or in the next. How carefully soever the
book of prophecy had been sealed by the apostle of Mecca, the wishes,
and (if we may profane the word) even the reason, of fanaticism might
believe that, after the successive missions of Adam, Noah, Abraham,
Moses, Jesus, and Mahomet, the same God, in the fulness of time, would
reveal a still more perfect and permanent law. In the two hundred and
seventy-seventh year of the Hegira, and in the neighborhood of Cufa, an
Arabian preacher, of the name of Carmath, assumed the lofty and
incomprehensible style of the Guide, the Director, the Demonstration,
the Word, the Holy Ghost, the Camel, the Herald of the Messiah, who had
conversed with him in a human shape, and the representative of Mohammed
the son of Ali, of St. John the Baptist, and of the angel Gabriel. In
his mystic volume, the precepts of the Koran were refined to a more
spiritual sense: he relaxed the duties of ablution, fasting, and
pilgrimage; allowed the indiscriminate use of wine and forbidden food;
and nourished the fervor of his disciples by the daily repetition of
fifty prayers. The idleness and ferment of the rustic crowd awakened the
attention of the magistrates of Cufa; a timid persecution assisted the
progress of the new sect; and the name of the prophet became more
revered after his person had been withdrawn from the world. His twelve
apostles dispersed themselves among the Bedoweens, "a race of men," says
Abulfeda, "equally devoid of reason and of religion;" and the success of
their preaching seemed to threaten Arabia with a new revolution. The
Carmathians were ripe for rebellion, since they disclaimed the title of
the house of Abbas, and abhorred the worldly pomp of the caliphs of
Bagdad. They were susceptible of discipline, since they vowed a blind
and absolute submission to their Imam, who was called to the prophetic
office by the voice of God and the people. Instead of the legal tithes,
he claimed the fifth of their substance and spoil; the most flagitious
sins were no more than the type of disobedience; and the brethren were
united and concealed by an oath of secrecy. After a bloody conflict,
they prevailed in the province of Bahrein, along the Persian Gulf: far
and wide, the tribes of the desert were subject to the sceptre, or
rather to the sword of Abu Said and his son Abu Taher; and these
rebellious imams could muster in the field a hundred and seven thousand
fanatics. The mercenaries of the caliph were dismayed at the approach of
an enemy who neither asked nor accepted quarter; and the difference
between, them in fortitude and patience, is expressive of the change
which three centuries of prosperity had effected in the character of the
Arabians. Such troops were discomfited in every action; the cities of
Racca and Baalbec, of Cufa and Bassora, were taken and pillaged; Bagdad
was filled with consternation; and the caliph trembled behind the veils
of his palace. In a daring inroad beyond the Tigris, Abu Taher advanced
to the gates of the capital with no more than five hundred horse. By the
special order of Moctader, the bridges had been broken down, and the
person or head of the rebel was expected every hour by the commander of
the faithful. His lieutenant, from a motive of fear or pity, apprised
Abu Taher of his danger, and recommended a speedy escape. "Your master,"
said the intrepid Carmathian to the messenger, "is at the head of thirty
thousand soldiers: three such men as these are wanting in his host: " at
the same instant, turning to three of his companions, he commanded the
first to plunge a dagger into his breast, the second to leap into the
Tigris, and the third to cast himself headlong down a precipice. They
obeyed without a murmur. "Relate," continued the imam, "what you have
seen: before the evening your general shall be chained among my dogs."
Before the evening, the camp was surprised, and the menace was executed.
The rapine of the Carmathians was sanctified by their aversion to the
worship of Mecca: they robbed a caravan of pilgrims, and twenty thousand
devout Moslems were abandoned on the burning sands to a death of hunger
and thirst. Another year they suffered the pilgrims to proceed without
interruption; but, in the festival of devotion, Abu Taher stormed the
holy city, and trampled on the most venerable relics of the Mahometan
faith. Thirty thousand citizens and strangers were put to the sword; the
sacred precincts were polluted by the burial of three thousand dead
bodies; the well of Zemzem overflowed with blood; the golden spout was
forced from its place; the veil of the Caaba was divided among these
impious sectaries; and the black stone, the first monument of the
nation, was borne away in triumph to their capital. After this deed of
sacrilege and cruelty, they continued to infest the confines of Irak,
Syria, and Egypt: but the vital principle of enthusiasm had withered at
the root. Their scruples, or their avarice, again opened the pilgrimage
of Mecca, and restored the black stone of the Caaba; and it is needless
to inquire into what factions they were broken, or by whose swords they
were finally extirpated. The sect of the Carmathians may be considered
as the second visible cause of the decline and fall of the empire of the
caliphs.

Chapter LII: More Conquests By The Arabs. -- Part V.

The third and most obvious cause was the weight and magnitude of the
empire itself. The caliph Almamon might proudly assert, that it was
easier for him to rule the East and the West, than to manage a
chess-board of two feet square:  yet I suspect that in both those games
he was guilty of many fatal mistakes; and I perceive, that in the
distant provinces the authority of the first and most powerful of the
Abbassides was already impaired. The analogy of despotism invests the
representative with the full majesty of the prince; the division and
balance of powers might relax the habits of obedience, might encourage
the passive subject to inquire into the origin and administration of
civil government. He who is born in the purple is seldom worthy to
reign; but the elevation of a private man, of a peasant, perhaps, or a
slave, affords a strong presumption of his courage and capacity. The
viceroy of a remote kingdom aspires to secure the property and
inheritance of his precarious trust; the nations must rejoice in the
presence of their sovereign; and the command of armies and treasures are
at once the object and the instrument of his ambition. A change was
scarcely visible as long as the lieutenants of the caliph were content
with their vicarious title; while they solicited for themselves or their
sons a renewal of the Imperial grant, and still maintained on the coin
and in the public prayers the name and prerogative of the commander of
the faithful. But in the long and hereditary exercise of power, they
assumed the pride and attributes of royalty; the alternative of peace or
war, of reward or punishment, depended solely on their will; and the
revenues of their government were reserved for local services or private
magnificence. Instead of a regular supply of men and money, the
successors of the prophet were flattered with the ostentatious gift of
an elephant, or a cast of hawks, a suit of silk hangings, or some pounds
of musk and amber.

After the revolt of Spain from the temporal and spiritual supremacy of
the Abbassides, the first symptoms of disobedience broke forth in the
province of Africa. Ibrahim, the son of Aglab, the lieutenant of the
vigilant and rigid Harun, bequeathed to the dynasty of the Aglabitesthe
inheritance of his name and power. The indolence or policy of the
caliphs dissembled the injury and loss, and pursued only with poison the
founder of the Edrisites,  who erected the kingdom and city of Fez on
the shores of the Western ocean.  In the East, the first dynasty was
that of the Taherites;  the posterity of the valiant Taher, who, in the
civil wars of the sons of Harun, had served with too much zeal and
success the cause of Almamon, the younger brother. He was sent into
honorable exile, to command on the banks of the Oxus; and the
independence of his successors, who reigned in Chorasan till the fourth
generation, was palliated by their modest and respectful demeanor, the
happiness of their subjects and the security of their frontier. They
were supplanted by one of those adventures so frequent in the annals of
the East, who left his trade of a brazier (from whence the name of
Soffarides) for the profession of a robber. In a nocturnal visit to the
treasure of the prince of Sistan, Jacob, the son of Leith, stumbled over
a lump of salt, which he unwarily tasted with his tongue. Salt, among
the Orientals, is the symbol of hospitality, and the pious robber
immediately retired without spoil or damage. The discovery of this
honorable behavior recommended Jacob to pardon and trust; he led an army
at first for his benefactor, at last for himself, subdued Persia, and
threatened the residence of the Abbassides. On his march towards Bagdad,
the conqueror was arrested by a fever. He gave audience in bed to the
ambassador of the caliph; and beside him on a table were exposed a naked
cimeter, a crust of brown bread, and a bunch of onions. "If I die," said
he, "your master is delivered from his fears. If I live, thismust
determine between us. If I am vanquished, I can return without
reluctance to the homely fare of my youth." From the height where he
stood, the descent would not have been so soft or harmless: a timely
death secured his own repose and that of the caliph, who paid with the
most lavish concessions the retreat of his brother Amrou to the palaces
of Shiraz and Ispahan. The Abbassides were too feeble to contend, too
proud to forgive: they invited the powerful dynasty of the Samanides,
who passed the Oxus with ten thousand horse so poor, that their stirrups
were of wood: so brave, that they vanquished the Soffarian army, eight
times more numerous than their own. The captive Amrou was sent in
chains, a grateful offering to the court of Bagdad; and as the victor
was content with the inheritance of Transoxiana and Chorasan, the realms
of Persia returned for a while to the allegiance of the caliphs. The
provinces of Syria and Egypt were twice dismembered by their Turkish
slaves of the race of Toulonand Ilkshid.  These Barbarians, in religion
and manners the countrymen of Mahomet, emerged from the bloody factions
of the palace to a provincial command and an independent throne: their
names became famous and formidable in their time; but the founders of
these two potent dynasties confessed, either in words or actions, the
vanity of ambition. The first on his death-bed implored the mercy of God
to a sinner, ignorant of the limits of his own power: the second, in the
midst of four hundred thousand soldiers and eight thousand slaves,
concealed from every human eye the chamber where he attempted to sleep.
Their sons were educated in the vices of kings; and both Egypt and Syria
were recovered and possessed by the Abbassides during an interval of
thirty years. In the decline of their empire, Mesopotamia, with the
important cities of Mosul and Aleppo, was occupied by the Arabian
princes of the tribe of Hamadan. The poets of their court could repeat
without a blush, that nature had formed their countenances for beauty,
their tongues for eloquence, and their hands for liberality and valor:
but the genuine tale of the elevation and reign of the
Hamadanitesexhibits a scene of treachery, murder, and parricide. At the
same fatal period, the Persian kingdom was again usurped by the dynasty
of the Bowides, by the sword of three brothers, who, under various
names, were styled the support and columns of the state, and who, from
the Caspian Sea to the ocean, would suffer no tyrants but themselves.
Under their reign, the language and genius of Persia revived, and the
Arabs, three hundred and four years after the death of Mahomet, were
deprived of the sceptre of the East.

Rahadi, the twentieth of the Abbassides, and the thirty-ninth of the
successors of Mahomet, was the last who deserved the title of commander
of the faithful;  the last (says Abulfeda) who spoke to the people, or
conversed with the learned; the last who, in the expense of his
household, represented the wealth and magnificence of the ancient
caliphs. After him, the lords of the Eastern world were reduced to the
most abject misery, and exposed to the blows and insults of a servile
condition. The revolt of the provinces circumscribed their dominions
within the walls of Bagdad: but that capital still contained an
innumerable multitude, vain of their past fortune, discontented with
their present state, and oppressed by the demands of a treasury which
had formerly been replenished by the spoil and tribute of nations. Their
idleness was exercised by faction and controversy. Under the mask of
piety, the rigid followers of Hanbal  invaded the pleasures of domestic
life, burst into the houses of plebeians and princes, the wine, broke
the instruments, beat the musicians, and dishonored, with infamous
suspicions, the associates of every handsome youth. In each profession,
which allowed room for two persons, the one was a votary, the other an
antagonist, of Ali; and the Abbassides were awakened by the clamorous
grief of the sectaries, who denied their title, and cursed their
progenitors. A turbulent people could only be repressed by a military
force; but who could satisfy the avarice or assert the discipline of the
mercenaries themselves? The African and the Turkish guards drew their
swords against each other, and the chief commanders, the emirs al Omra,
imprisoned or deposed their sovereigns, and violated the sanctuary of
the mosch and harem. If the caliphs escaped to the camp or court of any
neighboring prince, their deliverance was a change of servitude, till
they were prompted by despair to invite the Bowides, the sultans of
Persia, who silenced the factions of Bagdad by their irresistible arms.
The civil and military powers were assumed by Moezaldowlat, the second
of the three brothers, and a stipend of sixty thousand pounds sterling
was assigned by his generosity for the private expense of the commander
of the faithful. But on the fortieth day, at the audience of the
ambassadors of Chorasan, and in the presence of a trembling multitude,
the caliph was dragged from his throne to a dungeon, by the command of
the stranger, and the rude hands of his Dilemites. His palace was
pillaged, his eyes were put out, and the mean ambition of the Abbassides
aspired to the vacant station of danger and disgrace. In the school of
adversity, the luxurious caliphs resumed the grave and abstemious
virtues of the primitive times. Despoiled of their armor and silken
robes, they fasted, they prayed, they studied the Koran and the
tradition of the Sonnites: they performed, with zeal and knowledge, the
functions of their ecclesiastical character. The respect of nations
still waited on the successors of the apostle, the oracles of the law
and conscience of the faithful; and the weakness or division of their
tyrants sometimes restored the Abbassides to the sovereignty of Bagdad.
But their misfortunes had been imbittered by the triumph of the
Fatimites, the real or spurious progeny of Ali. Arising from the
extremity of Africa, these successful rivals extinguished, in Egypt and
Syria, both the spiritual and temporal authority of the Abbassides; and
the monarch of the Nile insulted the humble pontiff on the banks of the
Tigris.

In the declining age of the caliphs, in the century which elapsed after
the war of Theophilus and Motassem, the hostile transactions of the two
nations were confined to some inroads by sea and land, the fruits of
their close vicinity and indelible hatred. But when the Eastern world
was convulsed and broken, the Greeks were roused from their lethargy by
the hopes of conquest and revenge. The Byzantine empire, since the
accession of the Basilian race, had reposed in peace and dignity; and
they might encounter with their entire strength the front of some petty
emir, whose rear was assaulted and threatened by his national foes of
the Mahometan faith. The lofty titles of the morning star, and the death
of the Saracens,  were applied in the public acclamations to Nicephorus
Phocas, a prince as renowned in the camp, as he was unpopular in the
city. In the subordinate station of great domestic, or general of the
East, he reduced the Island of Crete, and extirpated the nest of pirates
who had so long defied, with impunity, the majesty of the empire.  His
military genius was displayed in the conduct and success of the
enterprise, which had so often failed with loss and dishonor. The
Saracens were confounded by the landing of his troops on safe and level
bridges, which he cast from the vessels to the shore. Seven months were
consumed in the siege of Candia; the despair of the native Cretans was
stimulated by the frequent aid of their brethren of Africa and Spain;
and after the massy wall and double ditch had been stormed by the Greeks
a hopeless conflict was still maintained in the streets and houses of
the city. * The whole island was subdued in the capital, and a
submissive people accepted, without resistance, the baptism of the
conqueror.  Constantinople applauded the long-forgotten pomp of a
triumph; but the Imperial diadem was the sole reward that could repay
the services, or satisfy the ambition, of Nicephorus.

After the death of the younger Romanus, the fourth in lineal descent of
the Basilian race, his widow Theophania successively married Nicephorus
Phocas and his assassin John Zimisces, the two heroes of the age. They
reigned as the guardians and colleagues of her infant sons; and the
twelve years of their military command form the most splendid period of
the Byzantine annals. The subjects and confederates, whom they led to
war, appeared, at least in the eyes of an enemy, two hundred thousand
strong; and of these about thirty thousand were armed with cuirasses:  a
train of four thousand mules attended their march; and their evening
camp was regularly fortified with an enclosure of iron spikes. A series
of bloody and undecisive combats is nothing more than an anticipation of
what would have been effected in a few years by the course of nature;
but I shall briefly prosecute the conquests of the two emperors from the
hills of Cappadocia to the desert of Bagdad. The sieges of Mopsuestia
and Tarsus, in Cilicia, first exercised the skill and perseverance of
their troops, on whom, at this moment, I shall not hesitate to bestow
the name of Romans. In the double city of Mopsuestia, which is divided
by the River Sarus, two hundred thousand Moslems were predestined to
death or slavery,  a surprising degree of population, which must at
least include the inhabitants of the dependent districts. They were
surrounded and taken by assault; but Tarsus was reduced by the slow
progress of famine; and no sooner had the Saracens yielded on honorable
terms than they were mortified by the distant and unprofitable view of
the naval succors of Egypt. They were dismissed with a safe-conduct to
the confines of Syria: a part of the old Christians had quietly lived
under their dominion; and the vacant habitations were replenished by a
new colony. But the mosch was converted into a stable; the pulpit was
delivered to the flames; many rich crosses of gold and gems, the spoils
of Asiatic churches, were made a grateful offering to the piety or
avarice of the emperor; and he transported the gates of Mopsuestia and
Tarsus, which were fixed in the walls of Constantinople, an eternal
monument of his victory. After they had forced and secured the narrow
passes of Mount Amanus, the two Roman princes repeatedly carried their
arms into the heart of Syria. Yet, instead of assaulting the walls of
Antioch, the humanity or superstition of Nicephorus appeared to respect
the ancient metropolis of the East: he contented himself with drawing
round the city a line of circumvallation; left a stationary army; and
instructed his lieutenant to expect, without impatience, the return of
spring. But in the depth of winter, in a dark and rainy night, an
adventurous subaltern, with three hundred soldiers, approached the
rampart, applied his scaling-ladders, occupied two adjacent towers,
stood firm against the pressure of multitudes, and bravely maintained
his post till he was relieved by the tardy, though effectual, support of
his reluctant chief. The first tumult of slaughter and rapine subsided;
the reign of Cæsar and of Christ was restored; and the efforts of a
hundred thousand Saracens, of the armies of Syria and the fleets of
Africa, were consumed without effect before the walls of Antioch. The
royal city of Aleppo was subject to Seifeddowlat, of the dynasty of
Hamadan, who clouded his past glory by the precipitate retreat which
abandoned his kingdom and capital to the Roman invaders. In his stately
palace, that stood without the walls of Aleppo, they joyfully seized a
well-furnished magazine of arms, a stable of fourteen hundred mules, and
three hundred bags of silver and gold. But the walls of the city
withstood the strokes of their battering-rams: and the besiegers pitched
their tents on the neighboring mountain of Jaushan. Their retreat
exasperated the quarrel of the townsmen and mercenaries; the guard of
the gates and ramparts was deserted; and while they furiously charged
each other in the market-place, they were surprised and destroyed by the
sword of a common enemy. The male sex was exterminated by the sword; ten
thousand youths were led into captivity; the weight of the precious
spoil exceeded the strength and number of the beasts of burden; the
superfluous remainder was burnt; and, after a licentious possession of
ten days, the Romans marched away from the naked and bleeding city. In
their Syrian inroads they commanded the husbandmen to cultivate their
lands, that they themselves, in the ensuing season, might reap the
benefit; more than a hundred cities were reduced to obedience; and
eighteen pulpits of the principal moschs were committed to the flames to
expiate the sacrilege of the disciples of Mahomet. The classic names of
Hierapolis, Apamea, and Emesa, revive for a moment in the list of
conquest: the emperor Zimisces encamped in the paradise of Damascus, and
accepted the ransom of a submissive people; and the torrent was only
stopped by the impregnable fortress of Tripoli, on the sea-coast of
Phnicia. Since the days of Heraclius, the Euphrates, below the passage
of Mount Taurus, had been impervious, and almost invisible, to the
Greeks. The river yielded a free passage to the victorious Zimisces; and
the historian may imitate the speed with which he overran the once
famous cities of Samosata, Edessa, Martyropolis, Amida,  and Nisibis,
the ancient limit of the empire in the neighborhood of the Tigris. His
ardor was quickened by the desire of grasping the virgin treasures of
Ecbatana,  a well-known name, under which the Byzantine writer has
concealed the capital of the Abbassides. The consternation of the
fugitives had already diffused the terror of his name; but the fancied
riches of Bagdad had already been dissipated by the avarice and
prodigality of domestic tyrants. The prayers of the people, and the
stern demands of the lieutenant of the Bowides, required the caliph to
provide for the defence of the city. The helpless Mothi replied, that
his arms, his revenues, and his provinces, had been torn from his hands,
and that he was ready to abdicate a dignity which he was unable to
support. The emir was inexorable; the furniture of the palace was sold;
and the paltry price of forty thousand pieces of gold was instantly
consumed in private luxury. But the apprehensions of Bagdad were
relieved by the retreat of the Greeks: thirst and hunger guarded the
desert of Mesopotamia; and the emperor, satiated with glory, and laden
with Oriental spoils, returned to Constantinople, and displayed, in his
triumph, the silk, the aromatics, and three hundred myriads of gold and
silver. Yet the powers of the East had been bent, not broken, by this
transient hurricane. After the departure of the Greeks, the fugitive
princes returned to their capitals; the subjects disclaimed their
involuntary oaths of allegiance; the Moslems again purified their
temples, and overturned the idols of the saints and martyrs; the
Nestorians and Jacobites preferred a Saracen to an orthodox master; and
the numbers and spirit of the Melchites were inadequate to the support
of the church and state. Of these extensive conquests, Antioch, with the
cities of Cilicia and the Isle of Cyprus, was alone restored, a
permanent and useful accession to the Roman empire.

Chapter LIII: Fate Of The Eastern Empire.

Part I.

Fate Of The Eastern Empire In The Tenth Century. -- Extent And Division.
-- Wealth And Revenue. -- Palace Of Constantinople. -- Titles And
Offices. -- Pride And Power Of The Emperors. -- Tactics Of The Greeks,
Arabs, And Franks. -- Loss Of The Latin Tongue. -- Studies And Solitude
Of The Greeks.

A ray of historic light seems to beam from the darkness of the tenth
century. We open with curiosity and respect the royal volumes of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus,  which he composed at a mature age for the
instruction of his son, and which promise to unfold the state of the
eastern empire, both in peace and war, both at home and abroad. In the
first of these works he minutely describes the pompous ceremonies of the
church and palace of Constantinople, according to his own practice, and
that of his predecessors.  In the second, he attempts an accurate survey
of the provinces, the themes, as they were then denominated, both of
Europe and Asia.  The system of Roman tactics, the discipline and order
of the troops, and the military operations by land and sea, are
explained in the third of these didactic collections, which may be
ascribed to Constantine or his father Leo.  In the fourth, of the
administration of the empire, he reveals the secrets of the Byzantine
policy, in friendly or hostile intercourse with the nations of the
earth. The literary labors of the age, the practical systems of law,
agriculture, and history, might redound to the benefit of the subject
and the honor of the Macedonian princes. The sixty books of the
Basilics,  the code and pandects of civil jurisprudence, were gradually
framed in the three first reigns of that prosperous dynasty. The art of
agriculture had amused the leisure, and exercised the pens, of the best
and wisest of the ancients; and their chosen precepts are comprised in
the twenty books of the Geoponicsof Constantine. At his command, the
historical examples of vice and virtue were methodized in fifty-three
books,  and every citizen might apply, to his contemporaries or himself,
the lesson or the warning of past times. From the august character of a
legislator, the sovereign of the East descends to the more humble office
of a teacher and a scribe; and if his successors and subjects were
regardless of his paternal cares, wemay inherit and enjoy the
everlasting legacy.

A closer survey will indeed reduce the value of the gift, and the
gratitude of posterity: in the possession of these Imperial treasures we
may still deplore our poverty and ignorance; and the fading glories of
their authors will be obliterated by indifference or contempt. The
Basilics will sink to a broken copy, a partial and mutilated version, in
the Greek language, of the laws of Justinian; but the sense of the old
civilians is often superseded by the influence of bigotry: and the
absolute prohibition of divorce, concubinage, and interest for money,
enslaves the freedom of trade and the happiness of private life. In the
historical book, a subject of Constantine might admire the inimitable
virtues of Greece and Rome: he might learn to what a pitch of energy and
elevation the human character had formerly aspired. But a contrary
effect must have been produced by a new edition of the lives of the
saints, which the great logothete, or chancellor of the empire, was
directed to prepare; and the dark fund of superstition was enriched by
the fabulous and florid legends of Simon the Metaphrast.  The merits and
miracles of the whole calendar are of less account in the eyes of a
sage, than the toil of a single husbandman, who multiplies the gifts of
the Creator, and supplies the food of his brethren. Yet the royal
authors of the Geoponicswere more seriously employed in expounding the
precepts of the destroying art, which had been taught since the days of
Xenophon,  as the art of heroes and kings. But the Tacticsof Leo and
Constantine are mingled with the baser alloy of the age in which they
lived. It was destitute of original genius; they implicitly transcribe
the rules and maxims which had been confirmed by victories. It was
unskilled in the propriety of style and method; they blindly confound
the most distant and discordant institutions, the phalanx of Sparta and
that of Macedon, the legions of Cato and Trajan, of Augustus and
Theodosius. Even the use, or at least the importance, of these military
rudiments may be fairly questioned: their general theory is dictated by
reason; but the merit, as well as difficulty, consists in the
application. The discipline of a soldier is formed by exercise rather
than by study: the talents of a commander are appropriated to those
calm, though rapid, minds, which nature produces to decide the fate of
armies and nations: the former is the habit of a life, the latter the
glance of a moment; and the battles won by lessons of tactics may be
numbered with the epic poems created from the rules of criticism. The
book of ceremonies is a recital, tedious yet imperfect, of the
despicable pageantry which had infected the church and state since the
gradual decay of the purity of the one and the power of the other. A
review of the themes or provinces might promise such authentic and
useful information, as the curiosity of government only can obtain,
instead of traditionary fables on the origin of the cities, and
malicious epigrams on the vices of their inhabitants.  Such information
the historian would have been pleased to record; nor should his silence
be condemned if the most interesting objects, the population of the
capital and provinces, the amount of the taxes and revenues, the numbers
of subjects and strangers who served under the Imperial standard, have
been unnoticed by Leo the philosopher, and his son Constantine. His
treatise of the public administration is stained with the same
blemishes; yet it is discriminated by peculiar merit; the antiquities of
the nations may be doubtful or fabulous; but the geography and manners
of the Barbaric world are delineated with curious accuracy. Of these
nations, the Franks alone were qualified to observe in their turn, and
to describe, the metropolis of the East. The ambassador of the great
Otho, a bishop of Cremona, has painted the state of Constantinople about
the middle of the tenth century: his style is glowing, his narrative
lively, his observation keen; and even the prejudices and passions of
Liutprand are stamped with an original character of freedom and genius.
From this scanty fund of foreign and domestic materials, I shall
investigate the form and substance of the Byzantine empire; the
provinces and wealth, the civil government and military force, the
character and literature, of the Greeks in a period of six hundred
years, from the reign of Heraclius to his successful invasion of the
Franks or Latins.

After the final division between the sons of Theodosius, the swarms of
Barbarians from Scythia and Germany over-spread the provinces and
extinguished the empire of ancient Rome. The weakness of Constantinople
was concealed by extent of dominion: her limits were inviolate, or at
least entire; and the kingdom of Justinian was enlarged by the splendid
acquisition of Africa and Italy. But the possession of these new
conquests was transient and precarious; and almost a moiety of the
Eastern empire was torn away by the arms of the Saracens. Syria and
Egypt were oppressed by the Arabian caliphs; and, after the reduction of
Africa, their lieutenants invaded and subdued the Roman province which
had been changed into the Gothic monarchy of Spain. The islands of the
Mediterranean were not inaccessible to their naval powers; and it was
from their extreme stations, the harbors of Crete and the fortresses of
Cilicia, that the faithful or rebel emirs insulted the majesty of the
throne and capital. The remaining provinces, under the obedience of the
emperors, were cast into a new mould; and the jurisdiction of the
presidents, the consulars, and the counts were superseded by the
institution of the themes,  or military governments, which prevailed
under the successors of Heraclius, and are described by the pen of the
royal author. Of the twenty-nine themes, twelve in Europe and seventeen
in Asia, the origin is obscure, the etymology doubtful or capricious:
the limits were arbitrary and fluctuating; but some particular names,
that sound the most strangely to our ear, were derived from the
character and attributes of the troops that were maintained at the
expense, and for the guard, of the respective divisions. The vanity of
the Greek princes most eagerly grasped the shadow of conquest and the
memory of lost dominion. A new Mesopotamia was created on the western
side of the Euphrates: the appellation and prætor of Sicily were
transferred to a narrow slip of Calabria; and a fragment of the duchy of
Beneventum was promoted to the style and title of the theme of Lombardy.
In the decline of the Arabian empire, the successors of Constantine
might indulge their pride in more solid advantages. The victories of
Nicephorus, John Zimisces, and Basil the Second, revived the fame, and
enlarged the boundaries, of the Roman name: the province of Cilicia, the
metropolis of Antioch, the islands of Crete and Cyprus, were restored to
the allegiance of Christ and Cæsar: one third of Italy was annexed to
the throne of Constantinople: the kingdom of Bulgaria was destroyed; and
the last sovereigns of the Macedonian dynasty extended their sway from
the sources of the Tigris to the neighborhood of Rome. In the eleventh
century, the prospect was again clouded by new enemies and new
misfortunes: the relics of Italy were swept away by the Norman
adventures; and almost all the Asiatic branches were dissevered from the
Roman trunk by the Turkish conquerors. After these losses, the emperors
of the Comnenian family continued to reign from the Danube to
Peloponnesus, and from Belgrade to Nice, Trebizond, and the winding
stream of the Meander. The spacious provinces of Thrace, Macedonia, and
Greece, were obedient to their sceptre; the possession of Cyprus,
Rhodes, and Crete, was accompanied by the fifty islands of the Ægean or
Holy Sea;  and the remnant of their empire transcends the measure of the
largest of the European kingdoms.

The same princes might assert, with dignity and truth, that of all the
monarchs of Christendom they possessed the greatest city,  the most
ample revenue, the most flourishing and populous state. With the decline
and fall of the empire, the cities of the West had decayed and fallen;
nor could the ruins of Rome, or the mud walls, wooden hovels, and narrow
precincts of Paris and London, prepare the Latin stranger to contemplate
the situation and extent of Constantinople, her stately palaces and
churches, and the arts and luxury of an innumerable people. Her
treasures might attract, but her virgin strength had repelled, and still
promised to repel, the audacious invasion of the Persian and Bulgarian,
the Arab and the Russian. The provinces were less fortunate and
impregnable; and few districts, few cities, could be discovered which
had not been violated by some fierce Barbarian, impatient to despoil,
because he was hopeless to possess. From the age of Justinian the
Eastern empire was sinking below its former level; the powers of
destruction were more active than those of improvement; and the
calamities of war were imbittered by the more permanent evils of civil
and ecclesiastical tyranny. The captive who had escaped from the
Barbarians was often stripped and imprisoned by the ministers of his
sovereign: the Greek superstition relaxed the mind by prayer, and
emaciated the body by fasting; and the multitude of convents and
festivals diverted many hands and many days from the temporal service of
mankind. Yet the subjects of the Byzantine empire were still the most
dexterous and diligent of nations; their country was blessed by nature
with every advantage of soil, climate, and situation; and, in the
support and restoration of the arts, their patient and peaceful temper
was more useful than the warlike spirit and feudal anarchy of Europe.
The provinces that still adhered to the empire were repeopled and
enriched by the misfortunes of those which were irrecoverably lost. From
the yoke of the caliphs, the Catholics of Syria, Egypt, and Africa
retired to the allegiance of their prince, to the society of their
brethren: the movable wealth, which eludes the search of oppression,
accompanied and alleviated their exile, and Constantinople received into
her bosom the fugitive trade of Alexandria and Tyre. The chiefs of
Armenia and Scythia, who fled from hostile or religious persecution,
were hospitably entertained: their followers were encouraged to build
new cities and to cultivate waste lands; and many spots, both in Europe
and Asia, preserved the name, the manners, or at least the memory, of
these national colonies. Even the tribes of Barbarians, who had seated
themselves in arms on the territory of the empire, were gradually
reclaimed to the laws of the church and state; and as long as they were
separated from the Greeks, their posterity supplied a race of faithful
and obedient soldiers. Did we possess sufficient materials to survey the
twenty-nine themes of the Byzantine monarchy, our curiosity might be
satisfied with a chosen example: it is fortunate enough that the
clearest light should be thrown on the most interesting province, and
the name of Peloponnesus will awaken the attention of the classic
reader.

As early as the eighth century, in the troubled reign of the
Iconoclasts, Greece, and even Peloponnesus,  were overrun by some
Sclavonian bands who outstripped the royal standard of Bulgaria. The
strangers of old, Cadmus, and Danaus, and Pelops, had planted in that
fruitful soil the seeds of policy and learning; but the savages of the
north eradicated what yet remained of their sickly and withered roots.
In this irruption, the country and the inhabitants were transformed; the
Grecian blood was contaminated; and the proudest nobles of Peloponnesus
were branded with the names of foreigners and slaves. By the diligence
of succeeding princes, the land was in some measure purified from the
Barbarians; and the humble remnant was bound by an oath of obedience,
tribute, and military service, which they often renewed and often
violated. The siege of Patras was formed by a singular concurrence of
the Sclavonians of Peloponnesus and the Saracens of Africa. In their
last distress, a pious fiction of the approach of the prætor of Corinth
revived the courage of the citizens. Their sally was bold and
successful; the strangers embarked, the rebels submitted, and the glory
of the day was ascribed to a phantom or a stranger, who fought in the
foremost ranks under the character of St. Andrew the Apostle. The shrine
which contained his relics was decorated with the trophies of victory,
and the captive race was forever devoted to the service and vassalage of
the metropolitan church of Patras. By the revolt of two Sclavonian
tribes, in the neighborhood of Helos and Lacedæmon, the peace of the
peninsula was often disturbed. They sometimes insulted the weakness, and
sometimes resisted the oppression, of the Byzantine government, till at
length the approach of their hostile brethren extorted a golden bull to
define the rites and obligations of the Ezzerites and Milengi, whose
annual tribute was defined at twelve hundred pieces of gold. From these
strangers the Imperial geographer has accurately distinguished a
domestic, and perhaps original, race, who, in some degree, might derive
their blood from the much-injured Helots. The liberality of the Romans,
and especially of Augustus, had enfranchised the maritime cities from
the dominion of Sparta; and the continuance of the same benefit ennobled
them with the title of Eleuthero, or Free-Laconians.  In the time of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus, they had acquired the name of Mainotes,
under which they dishonor the claim of liberty by the inhuman pillage of
all that is shipwrecked on their rocky shores. Their territory, barren
of corn, but fruitful of olives, extended to the Cape of Malea: they
accepted a chief or prince from the Byzantine prætor, and a light
tribute of four hundred pieces of gold was the badge of their immunity,
rather than of their dependence. The freemen of Laconia assumed the
character of Romans, and long adhered to the religion of the Greeks. By
the zeal of the emperor Basil, they were baptized in the faith of
Christ: but the altars of Venus and Neptune had been crowned by these
rustic votaries five hundred years after they were proscribed in the
Roman world. In the theme of Peloponnesus,  forty cities were still
numbered, and the declining state of Sparta, Argos, and Corinth, may be
suspended in the tenth century, at an equal distance, perhaps, between
their antique splendor and their present desolation. The duty of
military service, either in person or by substitute, was imposed on the
lands or benefices of the province; a sum of five pieces of gold was
assessed on each of the substantial tenants; and the same capitation was
shared among several heads of inferior value. On the proclamation of an
Italian war, the Peloponnesians excused themselves by a voluntary
oblation of one hundred pounds of gold, (four thousand pounds sterling,)
and a thousand horses with their arms and trappings. The churches and
monasteries furnished their contingent; a sacrilegious profit was
extorted from the sale of ecclesiastical honors; and the indigent bishop
of Leucadia  was made responsible for a pension of one hundred pieces of
gold.

But the wealth of the province, and the trust of the revenue, were
founded on the fair and plentiful produce of trade and manufacturers;
and some symptoms of liberal policy may be traced in a law which exempts
from all personal taxes the mariners of Peloponnesus, and the workmen in
parchment and purple. This denomination may be fairly applied or
extended to the manufacturers of linen, woollen, and more especially of
silk: the two former of which had flourished in Greece since the days of
Homer; and the last was introduced perhaps as early as the reign of
Justinian. These arts, which were exercised at Corinth, Thebes, and
Argos, afforded food and occupation to a numerous people: the men,
women, and children were distributed according to their age and
strength; and, if many of these were domestic slaves, their masters, who
directed the work and enjoyed the profit, were of a free and honorable
condition. The gifts which a rich and generous matron of Peloponnesus
presented to the emperor Basil, her adopted son, were doubtless
fabricated in the Grecian looms. Danielis bestowed a carpet of fine
wool, of a pattern which imitated the spots of a peacock's tail, of a
magnitude to overspread the floor of a new church, erected in the triple
name of Christ, of Michael the archangel, and of the prophet Elijah. She
gave six hundred pieces of silk and linen, of various use and
denomination: the silk was painted with the Tyrian dye, and adorned by
the labors of the needle; and the linen was so exquisitely fine, that an
entire piece might be rolled in the hollow of a cane.  In his
description of the Greek manufactures, an historian of Sicily
discriminates their price, according to the weight and quality of the
silk, the closeness of the texture, the beauty of the colors, and the
taste and materials of the embroidery. A single, or even a double or
treble thread was thought sufficient for ordinary sale; but the union of
six threads composed a piece of stronger and more costly workmanship.
Among the colors, he celebrates, with affectation of eloquence, the
fiery blaze of the scarlet, and the softer lustre of the green. The
embroidery was raised either in silk or gold: the more simple ornament
of stripes or circles was surpassed by the nicer imitation of flowers:
the vestments that were fabricated for the palace or the altar often
glittered with precious stones; and the figures were delineated in
strings of Oriental pearls.  Till the twelfth century, Greece alone, of
all the countries of Christendom, was possessed of the insect who is
taught by nature, and of the workmen who are instructed by art, to
prepare this elegant luxury. But the secret had been stolen by the
dexterity and diligence of the Arabs: the caliphs of the East and West
scorned to borrow from the unbelievers their furniture and apparel; and
two cities of Spain, Almeria and Lisbon, were famous for the
manufacture, the use, and, perhaps, the exportation, of silk. It was
first introduced into Sicily by the Normans; and this emigration of
trade distinguishes the victory of Roger from the uniform and fruitless
hostilities of every age. After the sack of Corinth, Athens, and Thebes,
his lieutenant embarked with a captive train of weavers and artificers
of both sexes, a trophy glorious to their master, and disgraceful to the
Greek emperor.  The king of Sicily was not insensible of the value of
the present; and, in the restitution of the prisoners, he excepted only
the male and female manufacturers of Thebes and Corinth, who labor, says
the Byzantine historian, under a barbarous lord, like the old Eretrians
in the service of Darius.  A stately edifice, in the palace of Palermo,
was erected for the use of this industrious colony;  and the art was
propagated by their children and disciples to satisfy the increasing
demand of the western world. The decay of the looms of Sicily may be
ascribed to the troubles of the island, and the competition of the
Italian cities. In the year thirteen hundred and fourteen, Lucca alone,
among her sister republics, enjoyed the lucrative monopoly.  A domestic
revolution dispersed the manufacturers to Florence, Bologna, Venice,
Milan, and even the countries beyond the Alps; and thirteen years after
this event the statutes of Modena enjoin the planting of mulberry-trees,
and regulate the duties on raw silk.  The northern climates are less
propitious to the education of the silkworm; but the industry of France
and England  is supplied and enriched by the productions of Italy and
China.

Chapter LIII: Fate Of The Eastern Empire. -- Part II.

I must repeat the complaint that the vague and scanty memorials of the
times will not afford any just estimate of the taxes, the revenue, and
the resources of the Greek empire. From every province of Europe and
Asia the rivulets of gold and silver discharged into the Imperial
reservoir a copious and perennial stream. The separation of the branches
from the trunk increased the relative magnitude of Constantinople; and
the maxims of despotism contracted the state to the capital, the capital
to the palace, and the palace to the royal person. A Jewish traveller,
who visited the East in the twelfth century, is lost in his admiration
of the Byzantine riches. "It is here," says Benjamin of Tudela, "in the
queen of cities, that the tributes of the Greek empire are annually
deposited and the lofty towers are filled with precious magazines of
silk, purple, and gold. It is said, that Constantinople pays each day to
her sovereign twenty thousand pieces of gold; which are levied on the
shops, taverns, and markets, on the merchants of Persia and Egypt, of
Russia and Hungary, of Italy and Spain, who frequent the capital by sea
and land."  In all pecuniary matters, the authority of a Jew is
doubtless respectable; but as the three hundred and sixty-five days
would produce a yearly income exceeding seven millions sterling, I am
tempted to retrench at least the numerous festivals of the Greek
calendar. The mass of treasure that was saved by Theodora and Basil the
Second will suggest a splendid, though indefinite, idea of their
supplies and resources. The mother of Michael, before she retired to a
cloister, attempted to check or expose the prodigality of her ungrateful
son, by a free and faithful account of the wealth which he inherited;
one hundred and nine thousand pounds of gold, and three hundred thousand
of silver, the fruits of her own economy and that of her deceased
husband.  The avarice of Basil is not less renowned than his valor and
fortune: his victorious armies were paid and rewarded without breaking
into the mass of two hundred thousand pounds of gold, (about eight
millions sterling,) which he had buried in the subterraneous vaults of
the palace.  Such accumulation of treasure is rejected by the theory and
practice of modern policy; and we are more apt to compute the national
riches by the use and abuse of the public credit. Yet the maxims of
antiquity are still embraced by a monarch formidable to his enemies; by
a republic respectable to her allies; and both have attained their
respective ends of military power and domestic tranquillity.

Whatever might be consumed for the present wants, or reserved for the
future use, of the state, the first and most sacred demand was for the
pomp and pleasure of the emperor, and his discretion only could define
the measure of his private expense. The princes of Constantinople were
far removed from the simplicity of nature; yet, with the revolving
seasons, they were led by taste or fashion to withdraw to a purer air,
from the smoke and tumult of the capital. They enjoyed, or affected to
enjoy, the rustic festival of the vintage: their leisure was amused by
the exercise of the chase and the calmer occupation of fishing, and in
the summer heats, they were shaded from the sun, and refreshed by the
cooling breezes from the sea. The coasts and islands of Asia and Europe
were covered with their magnificent villas; but, instead of the modest
art which secretly strives to hide itself and to decorate the scenery of
nature, the marble structure of their gardens served only to expose the
riches of the lord, and the labors of the architect. The successive
casualties of inheritance and forfeiture had rendered the sovereign
proprietor of many stately houses in the city and suburbs, of which
twelve were appropriated to the ministers of state; but the great
palace,  the centre of the Imperial residence, was fixed during eleven
centuries to the same position, between the hippodrome, the cathedral of
St. Sophia, and the gardens, which descended by many a terrace to the
shores of the Propontis. The primitive edifice of the first Constantine
was a copy, or rival, of ancient Rome; the gradual improvements of his
successors aspired to emulate the wonders of the old world,  and in the
tenth century, the Byzantine palace excited the admiration, at least of
the Latins, by an unquestionable preëminence of strength, size, and
magnificence.  But the toil and treasure of so many ages had produced a
vast and irregular pile: each separate building was marked with the
character of the times and of the founder; and the want of space might
excuse the reigning monarch, who demolished, perhaps with secret
satisfaction, the works of his predecessors. The economy of the emperor
Theophilus allowed a more free and ample scope for his domestic luxury
and splendor. A favorite ambassador, who had astonished the Abbassides
themselves by his pride and liberality, presented on his return the
model of a palace, which the caliph of Bagdad had recently constructed
on the banks of the Tigris. The model was instantly copied and
surpassed: the new buildings of Theophilus  were accompanied with
gardens, and with five churches, one of which was conspicuous for size
and beauty: it was crowned with three domes, the roof of gilt brass
reposed on columns of Italian marble, and the walls were incrusted with
marbles of various colors. In the face of the church, a semicircular
portico, of the figure and name of the Greek sigma, was supported by
fifteen columns of Phrygian marble, and the subterraneous vaults were of
a similar construction. The square before the sigma was decorated with a
fountain, and the margin of the basin was lined and encompassed with
plates of silver. In the beginning of each season, the basin, instead of
water, was replenished with the most exquisite fruits, which were
abandoned to the populace for the entertainment of the prince. He
enjoyed this tumultuous spectacle from a throne resplendent with gold
and gems, which was raised by a marble staircase to the height of a
lofty terrace. Below the throne were seated the officers of his guards,
the magistrates, the chiefs of the factions of the circus; the inferior
steps were occupied by the people, and the place below was covered with
troops of dancers, singers, and pantomimes. The square was surrounded by
the hall of justice, the arsenal, and the various offices of business
and pleasure; and the purplechamber was named from the annual
distribution of robes of scarlet and purple by the hand of the empress
herself. The long series of the apartments was adapted to the seasons,
and decorated with marble and porphyry, with painting, sculpture, and
mosaics, with a profusion of gold, silver, and precious stones. His
fanciful magnificence employed the skill and patience of such artists as
the times could afford: but the taste of Athens would have despised
their frivolous and costly labors; a golden tree, with its leaves and
branches, which sheltered a multitude of birds warbling their artificial
notes, and two lions of massy gold, and of natural size, who looked and
roared like their brethren of the forest. The successors of Theophilus,
of the Basilian and Comnenian dynasties, were not less ambitious of
leaving some memorial of their residence; and the portion of the palace
most splendid and august was dignified with the title of the golden
triclinium.  With becoming modesty, the rich and noble Greeks aspired to
imitate their sovereign, and when they passed through the streets on
horseback, in their robes of silk and embroidery, they were mistaken by
the children for kings.  A matron of Peloponnesus,  who had cherished
the infant fortunes of Basil the Macedonian, was excited by tenderness
or vanity to visit the greatness of her adopted son. In a journey of
five hundred miles from Patras to Constantinople, her age or indolence
declined the fatigue of a horse or carriage: the soft litter or bed of
Danielis was transported on the shoulders of ten robust slaves; and as
they were relieved at easy distances, a band of three hundred were
selected for the performance of this service. She was entertained in the
Byzantine palace with filial reverence, and the honors of a queen; and
whatever might be the origin of her wealth, her gifts were not unworthy
of the regal dignity. I have already described the fine and curious
manufactures of Peloponnesus, of linen, silk, and woollen; but the most
acceptable of her presents consisted in three hundred beautiful youths,
of whom one hundred were eunuchs;  "for she was not ignorant," says the
historian, "that the air of the palace is more congenial to such
insects, than a shepherd's dairy to the flies of the summer." During her
lifetime, she bestowed the greater part of her estates in Peloponnesus,
and her testament instituted Leo, the son of Basil, her universal heir.
After the payment of the legacies, fourscore villas or farms were added
to the Imperial domain; and three thousand slaves of Danielis were
enfranchised by their new lord, and transplanted as a colony to the
Italian coast. From this example of a private matron, we may estimate
the wealth and magnificence of the emperors. Yet our enjoyments are
confined by a narrow circle; and, whatsoever may be its value, the
luxury of life is possessed with more innocence and safety by the master
of his own, than by the steward of the public, fortune.

In an absolute government, which levels the distinctions of noble and
plebeian birth, the sovereign is the sole fountain of honor; and the
rank, both in the palace and the empire, depends on the titles and
offices which are bestowed and resumed by his arbitrary will. Above a
thousand years, from Vespasian to Alexius Comnenus,  the Cæsarwas the
second person, or at least the second degree, after the supreme title of
Augustuswas more freely communicated to the sons and brothers of the
reigning monarch. To elude without violating his promise to a powerful
associate, the husband of his sister, and, without giving himself an
equal, to reward the piety of his brother Isaac, the crafty Alexius
interposed a new and supereminent dignity. The happy flexibility of the
Greek tongue allowed him to compound the names of Augustus and Emperor
(Sebastos and Autocrator,) and the union produces the sonorous title of
Sebastocrator. He was exalted above the Cæsar on the first step of the
throne: the public acclamations repeated his name; and he was only
distinguished from the sovereign by some peculiar ornaments of the head
and feet. The emperor alone could assume the purple or red buskins, and
the close diadem or tiara, which imitated the fashion of the Persian
kings.  It was a high pyramidal cap of cloth or silk, almost concealed
by a profusion of pearls and jewels: the crown was formed by a
horizontal circle and two arches of gold: at the summit, the point of
their intersection, was placed a globe or cross, and two strings or
lappets of pearl depended on either cheek. Instead of red, the buskins
of the Sebastocrator and Cæsar were green; and on their opencoronets or
crowns, the precious gems were more sparingly distributed. Beside and
below the Cæsar the fancy of Alexius created the Panhypersebastosand the
Protosebastos, whose sound and signification will satisfy a Grecian ear.
They imply a superiority and a priority above the simple name of
Augustus; and this sacred and primitive title of the Roman prince was
degraded to the kinsmen and servants of the Byzantine court. The
daughter of Alexius applauds, with fond complacency, this artful
gradation of hopes and honors; but the science of words is accessible to
the meanest capacity; and this vain dictionary was easily enriched by
the pride of his successors. To their favorite sons or brothers, they
imparted the more lofty appellation of Lord or Despot, which was
illustrated with new ornaments, and prerogatives, and placed immediately
after the person of the emperor himself. The five titles of, 1. Despot;
2. Sebastocrator; 3. Cæsar; 4. Panhypersebastos; and, 5. Protosebastos;
were usually confined to the princes of his blood: they were the
emanations of his majesty; but as they exercised no regular functions,
their existence was useless, and their authority precarious.

But in every monarchy the substantial powers of government must be
divided and exercised by the ministers of the palace and treasury, the
fleet and army. The titles alone can differ; and in the revolution of
ages, the counts and præfects, the prætor and quæstor, insensibly
descended, while their servants rose above their heads to the first
honors of the state. 1. In a monarchy, which refers every object to the
person of the prince, the care and ceremonies of the palace form the
most respectable department. The Curopalata,  so illustrious in the age
of Justinian, was supplanted by the Protovestiare, whose primitive
functions were limited to the custody of the wardrobe. From thence his
jurisdiction was extended over the numerous menials of pomp and luxury;
and he presided with his silver wand at the public and private audience.
2. In the ancient system of Constantine, the name of Logothete, or
accountant, was applied to the receivers of the finances: the principal
officers were distinguished as the Logothetes of the domain, of the
posts, the army, the private and public treasure; and the great
Logothete, the supreme guardian of the laws and revenues, is compared
with the chancellor of the Latin monarchies.  His discerning eye
pervaded the civil administration; and he was assisted, in due
subordination, by the eparch or præfect of the city, the first
secretary, and the keepers of the privy seal, the archives, and the red
or purple ink which was reserved for the sacred signature of the emperor
alone.  The introductor and interpreter of foreign ambassadors were the
great Chiaussand the Dragoman,  two names of Turkish origin, and which
are still familiar to the Sublime Porte. 3. From the humble style and
service of guards, the Domesticsinsensibly rose to the station of
generals; the military themes of the East and West, the legions of
Europe and Asia, were often divided, till the great Domestic was finally
invested with the universal and absolute command of the land forces. The
Protostrator, in his original functions, was the assistant of the
emperor when he mounted on horseback: he gradually became the lieutenant
of the great Domestic in the field; and his jurisdiction extended over
the stables, the cavalry, and the royal train of hunting and hawking.
The Stratopedarchwas the great judge of the camp: the
Protospathairecommanded the guards; the Constable,  the great Æteriarch,
and the Acolyth, were the separate chiefs of the Franks, the Barbarians,
and the Varangi, or English, the mercenary strangers, who, a the decay
of the national spirit, formed the nerve of the Byzantine armies. 4. The
naval powers were under the command of the great Duke; in his absence
they obeyed the great Drungaireof the fleet; and, in hisplace, the Emir,
or Admiral, a name of Saracen extraction,  but which has been
naturalized in all the modern languages of Europe. Of these officers,
and of many more whom it would be useless to enumerate, the civil and
military hierarchy was framed. Their honors and emoluments, their dress
and titles, their mutual salutations and respective preëminence, were
balanced with more exquisite labor than would have fixed the
constitution of a free people; and the code was almost perfect when this
baseless fabric, the monument of pride and servitude, was forever buried
in the ruins of the empire.

Chapter LIII: Fate Of The Eastern Empire. -- Part III.

The most lofty titles, and the most humble postures, which devotion has
applied to the Supreme Being, have been prostituted by flattery and fear
to creatures of the same nature with ourselves. The mode of adoration,
of falling prostrate on the ground, and kissing the feet of the emperor,
was borrowed by Diocletian from Persian servitude; but it was continued
and aggravated till the last age of the Greek monarchy. Excepting only
on Sundays, when it was waived, from a motive of religious pride, this
humiliating reverence was exacted from all who entered the royal
presence, from the princes invested with the diadem and purple, and from
the ambassadors who represented their independent sovereigns, the
caliphs of Asia, Egypt, or Spain, the kings of France and Italy, and the
Latin emperors of ancient Rome. In his transactions of business,
Liutprand, bishop of Cremona,  asserted the free spirit of a Frank and
the dignity of his master Otho. Yet his sincerity cannot disguise the
abasement of his first audience. When he approached the throne, the
birds of the golden tree began to warble their notes, which were
accompanied by the roarings of the two lions of gold. With his two
companions Liutprand was compelled to bow and to fall prostrate; and
thrice to touch the ground with his forehead. He arose, but in the short
interval, the throne had been hoisted from the floor to the ceiling, the
Imperial figure appeared in new and more gorgeous apparel, and the
interview was concluded in haughty and majestic silence. In this honest
and curious narrative, the Bishop of Cremona represents the ceremonies
of the Byzantine court, which are still practised in the Sublime Porte,
and which were preserved in the last age by the dukes of Muscovy or
Russia. After a long journey by sea and land, from Venice to
Constantinople, the ambassador halted at the golden gate, till he was
conducted by the formal officers to the hospitable palace prepared for
his reception; but this palace was a prison, and his jealous keepers
prohibited all social intercourse either with strangers or natives. At
his first audience, he offered the gifts of his master, slaves, and
golden vases, and costly armor. The ostentatious payment of the officers
and troops displayed before his eyes the riches of the empire: he was
entertained at a royal banquet,  in which the ambassadors of the nations
were marshalled by the esteem or contempt of the Greeks: from his own
table, the emperor, as the most signal favor, sent the plates which he
had tasted; and his favorites were dismissed with a robe of honor.  In
the morning and evening of each day, his civil and military servants
attended their duty in the palace; their labors were repaid by the
sight, perhaps by the smile, of their lord; his commands were signified
by a nod or a sign: but all earthly greatness stoodsilent and submissive
in his presence. In his regular or extraordinary processions through the
capital, he unveiled his person to the public view: the rites of policy
were connected with those of religion, and his visits to the principal
churches were regulated by the festivals of the Greek calendar. On the
eve of these processions, the gracious or devout intention of the
monarch was proclaimed by the heralds. The streets were cleared and
purified; the pavement was strewed with flowers; the most precious
furniture, the gold and silver plate, and silken hangings, were
displayed from the windows and balconies, and a severe discipline
restrained and silenced the tumult of the populace. The march was opened
by the military officers at the head of their troops: they were followed
in long order by the magistrates and ministers of the civil government:
the person of the emperor was guarded by his eunuchs and domestics, and
at the church door he was solemnly received by the patriarch and his
clergy. The task of applause was not abandoned to the rude and
spontaneous voices of the crowd. The most convenient stations were
occupied by the bands of the blue and green factions of the circus; and
their furious conflicts, which had shaken the capital, were insensibly
sunk to an emulation of servitude. From either side they echoed in
responsive melody the praises of the emperor; their poets and musicians
directed the choir, and long life  and victory were the burden of every
song. The same acclamations were performed at the audience, the banquet,
and the church; and as an evidence of boundless sway, they were repeated
in the Latin,  Gothic, Persian, French, and even English language,  by
the mercenaries who sustained the real or fictitious character of those
nations. By the pen of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, this science of form
and flattery has been reduced into a pompous and trifling volume,  which
the vanity of succeeding times might enrich with an ample supplement.
Yet the calmer reflection of a prince would surely suggest that the same
acclamations were applied to every character and every reign: and if he
had risen from a private rank, he might remember, that his own voice had
been the loudest and most eager in applause, at the very moment when he
envied the fortune, or conspired against the life, of his predecessor.

The princes of the North, of the nations, says Constantine, without
faith or fame, were ambitious of mingling their blood with the blood of
the Cæsars, by their marriage with a royal virgin, or by the nuptials of
their daughters with a Roman prince.  The aged monarch, in his
instructions to his son, reveals the secret maxims of policy and pride;
and suggests the most decent reasons for refusing these insolent and
unreasonable demands. Every animal, says the discreet emperor, is
prompted by the distinction of language, religion, and manners. A just
regard to the purity of descent preserves the harmony of public and
private life; but the mixture of foreign blood is the fruitful source of
disorder and discord. Such had ever been the opinion and practice of the
sage Romans: their jurisprudence proscribed the marriage of a citizen
and a stranger: in the days of freedom and virtue, a senator would have
scorned to match his daughter with a king: the glory of Mark Antony was
sullied by an Egyptian wife:  and the emperor Titus was compelled, by
popular censure, to dismiss with reluctance the reluctant Berenice.
This perpetual interdict was ratified by the fabulous sanction of the
great Constantine. The ambassadors of the nations, more especially of
the unbelieving nations, were solemnly admonished, that such strange
alliances had been condemned by the founder of the church and city. The
irrevocable law was inscribed on the altar of St. Sophia; and the
impious prince who should stain the majesty of the purple was excluded
from the civil and ecclesiastical communion of the Romans. If the
ambassadors were instructed by any false brethren in the Byzantine
history, they might produce three memorable examples of the violation of
this imaginary law: the marriage of Leo, or rather of his father
Constantine the Fourth, with the daughter of the king of the Chozars,
the nuptials of the granddaughter of Romanus with a Bulgarian prince,
and the union of Bertha of France or Italy with young Romanus, the son
of Constantine Porphyrogenitus himself. To these objections three
answers were prepared, which solved the difficulty and established the
law. I. The deed and the guilt of Constantine Copronymus were
acknowledged. The Isaurian heretic, who sullied the baptismal font, and
declared war against the holy images, had indeed embraced a Barbarian
wife. By this impious alliance he accomplished the measure of his
crimes, and was devoted to the just censure of the church and of
posterity. II. Romanus could not be alleged as a legitimate emperor; he
was a plebeian usurper, ignorant of the laws, and regardless of the
honor, of the monarchy. His son Christopher, the father of the bride,
was the third in rank in the college of princes, at once the subject and
the accomplice of a rebellious parent. The Bulgarians were sincere and
devout Christians; and the safety of the empire, with the redemption of
many thousand captives, depended on this preposterous alliance. Yet no
consideration could dispense from the law of Constantine: the clergy,
the senate, and the people, disapproved the conduct of Romanus; and he
was reproached, both in his life and death, as the author of the public
disgrace. III. For the marriage of his own son with the daughter of
Hugo, king of Italy, a more honorable defence is contrived by the wise
Porphyrogenitus. Constantine, the great and holy, esteemed the fidelity
and valor of the Franks;  and his prophetic spirit beheld the vision of
their future greatness. They alone were excepted from the general
prohibition: Hugo, king of France, was the lineal descendant of
Charlemagne;  and his daughter Bertha inherited the prerogatives of her
family and nation. The voice of truth and malice insensibly betrayed the
fraud or error of the Imperial court. The patrimonial estate of Hugo was
reduced from the monarchy of France to the simple county of Arles;
though it was not denied, that, in the confusion of the times, he had
usurped the sovereignty of Provence, and invaded the kingdom of Italy.
His father was a private noble; and if Bertha derived her female descent
from the Carlovingian line, every step was polluted with illegitimacy or
vice. The grandmother of Hugo was the famous Valdrada, the concubine,
rather than the wife, of the second Lothair; whose adultery, divorce,
and second nuptials, had provoked against him the thunders of the
Vatican. His mother, as she was styled, the great Bertha, was
successively the wife of the count of Arles and of the marquis of
Tuscany: France and Italy were scandalized by her gallantries; and, till
the age of threescore, her lovers, of every degree, were the zealous
servants of her ambition. The example of maternal incontinence was
copied by the king of Italy; and the three favorite concubines of Hugo
were decorated with the classic names of Venus, Juno, and Semele.  The
daughter of Venus was granted to the solicitations of the Byzantine
court: her name of Bertha was changed to that of Eudoxia; and she was
wedded, or rather betrothed, to young Romanus, the future heir of the
empire of the East. The consummation of this foreign alliance was
suspended by the tender age of the two parties; and, at the end of five
years, the union was dissolved by the death of the virgin spouse. The
second wife of the emperor Romanus was a maiden of plebeian, but of
Roman, birth; and their two daughters, Theophano and Anne, were given in
marriage to the princes of the earth. The eldest was bestowed, as the
pledge of peace, on the eldest son of the great Otho, who had solicited
this alliance with arms and embassies. It might legally be questioned
how far a Saxon was entitled to the privilege of the French nation; but
every scruple was silenced by the fame and piety of a hero who had
restored the empire of the West. After the death of her father-in-law
and husband, Theophano governed Rome, Italy, and Germany, during the
minority of her son, the third Otho; and the Latins have praised the
virtues of an empress, who sacrificed to a superior duty the remembrance
of her country.  In the nuptials of her sister Anne, every prejudice was
lost, and every consideration of dignity was superseded, by the stronger
argument of necessity and fear. A Pagan of the North, Wolodomir, great
prince of Russia, aspired to a daughter of the Roman purple; and his
claim was enforced by the threats of war, the promise of conversion, and
the offer of a powerful succor against a domestic rebel. A victim of her
religion and country, the Grecian princess was torn from the palace of
her fathers, and condemned to a savage reign, and a hopeless exile on
the banks of the Borysthenes, or in the neighborhood of the Polar
circle.  Yet the marriage of Anne was fortunate and fruitful: the
daughter of her grandson Joroslaus was recommended by her Imperial
descent; and the king of France, Henry I., sought a wife on the last
borders of Europe and Christendom.

In the Byzantine palace, the emperor was the first slave of the
ceremonies which he imposed, of the rigid forms which regulated each
word and gesture, besieged him in the palace, and violated the leisure
of his rural solitude. But the lives and fortunes of millions hung on
his arbitrary will; and the firmest minds, superior to the allurements
of pomp and luxury, may be seduced by the more active pleasure of
commanding their equals. The legislative and executive powers were
centred in the person of the monarch, and the last remains of the
authority of the senate were finally eradicated by Leo the philosopher.
A lethargy of servitude had benumbed the minds of the Greeks: in the
wildest tumults of rebellion they never aspired to the idea of a free
constitution; and the private character of the prince was the only
source and measure of their public happiness. Superstition rivetted
their chains; in the church of St. Sophia he was solemnly crowned by the
patriarch; at the foot of the altar, they pledged their passive and
unconditional obedience to his government and family. On his side he
engaged to abstain as much as possible from the capital punishments of
death and mutilation; his orthodox creed was subscribed with his own
hand, and he promised to obey the decrees of the seven synods, and the
canons of the holy church.  But the assurance of mercy was loose and
indefinite: he swore, not to his people, but to an invisible judge; and
except in the inexpiable guilt of heresy, the ministers of heaven were
always prepared to preach the indefeasible right, and to absolve the
venial transgressions, of their sovereign. The Greek ecclesiastics were
themselves the subjects of the civil magistrate: at the nod of a tyrant,
the bishops were created, or transferred, or deposed, or punished with
an ignominious death: whatever might be their wealth or influence, they
could never succeed like the Latin clergy in the establishment of an
independent republic; and the patriarch of Constantinople condemned,
what he secretly envied, the temporal greatness of his Roman brother.
Yet the exercise of boundless despotism is happily checked by the laws
of nature and necessity. In proportion to his wisdom and virtue, the
master of an empire is confined to the path of his sacred and laborious
duty. In proportion to his vice and folly, he drops the sceptre too
weighty for his hands; and the motions of the royal image are ruled by
the imperceptible thread of some minister or favorite, who undertakes
for his private interest to exercise the task of the public oppression.
In some fatal moment, the most absolute monarch may dread the reason or
the caprice of a nation of slaves; and experience has proved, that
whatever is gained in the extent, is lost in the safety and solidity, of
regal power.

Whatever titles a despot may assume, whatever claims he may assert, it
is on the sword that he must ultimately depend to guard him against his
foreign and domestic enemies. From the age of Charlemagne to that of the
Crusades, the world (for I overlook the remote monarchy of China) was
occupied and disputed by the three great empires or nations of the
Greeks, the Saracens, and the Franks. Their military strength may be
ascertained by a comparison of their courage, their arts and riches, and
their obedience to a supreme head, who might call into action all the
energies of the state. The Greeks, far inferior to their rivals in the
first, were superior to the Franks, and at least equal to the Saracens,
in the second and third of these warlike qualifications.

The wealth of the Greeks enabled them to purchase the service of the
poorer nations, and to maintain a naval power for the protection of
their coasts and the annoyance of their enemies.  A commerce of mutual
benefit exchanged the gold of Constantinople for the blood of
Sclavonians and Turks, the Bulgarians and Russians: their valor
contributed to the victories of Nicephorus and Zimisces; and if a
hostile people pressed too closely on the frontier, they were recalled
to the defence of their country, and the desire of peace, by the
well-managed attack of a more distant tribe.  The command of the
Mediterranean, from the mouth of the Tanais to the columns of Hercules,
was always claimed, and often possessed, by the successors of
Constantine. Their capital was filled with naval stores and dexterous
artificers: the situation of Greece and Asia, the long coasts, deep
gulfs, and numerous islands, accustomed their subjects to the exercise
of navigation; and the trade of Venice and Amalfi supplied a nursery of
seamen to the Imperial fleet.  Since the time of the Peloponnesian and
Punic wars, the sphere of action had not been enlarged; and the science
of naval architecture appears to have declined. The art of constructing
those stupendous machines which displayed three, or six, or ten, ranges
of oars, rising above, or falling behind, each other, was unknown to the
ship-builders of Constantinople, as well as to the mechanicians of
modern days.  The Dromones,  or light galleys of the Byzantine empire,
were content with two tier of oars; each tier was composed of
five-and-twenty benches; and two rowers were seated on each bench, who
plied their oars on either side of the vessel. To these we must add the
captain or centurion, who, in time of action, stood erect with his
armor-bearer on the poop, two steersmen at the helm, and two officers at
the prow, the one to manage the anchor, the other to point and play
against the enemy the tube of liquid fire. The whole crew, as in the
infancy of the art, performed the double service of mariners and
soldiers; they were provided with defensive and offensive arms, with
bows and arrows, which they used from the upper deck, with long pikes,
which they pushed through the portholes of the lower tier. Sometimes,
indeed, the ships of war were of a larger and more solid construction;
and the labors of combat and navigation were more regularly divided
between seventy soldiers and two hundred and thirty mariners. But for
the most part they were of the light and manageable size; and as the
Cape of Malea in Peloponnesus was still clothed with its ancient
terrors, an Imperial fleet was transported five miles over land across
the Isthmus of Corinth.  The principles of maritime tactics had not
undergone any change since the time of Thucydides: a squadron of galleys
still advanced in a crescent, charged to the front, and strove to impel
their sharp beaks against the feeble sides of their antagonists. A
machine for casting stones and darts was built of strong timbers, in the
midst of the deck; and the operation of boarding was effected by a crane
that hoisted baskets of armed men. The language of signals, so clear and
copious in the naval grammar of the moderns, was imperfectly expressed
by the various positions and colors of a commanding flag. In the
darkness of the night, the same orders to chase, to attack, to halt, to
retreat, to break, to form, were conveyed by the lights of the leading
galley. By land, the fire-signals were repeated from one mountain to
another; a chain of eight stations commanded a space of five hundred
miles; and Constantinople in a few hours was apprised of the hostile
motions of the Saracens of Tarsus.  Some estimate may be formed of the
power of the Greek emperors, by the curious and minute detail of the
armament which was prepared for the reduction of Crete. A fleet of one
hundred and twelve galleys, and seventy-five vessels of the Pamphylian
style, was equipped in the capital, the islands of the Ægean Sea, and
the seaports of Asia, Macedonia, and Greece. It carried thirty-four
thousand mariners, seven thousand three hundred and forty soldiers,
seven hundred Russians, and five thousand and eighty-seven Mardaites,
whose fathers had been transplanted from the mountains of Libanus. Their
pay, most probably of a month, was computed at thirty-four centenaries
of gold, about one hundred and thirty-six thousand pounds sterling. Our
fancy is bewildered by the endless recapitulation of arms and engines,
of clothes and linen, of bread for the men and forage for the horses,
and of stores and utensils of every description, inadequate to the
conquest of a petty island, but amply sufficient for the establishment
of a flourishing colony.

The invention of the Greek fire did not, like that of gun powder,
produce a total revolution in the art of war. To these liquid
combustibles the city and empire of Constantine owed their deliverance;
and they were employed in sieges and sea-fights with terrible effect.
But they were either less improved, or less susceptible of improvement:
the engines of antiquity, the catapultæ, balistæ, and battering-rams,
were still of most frequent and powerful use in the attack and defence
of fortifications; nor was the decision of battles reduced to the quick
and heavy fireof a line of infantry, whom it were fruitless to protect
with armor against a similar fire of their enemies. Steel and iron were
still the common instruments of destruction and safety; and the helmets,
cuirasses, and shields, of the tenth century did not, either in form or
substance, essentially differ from those which had covered the
companions of Alexander or Achilles.  But instead of accustoming the
modern Greeks, like the legionaries of old, to the constant and easy use
of this salutary weight, their armor was laid aside in light chariots,
which followed the march, till, on the approach of an enemy, they
resumed with haste and reluctance the unusual encumbrance. Their
offensive weapons consisted of swords, battle-axes, and spears; but the
Macedonian pike was shortened a fourth of its length, and reduced to the
more convenient measure of twelve cubits or feet. The sharpness of the
Scythian and Arabian arrows had been severely felt; and the emperors
lament the decay of archery as a cause of the public misfortunes, and
recommend, as an advice and a command, that the military youth, till the
age of forty, should assiduously practise the exercise of the bow.  The
bands, or regiments, were usually three hundred strong; and, as a medium
between the extremes of four and sixteen, the foot soldiers of Leo and
Constantine were formed eight deep; but the cavalry charged in four
ranks, from the reasonable consideration, that the weight of the front
could not be increased by any pressure of the hindmost horses. If the
ranks of the infantry or cavalry were sometimes doubled, this cautious
array betrayed a secret distrust of the courage of the troops, whose
numbers might swell the appearance of the line, but of whom only a
chosen band would dare to encounter the spears and swords of the
Barbarians. The order of battle must have varied according to the
ground, the object, and the adversary; but their ordinary disposition,
in two lines and a reserve, presented a succession of hopes and
resources most agreeable to the temper as well as the judgment of the
Greeks.  In case of a repulse, the first line fell back into the
intervals of the second; and the reserve, breaking into two divisions,
wheeled round the flanks to improve the victory or cover the retreat.
Whatever authority could enact was accomplished, at least in theory, by
the camps and marches, the exercises and evolutions, the edicts and
books, of the Byzantine monarch.  Whatever art could produce from the
forge, the loom, or the laboratory, was abundantly supplied by the
riches of the prince, and the industry of his numerous workmen. But
neither authority nor art could frame the most important machine, the
soldier himself; and if the ceremoniesof Constantine always suppose the
safe and triumphal return of the emperor,  his tacticsseldom soar above
the means of escaping a defeat, and procrastinating the war.
Notwithstanding some transient success, the Greeks were sunk in their
own esteem and that of their neighbors. A cold hand and a loquacious
tongue was the vulgar description of the nation: the author of the
tactics was besieged in his capital; and the last of the Barbarians, who
trembled at the name of the Saracens, or Franks, could proudly exhibit
the medals of gold and silver which they had extorted from the feeble
sovereign of Constantinople. What spirit their government and character
denied, might have been inspired in some degree by the influence of
religion; but the religion of the Greeks could only teach them to suffer
and to yield. The emperor Nicephorus, who restored for a moment the
discipline and glory of the Roman name, was desirous of bestowing the
honors of martyrdom on the Christians who lost their lives in a holy war
against the infidels. But this political law was defeated by the
opposition of the patriarch, the bishops, and the principal senators;
and they strenuously urged the canons of St. Basil, that all who were
polluted by the bloody trade of a soldier should be separated, during
three years, from the communion of the faithful.

These scruples of the Greeks have been compared with the tears of the
primitive Moslems when they were held back from battle; and this
contrast of base superstition and high-spirited enthusiasm, unfolds to a
philosophic eye the history of the rival nations. The subjects of the
last caliphs  had undoubtedly degenerated from the zeal and faith of the
companions of the prophet. Yet their martial creed still represented the
Deity as the author of war:  the vital though latent spark of fanaticism
still glowed in the heart of their religion, and among the Saracens, who
dwelt on the Christian borders, it was frequently rekindled to a lively
and active flame. Their regular force was formed of the valiant slaves
who had been educated to guard the person and accompany the standard of
their lord: but the Mussulman people of Syria and Cilicia, of Africa and
Spain, was awakened by the trumpet which proclaimed a holy war against
the infidels. The rich were ambitious of death or victory in the cause
of God; the poor were allured by the hopes of plunder; and the old, the
infirm, and the women, assumed their share of meritorious service by
sending their substitutes, with arms and horses, into the field. These
offensive and defensive arms were similar in strength and temper to
those of the Romans, whom they far excelled in the management of the
horse and the bow: the massy silver of their belts, their bridles, and
their swords, displayed the magnificence of a prosperous nation; and
except some black archers of the South, the Arabs disdained the naked
bravery of their ancestors. Instead of wagons, they were attended by a
long train of camels, mules, and asses: the multitude of these animals,
whom they bedecked with flags and streamers, appeared to swell the pomp
and magnitude of their host; and the horses of the enemy were often
disordered by the uncouth figure and odious smell of the camels of the
East. Invincible by their patience of thirst and heat, their spirits
were frozen by a winter's cold, and the consciousness of their
propensity to sleep exacted the most rigorous precautions against the
surprises of the night. Their order of battle was a long square of two
deep and solid lines; the first of archers, the second of cavalry. In
their engagements by sea and land, they sustained with patient firmness
the fury of the attack, and seldom advanced to the charge till they
could discern and oppress the lassitude of their foes. But if they were
repulsed and broken, they knew not how to rally or renew the combat; and
their dismay was heightened by the superstitious prejudice, that God had
declared himself on the side of their enemies. The decline and fall of
the caliphs countenanced this fearful opinion; nor were there wanting,
among the Mahometans and Christians, some obscure prophecies  which
prognosticated their alternate defeats. The unity of the Arabian empire
was dissolved, but the independent fragments were equal to populous and
powerful kingdoms; and in their naval and military armaments, an emir of
Aleppo or Tunis might command no despicable fund of skill, and industry,
and treasure. In their transactions of peace and war with the Saracens,
the princes of Constantinople too often felt that these Barbarians had
nothing barbarous in their discipline; and that if they were destitute
of original genius, they had been endowed with a quick spirit of
curiosity and imitation. The model was indeed more perfect than the
copy; their ships, and engines, and fortifications, were of a less
skilful construction; and they confess, without shame, that the same God
who has given a tongue to the Arabians, had more nicely fashioned the
hands of the Chinese, and the heads of the Greeks.

Chapter LIII: Fate Of The Eastern Empire. -- Part IV.

A name of some German tribes between the Rhine and the Weser had spread
its victorious influence over the greatest part of Gaul, Germany, and
Italy; and the common appellation of Franks  was applied by the Greeks
and Arabians to the Christians of the Latin church, the nations of the
West, who stretched beyond theirknowledge to the shores of the Atlantic
Ocean. The vast body had been inspired and united by the soul of
Charlemagne; but the division and degeneracy of his race soon
annihilated the Imperial power, which would have rivalled the Cæsars of
Byzantium, and revenged the indignities of the Christian name. The
enemies no longer feared, nor could the subjects any longer trust, the
application of a public revenue, the labors of trade and manufactures in
the military service, the mutual aid of provinces and armies, and the
naval squadrons which were regularly stationed from the mouth of the
Elbe to that of the Tyber. In the beginning of the tenth century, the
family of Charlemagne had almost disappeared; his monarchy was broken
into many hostile and independent states; the regal title was assumed by
the most ambitious chiefs; their revolt was imitated in a long
subordination of anarchy and discord, and the nobles of every province
disobeyed their sovereign, oppressed their vassals, and exercised
perpetual hostilities against their equals and neighbors. Their private
wars, which overturned the fabric of government, fomented the martial
spirit of the nation. In the system of modern Europe, the power of the
sword is possessed, at least in fact, by five or six mighty potentates;
their operations are conducted on a distant frontier, by an order of men
who devote their lives to the study and practice of the military art:
the rest of the country and community enjoys in the midst of war the
tranquillity of peace, and is only made sensible of the change by the
aggravation or decrease of the public taxes. In the disorders of the
tenth and eleventh centuries, every peasant was a soldier, and every
village a fortification; each wood or valley was a scene of murder and
rapine; and the lords of each castle were compelled to assume the
character of princes and warriors. To their own courage and policy they
boldly trusted for the safety of their family, the protection of their
lands, and the revenge of their injuries; and, like the conquerors of a
larger size, they were too apt to transgress the privilege of defensive
war. The powers of the mind and body were hardened by the presence of
danger and necessity of resolution: the same spirit refused to desert a
friend and to forgive an enemy; and, instead of sleeping under the
guardian care of a magistrate, they proudly disdained the authority of
the laws. In the days of feudal anarchy, the instruments of agriculture
and art were converted into the weapons of bloodshed: the peaceful
occupations of civil and ecclesiastical society were abolished or
corrupted; and the bishop who exchanged his mitre for a helmet, was more
forcibly urged by the manners of the times than by the obligation of his
tenure.

The love of freedom and of arms was felt, with conscious pride, by the
Franks themselves, and is observed by the Greeks with some degree of
amazement and terror. "The Franks," says the emperor Constantine, "are
bold and valiant to the verge of temerity; and their dauntless spirit is
supported by the contempt of danger and death. In the field and in close
onset, they press to the front, and rush headlong against the enemy,
without deigning to compute either his numbers or their own. Their ranks
are formed by the firm connections of consanguinity and friendship; and
their martial deeds are prompted by the desire of saving or revenging
their dearest companions. In their eyes, a retreat is a shameful flight;
and flight is indelible infamy."  A nation endowed with such high and
intrepid spirit, must have been secure of victory if these advantages
had not been counter-balanced by many weighty defects. The decay of
their naval power left the Greeks and Saracens in possession of the sea,
for every purpose of annoyance and supply. In the age which preceded the
institution of knighthood, the Franks were rude and unskilful in the
service of cavalry;  and in all perilous emergencies, their warriors
were so conscious of their ignorance, that they chose to dismount from
their horses and fight on foot. Unpractised in the use of pikes, or of
missile weapons, they were encumbered by the length of their swords, the
weight of their armor, the magnitude of their shields, and, if I may
repeat the satire of the meagre Greeks, by their unwieldy intemperance.
Their independent spirit disdained the yoke of subordination, and
abandoned the standard of their chief, if he attempted to keep the field
beyond the term of their stipulation or service. On all sides they were
open to the snares of an enemy less brave but more artful than
themselves. They might be bribed, for the Barbarians were venal; or
surprised in the night, for they neglected the precautions of a close
encampment or vigilant sentinels. The fatigues of a summer's campaign
exhausted their strength and patience, and they sunk in despair if their
voracious appetite was disappointed of a plentiful supply of wine and of
food. This general character of the Franks was marked with some national
and local shades, which I should ascribe to accident rather than to
climate, but which were visible both to natives and to foreigners. An
ambassador of the great Otho declared, in the palace of Constantinople,
that the Saxons could dispute with swords better than with pens, and
that they preferred inevitable death to the dishonor of turning their
backs to an enemy.  It was the glory of the nobles of France, that, in
their humble dwellings, war and rapine were the only pleasure, the sole
occupation, of their lives. They affected to deride the palaces, the
banquets, the polished manner of the Italians, who in the estimate of
the Greeks themselves had degenerated from the liberty and valor of the
ancient Lombards.

By the well-known edict of Caracalla, his subjects, from Britain to
Egypt, were entitled to the name and privileges of Romans, and their
national sovereign might fix his occasional or permanent residence in
any province of their common country. In the division of the East and
West, an ideal unity was scrupulously observed, and in their titles,
laws, and statutes, the successors of Arcadius and Honorius announced
themselves as the inseparable colleagues of the same office, as the
joint sovereigns of the Roman world and city, which were bounded by the
same limits. After the fall of the Western monarchy, the majesty of the
purple resided solely in the princes of Constantinople; and of these,
Justinian was the first who, after a divorce of sixty years, regained
the dominion of ancient Rome, and asserted, by the right of conquest,
the august title of Emperor of the Romans.  A motive of vanity or
discontent solicited one of his successors, Constans the Second, to
abandon the Thracian Bosphorus, and to restore the pristine honors of
the Tyber: an extravagant project, (exclaims the malicious Byzantine,)
as if he had despoiled a beautiful and blooming virgin, to enrich, or
rather to expose, the deformity of a wrinkled and decrepit matron.  But
the sword of the Lombards opposed his settlement in Italy: he entered
Rome not as a conqueror, but as a fugitive, and, after a visit of twelve
days, he pillaged, and forever deserted, the ancient capital of the
world.  The final revolt and separation of Italy was accomplished about
two centuries after the conquests of Justinian, and from his reign we
may date the gradual oblivion of the Latin tongue. That legislator had
composed his Institutes, his Code, and his Pandects, in a language which
he celebrates as the proper and public style of the Roman government,
the consecrated idiom of the palace and senate of Constantinople, of the
campus and tribunals of the East.  But this foreign dialect was unknown
to the people and soldiers of the Asiatic provinces, it was imperfectly
understood by the greater part of the interpreters of the laws and the
ministers of the state. After a short conflict, nature and habit
prevailed over the obsolete institutions of human power: for the general
benefit of his subjects, Justinian promulgated his novels in the two
languages: the several parts of his voluminous jurisprudence were
successively translated;  the original was forgotten, the version was
studied, and the Greek, whose intrinsic merit deserved indeed the
preference, obtained a legal, as well as popular establishment in the
Byzantine monarchy. The birth and residence of succeeding princes
estranged them from the Roman idiom: Tiberius by the Arabs,  and Maurice
by the Italians,  are distinguished as the first of the Greek Cæsars, as
the founders of a new dynasty and empire: the silent revolution was
accomplished before the death of Heraclius; and the ruins of the Latin
speech were darkly preserved in the terms of jurisprudence and the
acclamations of the palace. After the restoration of the Western empire
by Charlemagne and the Othos, the names of Franks and Latins acquired an
equal signification and extent; and these haughty Barbarians asserted,
with some justice, their superior claim to the language and dominion of
Rome. They insulted the alien of the East who had renounced the dress
and idiom of Romans; and their reasonable practice will justify the
frequent appellation of Greeks.  But this contemptuous appellation was
indignantly rejected by the prince and people to whom it was applied.
Whatsoever changes had been introduced by the lapse of ages, they
alleged a lineal and unbroken succession from Augustus and Constantine;
and, in the lowest period of degeneracy and decay, the name of Romans
adhered to the last fragments of the empire of Constantinople.

While the government of the East was transacted in Latin, the Greek was
the language of literature and philosophy; nor could the masters of this
rich and perfect idiom be tempted to envy the borrowed learning and
imitative taste of their Roman disciples. After the fall of Paganism,
the loss of Syria and Egypt, and the extinction of the schools of
Alexandria and Athens, the studies of the Greeks insensibly retired to
some regular monasteries, and above all, to the royal college of
Constantinople, which was burnt in the reign of Leo the Isaurian.  In
the pompous style of the age, the president of that foundation was named
the Sun of Science: his twelve associates, the professors in the
different arts and faculties, were the twelve signs of the zodiac; a
library of thirty-six thousand five hundred volumes was open to their
inquiries; and they could show an ancient manuscript of Homer, on a roll
of parchment one hundred and twenty feet in length, the intestines, as
it was fabled, of a prodigious serpent.  But the seventh and eight
centuries were a period of discord and darkness: the library was burnt,
the college was abolished, the Iconoclasts are represented as the foes
of antiquity; and a savage ignorance and contempt of letters has
disgraced the princes of the Heraclean and Isaurian dynasties.

In the ninth century we trace the first dawnings of the restoration of
science.  After the fanaticism of the Arabs had subsided, the caliphs
aspired to conquer the arts, rather than the provinces, of the empire:
their liberal curiosity rekindled the emulation of the Greeks, brushed
away the dust from their ancient libraries, and taught them to know and
reward the philosophers, whose labors had been hitherto repaid by the
pleasure of study and the pursuit of truth. The Cæsar Bardas, the uncle
of Michael the Third, was the generous protector of letters, a title
which alone has preserved his memory and excused his ambition. A
particle of the treasures of his nephew was sometimes diverted from the
indulgence of vice and folly; a school was opened in the palace of
Magnaura; and the presence of Bardas excited the emulation of the
masters and students. At their head was the philosopher Leo, archbishop
of Thessalonica: his profound skill in astronomy and the mathematics was
admired by the strangers of the East; and this occult science was
magnified by vulgar credulity, which modestly supposes that all
knowledge superior to its own must be the effect of inspiration or
magic. At the pressing entreaty of the Cæsar, his friend, the celebrated
Photius,  renounced the freedom of a secular and studious life, ascended
the patriarchal throne, and was alternately excommunicated and absolved
by the synods of the East and West. By the confession even of priestly
hatred, no art or science, except poetry, was foreign to this universal
scholar, who was deep in thought, indefatigable in reading, and eloquent
in diction. Whilst he exercised the office of protospathaire or captain
of the guards, Photius was sent ambassador to the caliph of Bagdad.  The
tedious hours of exile, perhaps of confinement, were beguiled by the
hasty composition of his Library, a living monument of erudition and
criticism. Two hundred and fourscore writers, historians, orators,
philosophers, theologians, are reviewed without any regular method: he
abridges their narrative or doctrine, appreciates their style and
character, and judges even the fathers of the church with a discreet
freedom, which often breaks through the superstition of the times. The
emperor Basil, who lamented the defects of his own education, intrusted
to the care of Photius his son and successor, Leo the philosopher; and
the reign of that prince and of his son Constantine Porphyrogenitus
forms one of the most prosperous æras of the Byzantine literature. By
their munificence the treasures of antiquity were deposited in the
Imperial library; by their pens, or those of their associates, they were
imparted in such extracts and abridgments as might amuse the curiosity,
without oppressing the indolence, of the public. Besides the Basilics,
or code of laws, the arts of husbandry and war, of feeding or destroying
the human species, were propagated with equal diligence; and the history
of Greece and Rome was digested into fifty-three heads or titles, of
which two only (of embassies, and of virtues and vices) have escaped the
injuries of time. In every station, the reader might contemplate the
image of the past world, apply the lesson or warning of each page, and
learn to admire, perhaps to imitate, the examples of a brighter period.
I shall not expatiate on the works of the Byzantine Greeks, who, by the
assiduous study of the ancients, have deserved, in some measure, the
remembrance and gratitude of the moderns. The scholars of the present
age may still enjoy the benefit of the philosophical commonplace book of
Stobæus, the grammatical and historical lexicon of Suidas, the Chiliads
of Tzetzes, which comprise six hundred narratives in twelve thousand
verses, and the commentaries on Homer of Eustathius, archbishop of
Thessalonica, who, from his horn of plenty, has poured the names and
authorities of four hundred writers. From these originals, and from the
numerous tribe of scholiasts and critics,  some estimate may be formed
of the literary wealth of the twelfth century: Constantinople was
enlightened by the genius of Homer and Demosthenes, of Aristotle and
Plato: and in the enjoyment or neglect of our present riches, we must
envy the generation that could still peruse the history of Theopompus,
the orations of Hyperides, the comedies of Menander,  and the odes of
Alcæus and Sappho. The frequent labor of illustration attests not only
the existence, but the popularity, of the Grecian classics: the general
knowledge of the age may be deduced from the example of two learned
females, the empress Eudocia, and the princess Anna Comnena, who
cultivated, in the purple, the arts of rhetoric and philosophy.  The
vulgar dialect of the city was gross and barbarous: a more correct and
elaborate style distinguished the discourse, or at least the
compositions, of the church and palace, which sometimes affected to copy
the purity of the Attic models.

In our modern education, the painful though necessary attainment of two
languages, which are no longer living, may consume the time and damp the
ardor of the youthful student. The poets and orators were long
imprisoned in the barbarous dialects of our Western ancestors, devoid of
harmony or grace; and their genius, without precept or example, was
abandoned to the rule and native powers of their judgment and fancy. But
the Greeks of Constantinople, after purging away the impurities of their
vulgar speech, acquired the free use of their ancient language, the most
happy composition of human art, and a familiar knowledge of the sublime
masters who had pleased or instructed the first of nations. But these
advantages only tend to aggravate the reproach and shame of a degenerate
people. They held in their lifeless hands the riches of their fathers,
without inheriting the spirit which had created and improved that sacred
patrimony: they read, they praised, they compiled, but their languid
souls seemed alike incapable of thought and action. In the revolution of
ten centuries, not a single discovery was made to exalt the dignity or
promote the happiness of mankind. Not a single idea has been added to
the speculative systems of antiquity, and a succession of patient
disciples became in their turn the dogmatic teachers of the next servile
generation. Not a single composition of history, philosophy, or
literature, has been saved from oblivion by the intrinsic beauties of
style or sentiment, of original fancy, or even of successful imitation.
In prose, the least offensive of the Byzantine writers are absolved from
censure by their naked and unpresuming simplicity: but the orators, most
eloquent  in their own conceit, are the farthest removed from the models
whom they affect to emulate. In every page our taste and reason are
wounded by the choice of gigantic and obsolete words, a stiff and
intricate phraseology, the discord of images, the childish play of false
or unseasonable ornament, and the painful attempt to elevate themselves,
to astonish the reader, and to involve a trivial meaning in the smoke of
obscurity and exaggeration. Their prose is soaring to the vicious
affectation of poetry: their poetry is sinking below the flatness and
insipidity of prose. The tragic, epic, and lyric muses, were silent and
inglorious: the bards of Constantinople seldom rose above a riddle or
epigram, a panegyric or tale; they forgot even the rules of prosody; and
with the melody of Homer yet sounding in their ears, they confound all
measure of feet and syllables in the impotent strains which have
received the name of politicalor city verses.  The minds of the Greek
were bound in the fetters of a base and imperious superstition which
extends her dominion round the circle of profane science. Their
understandings were bewildered in metaphysical controversy: in the
belief of visions and miracles, they had lost all principles of moral
evidence, and their taste was vitiates by the homilies of the monks, an
absurd medley of declamation and Scripture. Even these contemptible
studies were no longer dignified by the abuse of superior talents: the
leaders of the Greek church were humbly content to admire and copy the
oracles of antiquity, nor did the schools of pulpit produce any rivals
of the fame of Athanasius and Chrysostom.

In all the pursuits of active and speculative life, the emulation of
states and individuals is the most powerful spring of the efforts and
improvements of mankind. The cities of ancient Greece were cast in the
happy mixture of union and independence, which is repeated on a larger
scale, but in a looser form, by the nations of modern Europe; the union
of language, religion, and manners, which renders them the spectators
and judges of each other's merit;  the independence of government and
interest, which asserts their separate freedom, and excites them to
strive for preëminence in the career of glory. The situation of the
Romans was less favorable; yet in the early ages of the republic, which
fixed the national character, a similar emulation was kindled among the
states of Latium and Italy; and in the arts and sciences, they aspired
to equal or surpass their Grecian masters. The empire of the Cæsars
undoubtedly checked the activity and progress of the human mind; its
magnitude might indeed allow some scope for domestic competition; but
when it was gradually reduced, at first to the East and at last to
Greece and Constantinople, the Byzantine subjects were degraded to an
abject and languid temper, the natural effect of their solitary and
insulated state. From the North they were oppressed by nameless tribes
of Barbarians, to whom they scarcely imparted the appellation of men.
The language and religion of the more polished Arabs were an
insurmountable bar to all social intercourse. The conquerors of Europe
were their brethren in the Christian faith; but the speech of the Franks
or Latins was unknown, their manners were rude, and they were rarely
connected, in peace or war, with the successors of Heraclius. Alone in
the universe, the self-satisfied pride of the Greeks was not disturbed
by the comparison of foreign merit; and it is no wonder if they fainted
in the race, since they had neither competitors to urge their speed, nor
judges to crown their victory. The nations of Europe and Asia were
mingled by the expeditions to the Holy Land; and it is under the
Comnenian dynasty that a faint emulation of knowledge and military
virtue was rekindled in the Byzantine empire.

Chapter LIV: Origin And Doctrine Of The Paulicians.

Part I.

Origin And Doctrine Of The Paulicians. -- Their Persecution By The Greek
Emperors. -- Revolt In Armenia &c. -- Transplantation Into Thrace. --
Propagation In The West. -- The Seeds, Character, And Consequences Of
The Reformation.

In the profession of Christianity, the variety of national characters
may be clearly distinguished. The natives of Syria and Egypt abandoned
their lives to lazy and contemplative devotion: Rome again aspired to
the dominion of the world; and the wit of the lively and loquacious
Greeks was consumed in the disputes of metaphysical theology. The
incomprehensible mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation, instead of
commanding their silent submission, were agitated in vehement and
subtile controversies, which enlarged their faith at the expense,
perhaps, of their charity and reason. From the council of Nice to the
end of the seventh century, the peace and unity of the church was
invaded by these spiritual wars; and so deeply did they affect the
decline and fall of the empire, that the historian has too often been
compelled to attend the synods, to explore the creeds, and to enumerate
the sects, of this busy period of ecclesiastical annals. From the
beginning of the eighth century to the last ages of the Byzantine
empire, the sound of controversy was seldom heard: curiosity was
exhausted, zeal was fatigued, and, in the decrees of six councils, the
articles of the Catholic faith had been irrevocably defined. The spirit
of dispute, however vain and pernicious, requires some energy and
exercise of the mental faculties; and the prostrate Greeks were content
to fast, to pray, and to believe in blind obedience to the patriarch and
his clergy. During a long dream of superstition, the Virgin and the
Saints, their visions and miracles, their relics and images, were
preached by the monks, and worshipped by the people; and the appellation
of people might be extended, without injustice, to the first ranks of
civil society. At an unseasonable moment, the Isaurian emperors
attempted somewhat rudely to awaken their subjects: under their
influence reason might obtain some proselytes, a far greater number was
swayed by interest or fear; but the Eastern world embraced or deplored
their visible deities, and the restoration of images was celebrated as
the feast of orthodoxy. In this passive and unanimous state the
ecclesiastical rulers were relieved from the toil, or deprived of the
pleasure, of persecution. The Pagans had disappeared; the Jews were
silent and obscure; the disputes with the Latins were rare and remote
hostilities against a national enemy; and the sects of Egypt and Syria
enjoyed a free toleration under the shadow of the Arabian caliphs. About
the middle of the seventh century, a branch of Manichæans was selected
as the victims of spiritual tyranny; their patience was at length
exasperated to despair and rebellion; and their exile has scattered over
the West the seeds of reformation. These important events will justify
some inquiry into the doctrine and story of the Paulicians;  and, as
they cannot plead for themselves, our candid criticism will magnify the
good, and abate or suspect the evil, that is reported by their
adversaries.

The Gnostics, who had distracted the infancy, were oppressed by the
greatness and authority, of the church. Instead of emulating or
surpassing the wealth, learning, and numbers of the Catholics, their
obscure remnant was driven from the capitals of the East and West, and
confined to the villages and mountains along the borders of the
Euphrates. Some vestige of the Marcionites may be detected in the fifth
century;  but the numerous sects were finally lost in the odious name of
the Manichæans; and these heretics, who presumed to reconcile the
doctrines of Zoroaster and Christ, were pursued by the two religions
with equal and unrelenting hatred. Under the grandson of Heraclius, in
the neighborhood of Samosata, more famous for the birth of Lucian than
for the title of a Syrian kingdom, a reformer arose, esteemed by the
Pauliciansas the chosen messenger of truth. In his humble dwelling of
Mananalis, Constantine entertained a deacon, who returned from Syrian
captivity, and received the inestimable gift of the New Testament, which
was already concealed from the vulgar by the prudence of the Greek, and
perhaps of the Gnostic, clergy.  These books became the measure of his
studies and the rule of his faith; and the Catholics, who dispute his
interpretation, acknowledge that his text was genuine and sincere. But
he attached himself with peculiar devotion to the writings and character
of St. Paul: the name of the Paulicians is derived by their enemies from
some unknown and domestic teacher; but I am confident that they gloried
in their affinity to the apostle of the Gentiles. His disciples, Titus,
Timothy, Sylvanus, Tychicus, were represented by Constantine and his
fellow-laborers: the names of the apostolic churches were applied to the
congregations which they assembled in Armenia and Cappadocia; and this
innocent allegory revived the example and memory of the first ages. In
the Gospel, and the Epistles of St. Paul, his faithful follower
investigated the Creed of primitive Christianity; and, whatever might be
the success, a Protestant reader will applaud the spirit, of the
inquiry. But if the Scriptures of the Paulicians were pure, they were
not perfect. Their founders rejected the two Epistles of St. Peter,  the
apostle of the circumcision, whose dispute with their favorite for the
observance of the law could not easily be forgiven.  They agreed with
their Gnostic brethren in the universal contempt for the Old Testament,
the books of Moses and the prophets, which have been consecrated by the
decrees of the Catholic church. With equal boldness, and doubtless with
more reason, Constantine, the new Sylvanus, disclaimed the visions,
which, in so many bulky and splendid volumes, had been published by the
Oriental sects;  the fabulous productions of the Hebrew patriarchs and
the sages of the East; the spurious gospels, epistles, and acts, which
in the first age had overwhelmed the orthodox code; the theology of
Manes, and the authors of the kindred heresies; and the thirty
generations, or æons, which had been created by the fruitful fancy of
Valentine. The Paulicians sincerely condemned the memory and opinions of
the Manichæan sect, and complained of the injustice which impressed that
invidious name on the simple votaries of St. Paul and of Christ.

Of the ecclesiastical chain, many links had been broken by the Paulician
reformers; and their liberty was enlarged, as they reduced the number of
masters, at whose voice profane reason must bow to mystery and miracle.
The early separation of the Gnostics had preceded the establishment of
the Catholic worship; and against the gradual innovations of discipline
and doctrine they were as strongly guarded by habit and aversion, as by
the silence of St. Paul and the evangelists. The objects which had been
transformed by the magic of superstition, appeared to the eyes of the
Paulicians in their genuine and naked colors. An image made without
hands was the common workmanship of a mortal artist, to whose skill
alone the wood and canvas must be indebted for their merit or value. The
miraculous relics were a heap of bones and ashes, destitute of life or
virtue, or of any relation, perhaps, with the person to whom they were
ascribed. The true and vivifying cross was a piece of sound or rotten
timber, the body and blood of Christ, a loaf of bread and a cup of wine,
the gifts of nature and the symbols of grace. The mother of God was
degraded from her celestial honors and immaculate virginity; and the
saints and angels were no longer solicited to exercise the laborious
office of meditation in heaven, and ministry upon earth. In the
practice, or at least in the theory, of the sacraments, the Paulicians
were inclined to abolish all visible objects of worship, and the words
of the gospel were, in their judgment, the baptism and communion of the
faithful. They indulged a convenient latitude for the interpretation of
Scripture: and as often as they were pressed by the literal sense, they
could escape to the intricate mazes of figure and allegory. Their utmost
diligence must have been employed to dissolve the connection between the
Old and the New Testament; since they adored the latter as the oracles
of God, and abhorred the former as the fabulous and absurd invention of
men or dæmons. We cannot be surprised, that they should have found in
the Gospel the orthodox mystery of the Trinity: but, instead of
confessing the human nature and substantial sufferings of Christ, they
amused their fancy with a celestial body that passed through the virgin
like water through a pipe; with a fantastic crucifixion, that eluded the
vain and important malice of the Jews. A creed thus simple and spiritual
was not adapted to the genius of the times;  and the rational Christian,
who might have been contented with the light yoke and easy burden of
Jesus and his apostles, was justly offended, that the Paulicians should
dare to violate the unity of God, the first article of natural and
revealed religion. Their belief and their trust was in the Father, of
Christ, of the human soul, and of the invisible world. But they likewise
held the eternity of matter; a stubborn and rebellious substance, the
origin of a second principle of an active being, who has created this
visible world, and exercises his temporal reign till the final
consummation of death and sin.  The appearances of moral and physical
evil had established the two principles in the ancient philosophy and
religion of the East; from whence this doctrine was transfused to the
various swarms of the Gnostics. A thousand shades may be devised in the
nature and character of Ahriman, from a rival god to a subordinate
dæmon, from passion and frailty to pure and perfect malevolence: but, in
spite of our efforts, the goodness, and the power, of Ormusd are placed
at the opposite extremities of the line; and every step that approaches
the one must recede in equal proportion from the other.

The apostolic labors of Constantine Sylvanus soon multiplied the number
of his disciples, the secret recompense of spiritual ambition. The
remnant of the Gnostic sects, and especially the Manichæans of Armenia,
were united under his standard; many Catholics were converted or seduced
by his arguments; and he preached with success in the regions of Pontus
and Cappadocia, which had long since imbibed the religion of Zoroaster.
The Paulician teachers were distinguished only by their Scriptural
names, by the modest title of Fellow-pilgrims, by the austerity of their
lives, their zeal or knowledge, and the credit of some extraordinary
gifts of the Holy Spirit. But they were incapable of desiring, or at
least of obtaining, the wealth and honors of the Catholic prelacy; such
anti-Christian pride they bitterly censured; and even the rank of elders
or presbyters was condemned as an institution of the Jewish synagogue.
The new sect was loosely spread over the provinces of Asia Minor to the
westward of the Euphrates; six of their principal congregations
represented the churches to which St. Paul had addressed his epistles;
and their founder chose his residence in the neighborhood of Colonia,
in the same district of Pontus which had been celebrated by the altars
of Bellona  and the miracles of Gregory.  After a mission of
twenty-seven years, Sylvanus, who had retired from the tolerating
government of the Arabs, fell a sacrifice to Roman persecution. The laws
of the pious emperors, which seldom touched the lives of less odious
heretics, proscribed without mercy or disguise the tenets, the books,
and the persons of the Montanists and Manichæans: the books were
delivered to the flames; and all who should presume to secrete such
writings, or to profess such opinions, were devoted to an ignominious
death.  A Greek minister, armed with legal and military powers, appeared
at Colonia to strike the shepherd, and to reclaim, if possible, the lost
sheep. By a refinement of cruelty, Simeon placed the unfortunate
Sylvanus before a line of his disciples, who were commanded, as the
price of their pardon and the proof of their repentance, to massacre
their spiritual father. They turned aside from the impious office; the
stones dropped from their filial hands, and of the whole number, only
one executioner could be found, a new David, as he is styled by the
Catholics, who boldly overthrew the giant of heresy. This apostate
(Justin was his name) again deceived and betrayed his unsuspecting
brethren, and a new conformity to the acts of St. Paul may be found in
the conversion of Simeon: like the apostle, he embraced the doctrine
which he had been sent to persecute, renounced his honors and fortunes,
and required among the Paulicians the fame of a missionary and a martyr.
They were not ambitious of martyrdom,  but in a calamitous period of one
hundred and fifty years, their patience sustained whatever zeal could
inflict; and power was insufficient to eradicate the obstinate
vegetation of fanaticism and reason. From the blood and ashes of the
first victims, a succession of teachers and congregations repeatedly
arose: amidst their foreign hostilities, they found leisure for domestic
quarrels: they preached, they disputed, they suffered; and the virtues,
the apparent virtues, of Sergius, in a pilgrimage of thirty-three years,
are reluctantly confessed by the orthodox historians.  The native
cruelty of Justinian the Second was stimulated by a pious cause; and he
vainly hoped to extinguish, in a single conflagration, the name and
memory of the Paulicians. By their primitive simplicity, their
abhorrence of popular superstition, the Iconoclast princes might have
been reconciled to some erroneous doctrines; but they themselves were
exposed to the calumnies of the monks, and they chose to be the tyrants,
lest they should be accused as the accomplices, of the Manichæans. Such
a reproach has sullied the clemency of Nicephorus, who relaxed in their
favor the severity of the penal statutes, nor will his character sustain
the honor of a more liberal motive. The feeble Michael the First, the
rigid Leo the Armenian, were foremost in the race of persecution; but
the prize must doubtless be adjudged to the sanguinary devotion of
Theodora, who restored the images to the Oriental church. Her
inquisitors explored the cities and mountains of the Lesser Asia, and
the flatterers of the empress have affirmed that, in a short reign, one
hundred thousand Paulicians were extirpated by the sword, the gibbet, or
the flames. Her guilt or merit has perhaps been stretched beyond the
measure of truth: but if the account be allowed, it must be presumed
that many simple Iconoclasts were punished under a more odious name; and
that some who were driven from the church, unwillingly took refuge in
the bosom of heresy.

The most furious and desperate of rebels are the sectaries of a religion
long persecuted, and at length provoked. In a holy cause they are no
longer susceptible of fear or remorse: the justice of their arms hardens
them against the feelings of humanity; and they revenge their fathers'
wrongs on the children of their tyrants. Such have been the Hussites of
Bohemia and the Calvinists of France, and such, in the ninth century,
were the Paulicians of Armenia and the adjacent provinces.  They were
first awakened to the massacre of a governor and bishop, who exercised
the Imperial mandate of converting or destroying the heretics; and the
deepest recesses of Mount Argæus protected their independence and
revenge. A more dangerous and consuming flame was kindled by the
persecution of Theodora, and the revolt of Carbeas, a valiant Paulician,
who commanded the guards of the general of the East. His father had been
impaled by the Catholic inquisitors; and religion, or at least nature,
might justify his desertion and revenge. Five thousand of his brethren
were united by the same motives; they renounced the allegiance of
anti-Christian Rome; a Saracen emir introduced Carbeas to the caliph;
and the commander of the faithful extended his sceptre to the implacable
enemy of the Greeks. In the mountains between Siwas and Trebizond he
founded or fortified the city of Tephrice,  which is still occupied by a
fierce or licentious people, and the neighboring hills were covered with
the Paulician fugitives, who now reconciled the use of the Bible and the
sword. During more than thirty years, Asia was afflicted by the
calamities of foreign and domestic war; in their hostile inroads, the
disciples of St. Paul were joined with those of Mahomet; and the
peaceful Christians, the aged parent and tender virgin, who were
delivered into barbarous servitude, might justly accuse the intolerant
spirit of their sovereign. So urgent was the mischief, so intolerable
the shame, that even the dissolute Michael, the son of Theodora, was
compelled to march in person against the Paulicians: he was defeated
under the walls of Samosata; and the Roman emperor fled before the
heretics whom his mother had condemned to the flames. The Saracens
fought under the same banners, but the victory was ascribed to Carbeas;
and the captive generals, with more than a hundred tribunes, were either
released by his avarice, or tortured by his fanaticism. The valor and
ambition of Chrysocheir,  his successor, embraced a wider circle of
rapine and revenge. In alliance with his faithful Moslems, he boldly
penetrated into the heart of Asia; the troops of the frontier and the
palace were repeatedly overthrown; the edicts of persecution were
answered by the pillage of Nice and Nicomedia, of Ancyra and Ephesus;
nor could the apostle St. John protect from violation his city and
sepulchre. The cathedral of Ephesus was turned into a stable for mules
and horses; and the Paulicians vied with the Saracens in their contempt
and abhorrence of images and relics. It is not unpleasing to observe the
triumph of rebellion over the same despotism which had disdained the
prayers of an injured people. The emperor Basil, the Macedonian, was
reduced to sue for peace, to offer a ransom for the captives, and to
request, in the language of moderation and charity, that Chrysocheir
would spare his fellow-Christians, and content himself with a royal
donative of gold and silver and silk garments. "If the emperor," replied
the insolent fanatic, "be desirous of peace, let him abdicate the East,
and reign without molestation in the West. If he refuse, the servants of
the Lord will precipitate him from the throne." The reluctant Basil
suspended the treaty, accepted the defiance, and led his army into the
land of heresy, which he wasted with fire and sword. The open country of
the Paulicians was exposed to the same calamities which they had
inflicted; but when he had explored the strength of Tephrice, the
multitude of the Barbarians, and the ample magazines of arms and
provisions, he desisted with a sigh from the hopeless siege. On his
return to Constantinople, he labored, by the foundation of convents and
churches, to secure the aid of his celestial patrons, of Michael the
archangel and the prophet Elijah; and it was his daily prayer that he
might live to transpierce, with three arrows, the head of his impious
adversary. Beyond his expectations, the wish was accomplished: after a
successful inroad, Chrysocheir was surprised and slain in his retreat;
and the rebel's head was triumphantly presented at the foot of the
throne. On the reception of this welcome trophy, Basil instantly called
for his bow, discharged three arrows with unerring aim, and accepted the
applause of the court, who hailed the victory of the royal archer. With
Chrysocheir, the glory of the Paulicians faded and withered:  on the
second expedition of the emperor, the impregnable Tephrice, was deserted
by the heretics, who sued for mercy or escaped to the borders. The city
was ruined, but the spirit of independence survived in the mountains:
the Paulicians defended, above a century, their religion and liberty,
infested the Roman limits, and maintained their perpetual alliance with
the enemies of the empire and the gospel.

Chapter LIV: Origin And Doctrine Of The Paulicians. -- Part II.

About the middle of the eight century, Constantine, surnamed Copronymus
by the worshippers of images, had made an expedition into Armenia, and
found, in the cities of Melitene and Theodosiopolis, a great number of
Paulicians, his kindred heretics. As a favor, or punishment, he
transplanted them from the banks of the Euphrates to Constantinople and
Thrace; and by this emigration their doctrine was introduced and
diffused in Europe.  If the sectaries of the metropolis were soon
mingled with the promiscuous mass, those of the country struck a deep
root in a foreign soil. The Paulicians of Thrace resisted the storms of
persecution, maintained a secret correspondence with their Armenian
brethren, and gave aid and comfort to their preachers, who solicited,
not without success, the infant faith of the Bulgarians.  In the tenth
century, they were restored and multiplied by a more powerful colony,
which John Zimisces  transported from the Chalybian hills to the valleys
of Mount Hæmus. The Oriental clergy who would have preferred the
destruction, impatiently sighed for the absence, of the Manichæans: the
warlike emperor had felt and esteemed their valor: their attachment to
the Saracens was pregnant with mischief; but, on the side of the Danube,
against the Barbarians of Scythia, their service might be useful, and
their loss would be desirable. Their exile in a distant land was
softened by a free toleration: the Paulicians held the city of
Philippopolis and the keys of Thrace; the Catholics were their subjects;
the Jacobite emigrants their associates: they occupied a line of
villages and castles in Macedonia and Epirus; and many native Bulgarians
were associated to the communion of arms and heresy. As long as they
were awed by power and treated with moderation, their voluntary bands
were distinguished in the armies of the empire; and the courage of these
dogs, ever greedy of war, ever thirsty of human blood, is noticed with
astonishment, and almost with reproach, by the pusillanimous Greeks. The
same spirit rendered them arrogant and contumacious: they were easily
provoked by caprice or injury; and their privileges were often violated
by the faithless bigotry of the government and clergy. In the midst of
the Norman war, two thousand five hundred Manichæans deserted the
standard of Alexius Comnenus,  and retired to their native homes. He
dissembled till the moment of revenge; invited the chiefs to a friendly
conference; and punished the innocent and guilty by imprisonment,
confiscation, and baptism. In an interval of peace, the emperor
undertook the pious office of reconciling them to the church and state:
his winter quarters were fixed at Philippopolis; and the thirteenth
apostle, as he is styled by his pious daughter, consumed whole days and
nights in theological controversy. His arguments were fortified, their
obstinacy was melted, by the honors and rewards which he bestowed on the
most eminent proselytes; and a new city, surrounded with gardens,
enriched with immunities, and dignified with his own name, was founded
by Alexius for the residence of his vulgar converts. The important
station of Philippopolis was wrested from their hands; the contumacious
leaders were secured in a dungeon, or banished from their country; and
their lives were spared by the prudence, rather than the mercy, of an
emperor, at whose command a poor and solitary heretic was burnt alive
before the church of St. Sophia.  But the proud hope of eradicating the
prejudices of a nation was speedily overturned by the invincible zeal of
the Paulicians, who ceased to dissemble or refused to obey. After the
departure and death of Alexius, they soon resumed their civil and
religious laws. In the beginning of the thirteenth century, their pope
or primate (a manifest corruption) resided on the confines of Bulgaria,
Croatia, and Dalmatia, and governed, by his vicars, the filial
congregations of Italy and France.  From that æra, a minute scrutiny
might prolong and perpetuate the chain of tradition. At the end of the
last age, the sect or colony still inhabited the valleys of Mount Hæmus,
where their ignorance and poverty were more frequently tormented by the
Greek clergy than by the Turkish government. The modern Paulicians have
lost all memory of their origin; and their religion is disgraced by the
worship of the cross, and the practice of bloody sacrifice, which some
captives have imported from the wilds of Tartary.

In the West, the first teachers of the Manichæan theology had been
repulsed by the people, or suppressed by the prince. The favor and
success of the Paulicians in the eleventh and twelfth centuries must be
imputed to the strong, though secret, discontent which armed the most
pious Christians against the church of Rome. Her avarice was oppressive,
her despotism odious; less degenerate perhaps than the Greeks in the
worship of saints and images, her innovations were more rapid and
scandalous: she had rigorously defined and imposed the doctrine of
transubstantiation: the lives of the Latin clergy were more corrupt, and
the Eastern bishops might pass for the successors of the apostles, if
they were compared with the lordly prelates, who wielded by turns the
crosier, the sceptre, and the sword. Three different roads might
introduce the Paulicians into the heart of Europe. After the conversion
of Hungary, the pilgrims who visited Jerusalem might safely follow the
course of the Danube: in their journey and return they passed through
Philippopolis; and the sectaries, disguising their name and heresy,
might accompany the French or German caravans to their respective
countries. The trade and dominion of Venice pervaded the coast of the
Adriatic, and the hospitable republic opened her bosom to foreigners of
every climate and religion. Under the Byzantine standard, the Paulicians
were often transported to the Greek provinces of Italy and Sicily: in
peace and war, they freely conversed with strangers and natives, and
their opinions were silently propagated in Rome, Milan, and the kingdoms
beyond the Alps.  It was soon discovered, that many thousand Catholics
of every rank, and of either sex, had embraced the Manichæan heresy; and
the flames which consumed twelve canons of Orleans was the first act and
signal of persecution. The Bulgarians,  a name so innocent in its
origin, so odious in its application, spread their branches over the
face of Europe. United in common hatred of idolatry and Rome, they were
connected by a form of episcopal and presbyterian government; their
various sects were discriminated by some fainter or darker shades of
theology; but they generally agreed in the two principles, the contempt
of the Old Testament and the denial of the body of Christ, either on the
cross or in the eucharist. A confession of simple worship and blameless
manners is extorted from their enemies; and so high was their standard
of perfection, that the increasing congregations were divided into two
classes of disciples, of those who practised, and of those who aspired.
It was in the country of the Albigeois,  in the southern provinces of
France, that the Paulicians were most deeply implanted; and the same
vicissitudes of martyrdom and revenge which had been displayed in the
neighborhood of the Euphrates, were repeated in the thirteenth century
on the banks of the Rhone. The laws of the Eastern emperors were revived
by Frederic the Second. The insurgents of Tephrice were represented by
the barons and cities of Languedoc: Pope Innocent III. surpassed the
sanguinary fame of Theodora. It was in cruelty alone that her soldiers
could equal the heroes of the Crusades, and the cruelty of her priests
was far excelled by the founders of the Inquisition;  an office more
adapted to confirm, than to refute, the belief of an evil principle. The
visible assemblies of the Paulicians, or Albigeois, were extirpated by
fire and sword; and the bleeding remnant escaped by flight, concealment,
or Catholic conformity. But the invincible spirit which they had kindled
still lived and breathed in the Western world. In the state, in the
church, and even in the cloister, a latent succession was preserved of
the disciples of St. Paul; who protested against the tyranny of Rome,
embraced the Bible as the rule of faith, and purified their creed from
all the visions of the Gnostic theology. * The struggles of Wickliff in
England, of Huss in Bohemia, were premature and ineffectual; but the
names of Zuinglius, Luther, and Calvin, are pronounced with gratitude as
the deliverers of nations.

A philosopher, who calculates the degree of their merit and the value of
their reformation, will prudently ask from what articles of faith,
aboveor againstour reason, they have enfranchised the Christians; for
such enfranchisement is doubtless a benefit so far as it may be
compatible with truth and piety. After a fair discussion, we shall
rather be surprised by the timidity, than scandalized by the freedom, of
our first reformers.  With the Jews, they adopted the belief and defence
of all the Hebrew Scriptures, with all their prodigies, from the garden
of Eden to the visions of the prophet Daniel; and they were bound, like
the Catholics, to justify against the Jews the abolition of a divine
law. In the great mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation the reformers
were severely orthodox: they freely adopted the theology of the four, or
the six first councils; and with the Athanasian creed, they pronounced
the eternal damnation of all who did not believe the Catholic faith.
Transubstantiation, the invisible change of the bread and wine into the
body and blood of Christ, is a tenet that may defy the power of argument
and pleasantry; but instead of consulting the evidence of their senses,
of their sight, their feeling, and their taste, the first Protestants
were entangled in their own scruples, and awed by the words of Jesus in
the institution of the sacrament. Luther maintained a corporeal, and
Calvin a real, presence of Christ in the eucharist; and the opinion of
Zuinglius, that it is no more than a spiritual communion, a simple
memorial, has slowly prevailed in the reformed churches.  But the loss
of one mystery was amply compensated by the stupendous doctrines of
original sin, redemption, faith, grace, and predestination, which have
been strained from the epistles of St. Paul. These subtile questions had
most assuredly been prepared by the fathers and schoolmen; but the final
improvement and popular use may be attributed to the first reformers,
who enforced them as the absolute and essential terms of salvation.
Hitherto the weight of supernatural belief inclines against the
Protestants; and many a sober Christian would rather admit that a wafer
is God, than that God is a cruel and capricious tyrant.

Yet the services of Luther and his rivals are solid and important; and
the philosopher must own his obligations to these fearless enthusiasts.
I. By their hands the lofty fabric of superstition, from the abuse of
indulgences to the intercession of the Virgin, has been levelled with
the ground. Myriads of both sexes of the monastic profession were
restored to the liberty and labors of social life. A hierarchy of saints
and angels, of imperfect and subordinate deities, were stripped of their
temporal power, and reduced to the enjoyment of celestial happiness;
their images and relics were banished from the church; and the credulity
of the people was no longer nourished with the daily repetition of
miracles and visions. The imitation of Paganism was supplied by a pure
and spiritual worship of prayer and thanksgiving, the most worthy of
man, the least unworthy of the Deity. It only remains to observe,
whether such sublime simplicity be consistent with popular devotion;
whether the vulgar, in the absence of all visible objects, will not be
inflamed by enthusiasm, or insensibly subside in languor and
indifference. II. The chain of authority was broken, which restrains the
bigot from thinking as he pleases, and the slave from speaking as he
thinks: the popes, fathers, and councils, were no longer the supreme and
infallible judges of the world; and each Christian was taught to
acknowledge no law but the Scriptures, no interpreter but his own
conscience. This freedom, however, was the consequence, rather than the
design, of the Reformation. The patriot reformers were ambitious of
succeeding the tyrants whom they had dethroned. They imposed with equal
rigor their creeds and confessions; they asserted the right of the
magistrate to punish heretics with death. The pious or personal
animosity of Calvin proscribed in Servetus  the guilt of his own
rebellion;  and the flames of Smithfield, in which he was afterwards
consumed, had been kindled for the Anabaptists by the zeal of Cranmer.
The nature of the tiger was the same, but he was gradually deprived of
his teeth and fangs. A spiritual and temporal kingdom was possessed by
the Roman pontiff; the Protestant doctors were subjects of an humble
rank, without revenue or jurisdiction. Hisdecrees were consecrated by
the antiquity of the Catholic church: theirarguments and disputes were
submitted to the people; and their appeal to private judgment was
accepted beyond their wishes, by curiosity and enthusiasm. Since the
days of Luther and Calvin, a secret reformation has been silently
working in the bosom of the reformed churches; many weeds of prejudice
were eradicated; and the disciples of Erasmus  diffused a spirit of
freedom and moderation. The liberty of conscience has been claimed as a
common benefit, an inalienable right:  the free governments of Holland
and England  introduced the practice of toleration; and the narrow
allowance of the laws has been enlarged by the prudence and humanity of
the times. In the exercise, the mind has understood the limits of its
powers, and the words and shadows that might amuse the child can no
longer satisfy his manly reason. The volumes of controversy are
overspread with cobwebs: the doctrine of a Protestant church is far
removed from the knowledge or belief of its private members; and the
forms of orthodoxy, the articles of faith, are subscribed with a sigh,
or a smile, by the modern clergy. Yet the friends of Christianity are
alarmed at the boundless impulse of inquiry and scepticism. The
predictions of the Catholics are accomplished: the web of mystery is
unravelled by the Arminians, Arians, and Socinians, whose number must
not be computed from their separate congregations; and the pillars of
Revelation are shaken by those men who preserve the name without the
substance of religion, who indulge the license without the temper of
philosophy.  *

Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians.

Part I.

The Bulgarians. -- Origin, Migrations, And Settlement Of The Hungarians.
-- Their Inroads In The East And West. -- The Monarchy Of Russia. --
Geography And Trade. -- Wars Of The Russians Against The Greek Empire.
-- Conversion Of The Barbarians.

Under the reign of Constantine the grandson of Heraclius, the ancient
barrier of the Danube, so often violated and so often restored, was
irretrievably swept away by a new deluge of Barbarians. Their progress
was favored by the caliphs, their unknown and accidental auxiliaries:
the Roman legions were occupied in Asia; and after the loss of Syria,
Egypt, and Africa, the Cæsars were twice reduced to the danger and
disgrace of defending their capital against the Saracens. If, in the
account of this interesting people, I have deviated from the strict and
original line of my undertaking, the merit of the subject will hide my
transgression, or solicit my excuse. In the East, in the West, in war,
in religion, in science, in their prosperity, and in their decay, the
Arabians press themselves on our curiosity: the first overthrow of the
church and empire of the Greeks may be imputed to their arms; and the
disciples of Mahomet still hold the civil and religious sceptre of the
Oriental world. But the same labor would be unworthily bestowed on the
swarms of savages, who, between the seventh and the twelfth century,
descended from the plains of Scythia, in transient inroad or perpetual
emigration.  Their names are uncouth, their origins doubtful, their
actions obscure, their superstition was blind, their valor brutal, and
the uniformity of their public and private lives was neither softened by
innocence nor refined by policy. The majesty of the Byzantine throne
repelled and survived their disorderly attacks; the greater part of
these Barbarians has disappeared without leaving any memorial of their
existence, and the despicable remnant continues, and may long continue,
to groan under the dominion of a foreign tyrant. From the antiquities
of, I. Bulgarians, II. Hungarians, and, III. Russians, I shall content
myself with selecting such facts as yet deserve to be remembered. The
conquests of the, IV. Normans, and the monarchy of the, V. Turks, will
naturally terminate in the memorable Crusades to the Holy Land, and the
double fall of the city and empire of Constantine.

I. In his march to Italy, Theodoric  the Ostrogoth had trampled on the
arms of the Bulgarians. After this defeat, the name and the nation are
lost during a century and a half; and it may be suspected that the same
or a similar appellation was revived by strange colonies from the
Borysthenes, the Tanais, or the Volga. A king of the ancient Bulgaria
bequeathed to his five sons a last lesson of moderation and concord. It
was received as youth has ever received the counsels of age and
experience: the five princes buried their father; divided his subjects
and cattle; forgot his advice; separated from each other; and wandered
in quest of fortune till we find the most adventurous in the heart of
Italy, under the protection of the exarch of Ravenna.  But the stream of
emigration was directed or impelled towards the capital. The modern
Bulgaria, along the southern banks of the Danube, was stamped with the
name and image which it has retained to the present hour: the new
conquerors successively acquired, by war or treaty, the Roman provinces
of Dardania, Thessaly, and the two Epirus;  the ecclesiastical supremacy
was translated from the native city of Justinian; and, in their
prosperous age, the obscure town of Lychnidus, or Achrida, was honored
with the throne of a king and a patriarch.  The unquestionable evidence
of language attests the descent of the Bulgarians from the original
stock of the Sclavonian, or more properly Slavonian, race;  and the
kindred bands of Servians, Bosnians, Rascians, Croatians, Walachians,
&c., followed either the standard or the example of the leading tribe.
From the Euxine to the Adriatic, in the state of captives, or subjects,
or allies, or enemies, of the Greek empire, they overspread the land;
and the national appellation of the slaves  has been degraded by chance
or malice from the signification of glory to that of servitude.  Among
these colonies, the Chrobatians,  or Croats, who now attend the motions
of an Austrian army, are the descendants of a mighty people, the
conquerors and sovereigns of Dalmatia. The maritime cities, and of these
the infant republic of Ragusa, implored the aid and instructions of the
Byzantine court: they were advised by the magnanimous Basil to reserve a
small acknowledgment of their fidelity to the Roman empire, and to
appease, by an annual tribute, the wrath of these irresistible
Barbarians. The kingdom of Croatia was shared by eleven Zoupans, or
feudatory lords; and their united forces were numbered at sixty thousand
horse and one hundred thousand foot. A long sea-coast, indented with
capacious harbors, covered with a string of islands, and almost in sight
of the Italian shores, disposed both the natives and strangers to the
practice of navigation. The boats or brigantines of the Croats were
constructed after the fashion of the old Liburnians: one hundred and
eighty vessels may excite the idea of a respectable navy; but our seamen
will smile at the allowance of ten, or twenty, or forty, men for each of
these ships of war. They were gradually converted to the more honorable
service of commerce; yet the Sclavonian pirates were still frequent and
dangerous; and it was not before the close of the tenth century that the
freedom and sovereignty of the Gulf were effectually vindicated by the
Venetian republic.  The ancestors of these Dalmatian kings were equally
removed from the use and abuse of navigation: they dwelt in the White
Croatia, in the inland regions of Silesia and Little Poland, thirty
days' journey, according to the Greek computation, from the sea of
darkness.

The glory of the Bulgarians  was confined to a narrow scope both of time
and place. In the ninth and tenth centuries, they reigned to the south
of the Danube; but the more powerful nations that had followed their
emigration repelled all return to the north and all progress to the
west. Yet in the obscure catalogue of their exploits, they might boast
an honor which had hitherto been appropriated to the Goths: that of
slaying in battle one of the successors of Augustus and Constantine. The
emperor Nicephorus had lost his fame in the Arabian, he lost his life in
the Sclavonian, war. In his first operations he advanced with boldness
and success into the centre of Bulgaria, and burnt the royal court,
which was probably no more than an edifice and village of timber. But
while he searched the spoil and refused all offers of treaty, his
enemies collected their spirits and their forces: the passes of retreat
were insuperably barred; and the trembling Nicephorus was heard to
exclaim, "Alas, alas! unless we could assume the wings of birds, we
cannot hope to escape." Two days he waited his fate in the inactivity of
despair; but, on the morning of the third, the Bulgarians surprised the
camp, and the Roman prince, with the great officers of the empire, were
slaughtered in their tents. The body of Valens had been saved from
insult; but the head of Nicephorus was exposed on a spear, and his
skull, enchased with gold, was often replenished in the feasts of
victory. The Greeks bewailed the dishonor of the throne; but they
acknowledged the just punishment of avarice and cruelty. This savage cup
was deeply tinctured with the manners of the Scythian wilderness; but
they were softened before the end of the same century by a peaceful
intercourse with the Greeks, the possession of a cultivated region, and
the introduction of the Christian worship. The nobles of Bulgaria were
educated in the schools and palace of Constantinople; and Simeon,  a
youth of the royal line, was instructed in the rhetoric of Demosthenes
and the logic of Aristotle. He relinquished the profession of a monk for
that of a king and warrior; and in his reign of more than forty years,
Bulgaria assumed a rank among the civilized powers of the earth. The
Greeks, whom he repeatedly attacked, derived a faint consolation from
indulging themselves in the reproaches of perfidy and sacrilege. They
purchased the aid of the Pagan Turks; but Simeon, in a second battle,
redeemed the loss of the first, at a time when it was esteemed a victory
to elude the arms of that formidable nation. The Servians were
overthrown, made captive and dispersed; and those who visited the
country before their restoration could discover no more than fifty
vagrants, without women or children, who extorted a precarious
subsistence from the chase. On classic ground, on the banks of Achelöus,
the Greeks were defeated; their horn was broken by the strength of the
Barbaric Hercules.  He formed the siege of Constantinople; and, in a
personal conference with the emperor, Simeon imposed the conditions of
peace. They met with the most jealous precautions: the royal gallery was
drawn close to an artificial and well-fortified platform; and the
majesty of the purple was emulated by the pomp of the Bulgarian. "Are
you a Christian?" said the humble Romanus: "it is your duty to abstain
from the blood of your fellow-Christians. Has the thirst of riches
seduced you from the blessings of peace? Sheathe your sword, open your
hand, and I will satiate the utmost measure of your desires." The
reconciliation was sealed by a domestic alliance; the freedom of trade
was granted or restored; the first honors of the court were secured to
the friends of Bulgaria, above the ambassadors of enemies or strangers;
and her princes were dignified with the high and invidious title of
Basileus, or emperor. But this friendship was soon disturbed: after the
death of Simeon, the nations were again in arms; his feeble successors
were divided and extinguished; and, in the beginning of the eleventh
century, the second Basil, who was born in the purple, deserved the
appellation of conqueror of the Bulgarians. His avarice was in some
measure gratified by a treasure of four hundred thousand pounds
sterling, (ten thousand pounds' weight of gold,) which he found in the
palace of Lychnidus. His cruelty inflicted a cool and exquisite
vengeance on fifteen thousand captives who had been guilty of the
defence of their country. They were deprived of sight; but to one of
each hundred a single eye was left, that he might conduct his blind
century to the presence of their king. Their king is said to have
expired of grief and horror; the nation was awed by this terrible
example; the Bulgarians were swept away from their settlements, and
circumscribed within a narrow province; the surviving chiefs bequeathed
to their children the advice of patience and the duty of revenge.

II. When the black swarm of Hungarians first hung over Europe, above
nine hundred years after the Christian æra, they were mistaken by fear
and superstition for the Gog and Magog of the Scriptures, the signs and
forerunners of the end of the world.  Since the introduction of letters,
they have explored their own antiquities with a strong and laudable
impulse of patriotic curiosity.  Their rational criticism can no longer
be amused with a vain pedigree of Attila and the Huns; but they complain
that their primitive records have perished in the Tartar war; that the
truth or fiction of their rustic songs is long since forgotten; and that
the fragments of a rude chronicle  must be painfully reconciled with the
contemporary though foreign intelligence of the imperial geographer.
Magiaris the national and oriental denomination of the Hungarians; but,
among the tribes of Scythia, they are distinguished by the Greeks under
the proper and peculiar name of Turks, as the descendants of that mighty
people who had conquered and reigned from China to the Volga. The
Pannonian colony preserved a correspondence of trade and amity with the
eastern Turks on the confines of Persia and after a separation of three
hundred and fifty years, the missionaries of the king of Hungary
discovered and visited their ancient country near the banks of the
Volga. They were hospitably entertained by a people of Pagans and
Savages who still bore the name of Hungarians; conversed in their native
tongue, recollected a tradition of their long-lost brethren, and
listened with amazement to the marvellous tale of their new kingdom and
religion. The zeal of conversion was animated by the interest of
consanguinity; and one of the greatest of their princes had formed the
generous, though fruitless, design of replenishing the solitude of
Pannonia by this domestic colony from the heart of Tartary.  From this
primitive country they were driven to the West by the tide of war and
emigration, by the weight of the more distant tribes, who at the same
time were fugitives and conquerors. * Reason or fortune directed their
course towards the frontiers of the Roman empire: they halted in the
usual stations along the banks of the great rivers; and in the
territories of Moscow, Kiow, and Moldavia, some vestiges have been
discovered of their temporary residence. In this long and various
peregrination, they could not always escape the dominion of the
stronger; and the purity of their blood was improved or sullied by the
mixture of a foreign race: from a motive of compulsion, or choice,
several tribes of the Chazars were associated to the standard of their
ancient vassals; introduced the use of a second language; and obtained
by their superior renown the most honorable place in the front of
battle. The military force of the Turks and their allies marched in
seven equal and artificial divisions; each division was formed of thirty
thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven warriors, and the proportion of
women, children, and servants, supposes and requires at least a million
of emigrants. Their public counsels were directed by seven vayvods, or
hereditary chiefs; but the experience of discord and weakness
recommended the more simple and vigorous administration of a single
person. The sceptre, which had been declined by the modest Lebedias, was
granted to the birth or merit of Almus and his son Arpad, and the
authority of the supreme khan of the Chazars confirmed the engagement of
the prince and people; of the people to obey his commands, of the prince
to consult their happiness and glory.

With this narrative we might be reasonably content, if the penetration
of modern learning had not opened a new and larger prospect of the
antiquities of nations. The Hungarian language stands alone, and as it
were insulated, among the Sclavonian dialects; but it bears a close and
clear affinity to the idioms of the Fennic race,  of an obsolete and
savage race, which formerly occupied the northern regions of Asia and
Europe. * The genuine appellation of Ugrior Igoursis found on the
western confines of China;  their migration to the banks of the Irtish
is attested by Tartar evidence;  a similar name and language are
detected in the southern parts of Siberia;  and the remains of the
Fennic tribes are widely, though thinly scattered from the sources of
the Oby to the shores of Lapland.  The consanguinity of the Hungarians
and Laplanders would display the powerful energy of climate on the
children of a common parent; the lively contrast between the bold
adventurers who are intoxicated with the wines of the Danube, and the
wretched fugitives who are immersed beneath the snows of the polar
circle. Arms and freedom have ever been the ruling, though too often the
unsuccessful, passion of the Hungarians, who are endowed by nature with
a vigorous constitution of soul and body.  Extreme cold has diminished
the stature and congealed the faculties of the Laplanders; and the
arctic tribes, alone among the sons of men, are ignorant of war, and
unconscious of human blood; a happy ignorance, if reason and virtue were
the guardians of their peace!

Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians. -- Part II.

It is the observation of the Imperial author of the Tactics,  that all
the Scythian hordes resembled each other in their pastoral and military
life, that they all practised the same means of subsistence, and
employed the same instruments of destruction. But he adds, that the two
nations of Bulgarians and Hungarians were superior to their brethren,
and similar to each other in the improvements, however rude, of their
discipline and government: their visible likeness determines Leo to
confound his friends and enemies in one common description; and the
picture may be heightened by some strokes from their contemporaries of
the tenth century. Except the merit and fame of military prowess, all
that is valued by mankind appeared vile and contemptible to these
Barbarians, whose native fierceness was stimulated by the consciousness
of numbers and freedom. The tents of the Hungarians were of leather,
their garments of fur; they shaved their hair, and scarified their
faces: in speech they were slow, in action prompt, in treaty perfidious;
and they shared the common reproach of Barbarians, too ignorant to
conceive the importance of truth, too proud to deny or palliate the
breach of their most solemn engagements. Their simplicity has been
praised; yet they abstained only from the luxury they had never known;
whatever they saw they coveted; their desires were insatiate, and their
sole industry was the hand of violence and rapine. By the definition of
a pastoral nation, I have recalled a long description of the economy,
the warfare, and the government that prevail in that state of society; I
may add, that to fishing, as well as to the chase, the Hungarians were
indebted for a part of their subsistence; and since they
seldomcultivated the ground, they must, at least in their new
settlements, have sometimes practised a slight and unskilful husbandry.
In their emigrations, perhaps in their expeditions, the host was
accompanied by thousands of sheep and oxen which increased the cloud of
formidable dust, and afforded a constant and wholesale supply of milk
and animal food. A plentiful command of forage was the first care of the
general, and if the flocks and herds were secure of their pastures, the
hardy warrior was alike insensible of danger and fatigue. The confusion
of men and cattle that overspread the country exposed their camp to a
nocturnal surprise, had not a still wider circuit been occupied by their
light cavalry, perpetually in motion to discover and delay the approach
of the enemy. After some experience of the Roman tactics, they adopted
the use of the sword and spear, the helmet of the soldier, and the iron
breastplate of his steed: but their native and deadly weapon was the
Tartar bow: from the earliest infancy their children and servants were
exercised in the double science of archery and horsemanship; their arm
was strong; their aim was sure; and in the most rapid career, they were
taught to throw themselves backwards, and to shoot a volley of arrows
into the air. In open combat, in secret ambush, in flight, or pursuit,
they were equally formidable; an appearance of order was maintained in
the foremost ranks, but their charge was driven forwards by the
impatient pressure of succeeding crowds. They pursued, headlong and
rash, with loosened reins and horrific outcries; but, if they fled, with
real or dissembled fear, the ardor of a pursuing foe was checked and
chastised by the same habits of irregular speed and sudden evolution. In
the abuse of victory, they astonished Europe, yet smarting from the
wounds of the Saracen and the Dane: mercy they rarely asked, and more
rarely bestowed: both sexes were accused is equally inaccessible to
pity, and their appetite for raw flesh might countenance the popular
tale, that they drank the blood, and feasted on the hearts of the slain.
Yet the Hungarians were not devoid of those principles of justice and
humanity, which nature has implanted in every bosom. The license of
public and private injuries was restrained by laws and punishments; and
in the security of an open camp, theft is the most tempting and most
dangerous offence. Among the Barbarians there were many, whose
spontaneous virtue supplied their laws and corrected their manners, who
performed the duties, and sympathized with the affections, of social
life.

After a long pilgrimage of flight or victory, the Turkish hordes
approached the common limits of the French and Byzantine empires. Their
first conquests and final settlements extended on either side of the
Danube above Vienna, below Belgrade, and beyond the measure of the Roman
province of Pannonia, or the modern kingdom of Hungary.  That ample and
fertile land was loosely occupied by the Moravians, a Sclavonian name
and tribe, which were driven by the invaders into the compass of a
narrow province. Charlemagne had stretched a vague and nominal empire as
far as the edge of Transylvania; but, after the failure of his
legitimate line, the dukes of Moravia forgot their obedience and tribute
to the monarchs of Oriental France. The bastard Arnulph was provoked to
invite the arms of the Turks: they rushed through the real or figurative
wall, which his indiscretion had thrown open; and the king of Germany
has been justly reproached as a traitor to the civil and ecclesiastical
society of the Christians. During the life of Arnulph, the Hungarians
were checked by gratitude or fear; but in the infancy of his son Lewis
they discovered and invaded Bavaria; and such was their Scythian speed,
that in a single day a circuit of fifty miles was stripped and consumed.
In the battle of Augsburgh the Christians maintained their advantage
till the seventh hour of the day, they were deceived and vanquished by
the flying stratagems of the Turkish cavalry. The conflagration spread
over the provinces of Bavaria, Swabia, and Franconia; and the Hungarians
promoted the reign of anarchy, by forcing the stoutest barons to
discipline their vassals and fortify their castles. The origin of walled
towns is ascribed to this calamitous period; nor could any distance be
secure against an enemy, who, almost at the same instant, laid in ashes
the Helvetian monastery of St. Gall, and the city of Bremen, on the
shores of the northern ocean. Above thirty years the Germanic empire, or
kingdom, was subject to the ignominy of tribute; and resistance was
disarmed by the menace, the serious and effectual menace of dragging the
women and children into captivity, and of slaughtering the males above
the age of ten years. I have neither power nor inclination to follow the
Hungarians beyond the Rhine; but I must observe with surprise, that the
southern provinces of France were blasted by the tempest, and that
Spain, behind her Pyrenees, was astonished at the approach of these
formidable strangers.  The vicinity of Italy had tempted their early
inroads; but from their camp on the Brenta, they beheld with some terror
the apparent strength and populousness of the new discovered country.
They requested leave to retire; their request was proudly rejected by
the Italian king; and the lives of twenty thousand Christians paid the
forfeit of his obstinacy and rashness. Among the cities of the West, the
royal Pavia was conspicuous in fame and splendor; and the preëminence of
Rome itself was only derived from the relics of the apostles. The
Hungarians appeared; Pavia was in flames; forty-three churches were
consumed; and, after the massacre of the people, they spared about two
hundred wretches who had gathered some bushels of gold and silver (a
vague exaggeration) from the smoking ruins of their country. In these
annual excursions from the Alps to the neighborhood of Rome and Capua,
the churches, that yet escaped, resounded with a fearful litany: "O,
save and deliver us from the arrows of the Hungarians!" But the saints
were deaf or inexorable; and the torrent rolled forwards, till it was
stopped by the extreme land of Calabria.  A composition was offered and
accepted for the head of each Italian subject; and ten bushels of silver
were poured forth in the Turkish camp. But falsehood is the natural
antagonist of violence; and the robbers were defrauded both in the
numbers of the assessment and the standard of the metal. On the side of
the East, the Hungarians were opposed in doubtful conflict by the equal
arms of the Bulgarians, whose faith forbade an alliance with the Pagans,
and whose situation formed the barrier of the Byzantine empire. The
barrier was overturned; the emperor of Constantinople beheld the waving
banners of the Turks; and one of their boldest warriors presumed to
strike a battle-axe into the golden gate. The arts and treasures of the
Greeks diverted the assault; but the Hungarians might boast, in their
retreat, that they had imposed a tribute on the spirit of Bulgaria and
the majesty of the Cæsars.  The remote and rapid operations of the same
campaign appear to magnify the power and numbers of the Turks; but their
courage is most deserving of praise, since a light troop of three or
four hundred horse would often attempt and execute the most daring
inroads to the gates of Thessalonica and Constantinople. At this
disastrous æra of the ninth and tenth centuries, Europe was afflicted by
a triple scourge from the North, the East, and the South: the Norman,
the Hungarian, and the Saracen, sometimes trod the same ground of
desolation; and these savage foes might have been compared by Homer to
the two lions growling over the carcass of a mangled stag.

The deliverance of Germany and Christendom was achieved by the Saxon
princes, Henry the Fowler and Otho the Great, who, in two memorable
battles, forever broke the power of the Hungarians.  The valiant Henry
was roused from a bed of sickness by the invasion of his country; but
his mind was vigorous and his prudence successful. "My companions," said
he, on the morning of the combat, "maintain your ranks, receive on your
bucklers the first arrows of the Pagans, and prevent their second
discharge by the equal and rapid career of your lances." They obeyed and
conquered: and the historical picture of the castle of Merseburgh
expressed the features, or at least the character, of Henry, who, in an
age of ignorance, intrusted to the finer arts the perpetuity of his
name.  At the end of twenty years, the children of the Turks who had
fallen by his sword invaded the empire of his son; and their force is
defined, in the lowest estimate, at one hundred thousand horse. They
were invited by domestic faction; the gates of Germany were
treacherously unlocked; and they spread, far beyond the Rhine and the
Meuse, into the heart of Flanders. But the vigor and prudence of Otho
dispelled the conspiracy; the princes were made sensible that unless
they were true to each other, their religion and country were
irrecoverably lost; and the national powers were reviewed in the plains
of Augsburgh. They marched and fought in eight legions, according to the
division of provinces and tribes; the first, second, and third, were
composed of Bavarians; the fourth, of Franconians; the fifth, of Saxons,
under the immediate command of the monarch; the sixth and seventh
consisted of Swabians; and the eighth legion, of a thousand Bohemians,
closed the rear of the host. The resources of discipline and valor were
fortified by the arts of superstition, which, on this occasion, may
deserve the epithets of generous and salutary. The soldiers were
purified with a fast; the camp was blessed with the relics of saints and
martyrs; and the Christian hero girded on his side the sword of
Constantine, grasped the invincible spear of Charlemagne, and waved the
banner of St. Maurice, the præfect of the Thebæan legion. But his
firmest confidence was placed in the holy lance,  whose point was
fashioned of the nails of the cross, and which his father had extorted
from the king of Burgundy, by the threats of war, and the gift of a
province. The Hungarians were expected in the front; they secretly
passed the Lech, a river of Bavaria that falls into the Danube; turned
the rear of the Christian army; plundered the baggage, and disordered
the legion of Bohemia and Swabia. The battle was restored by the
Franconians, whose duke, the valiant Conrad, was pierced with an arrow
as he rested from his fatigues: the Saxons fought under the eyes of
their king; and his victory surpassed, in merit and importance, the
triumphs of the last two hundred years. The loss of the Hungarians was
still greater in the flight than in the action; they were encompassed by
the rivers of Bavaria; and their past cruelties excluded them from the
hope of mercy. Three captive princes were hanged at Ratisbon, the
multitude of prisoners was slain or mutilated, and the fugitives, who
presumed to appear in the face of their country, were condemned to
everlasting poverty and disgrace.  Yet the spirit of the nation was
humbled, and the most accessible passes of Hungary were fortified with a
ditch and rampart. Adversity suggested the counsels of moderation and
peace: the robbers of the West acquiesced in a sedentary life; and the
next generation was taught, by a discerning prince, that far more might
be gained by multiplying and exchanging the produce of a fruitful soil.
The native race, the Turkish or Fennic blood, was mingled with new
colonies of Scythian or Sclavonian origin;  many thousands of robust and
industrious captives had been imported from all the countries of Europe;
and after the marriage of Geisa with a Bavarian princess, he bestowed
honors and estates on the nobles of Germany.  The son of Geisa was
invested with the regal title, and the house of Arpad reigned three
hundred years in the kingdom of Hungary. But the freeborn Barbarians
were not dazzled by the lustre of the diadem, and the people asserted
their indefeasible right of choosing, deposing, and punishing the
hereditary servant of the state.

III. The name of Russians  was first divulged, in the ninth century, by
an embassy of Theophilus, emperor of the East, to the emperor of the
West, Lewis, the son of Charlemagne. The Greeks were accompanied by the
envoys of the great duke, or chagan, or czar, of the Russians. In their
journey to Constantinople, they had traversed many hostile nations; and
they hoped to escape the dangers of their return, by requesting the
French monarch to transport them by sea to their native country. A
closer examination detected their origin: they were the brethren of the
Swedes and Normans, whose name was already odious and formidable in
France; and it might justly be apprehended, that these Russian strangers
were not the messengers of peace, but the emissaries of war. They were
detained, while the Greeks were dismissed; and Lewis expected a more
satisfactory account, that he might obey the laws of hospitality or
prudence, according to the interest of both empires.  This Scandinavian
origin of the people, or at least the princes, of Russia, may be
confirmed and illustrated by the national annals  and the general
history of the North. The Normans, who had so long been concealed by a
veil of impenetrable darkness, suddenly burst forth in the spirit of
naval and military enterprise. The vast, and, as it is said, the
populous regions of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, were crowded with
independent chieftains and desperate adventurers, who sighed in the
laziness of peace, and smiled in the agonies of death. Piracy was the
exercise, the trade, the glory, and the virtue, of the Scandinavian
youth. Impatient of a bleak climate and narrow limits, they started from
the banquet, grasped their arms, sounded their horn, ascended their
vessels, and explored every coast that promised either spoil or
settlement. The Baltic was the first scene of their naval achievements
they visited the eastern shores, the silent residence of Fennic and
Sclavonic tribes, and the primitive Russians of the Lake Ladoga paid a
tribute, the skins of white squirrels, to these strangers, whom they
saluted with the title of Varangiansor Corsairs. Their superiority in
arms, discipline, and renown, commanded the fear and reverence of the
natives. In their wars against the more inland savages, the Varangians
condescended to serve as friends and auxiliaries, and gradually, by
choice or conquest, obtained the dominion of a people whom they were
qualified to protect. Their tyranny was expelled, their valor was again
recalled, till at length Ruric, a Scandinavian chief, became the father
of a dynasty which reigned above seven hundred years. His brothers
extended his influence: the example of service and usurpation was
imitated by his companions in the southern provinces of Russia; and
their establishments, by the usual methods of war and assassination,
were cemented into the fabric of a powerful monarchy.

As long as the descendants of Ruric were considered as aliens and
conquerors, they ruled by the sword of the Varangians, distributed
estates and subjects to their faithful captains, and supplied their
numbers with fresh streams of adventurers from the Baltic coast.  But
when the Scandinavian chiefs had struck a deep and permanent root into
the soil, they mingled with the Russians in blood, religion, and
language, and the first Waladimir had the merit of delivering his
country from these foreign mercenaries. They had seated him on the
throne; his riches were insufficient to satisfy their demands; but they
listened to his pleasing advice, that they should seek, not a more
grateful, but a more wealthy, master; that they should embark for
Greece, where, instead of the skins of squirrels, silk and gold would be
the recompense of their service. At the same time, the Russian prince
admonished his Byzantine ally to disperse and employ, to recompense and
restrain, these impetuous children of the North. Contemporary writers
have recorded the introduction, name, and character, of the Varangians:
each day they rose in confidence and esteem; the whole body was
assembled at Constantinople to perform the duty of guards; and their
strength was recruited by a numerous band of their countrymen from the
Island of Thule. On this occasion, the vague appellation of Thule is
applied to England; and the new Varangians were a colony of English and
Danes who fled from the yoke of the Norman conqueror. The habits of
pilgrimage and piracy had approximated the countries of the earth; these
exiles were entertained in the Byzantine court; and they preserved, till
the last age of the empire, the inheritance of spotless loyalty, and the
use of the Danish or English tongue. With their broad and double-edged
battle-axes on their shoulders, they attended the Greek emperor to the
temple, the senate, and the hippodrome; he slept and feasted under their
trusty guard; and the keys of the palace, the treasury, and the capital,
were held by the firm and faithful hands of the Varangians.

In the tenth century, the geography of Scythia was extended far beyond
the limits of ancient knowledge; and the monarchy of the Russians
obtains a vast and conspicuous place in the map of Constantine.  The
sons of Ruric were masters of the spacious province of Wolodomir, or
Moscow; and, if they were confined on that side by the hordes of the
East, their western frontier in those early days was enlarged to the
Baltic Sea and the country of the Prussians. Their northern reign
ascended above the sixtieth degree of latitude over the Hyperborean
regions, which fancy had peopled with monsters, or clouded with eternal
darkness. To the south they followed the course of the Borysthenes, and
approached with that river the neighborhood of the Euxine Sea. The
tribes that dwelt, or wandered, in this ample circuit were obedient to
the same conqueror, and insensibly blended into the same nation. The
language of Russia is a dialect of the Sclavonian; but in the tenth
century, these two modes of speech were different from each other; and,
as the Sclavonian prevailed in the South, it may be presumed that the
original Russians of the North, the primitive subjects of the Varangian
chief, were a portion of the Fennic race. With the emigration, union, or
dissolution, of the wandering tribes, the loose and indefinite picture
of the Scythian desert has continually shifted. But the most ancient map
of Russia affords some places which still retain their name and
position; and the two capitals, Novogorod  and Kiow,  are coeval with
the first age of the monarchy. Novogorod had not yet deserved the
epithet of great, nor the alliance of the Hanseatic League, which
diffused the streams of opulence and the principles of freedom. Kiow
could not yet boast of three hundred churches, an innumerable people,
and a degree of greatness and splendor which was compared with
Constantinople by those who had never seen the residence of the Cæsars.
In their origin, the two cities were no more than camps or fairs, the
most convenient stations in which the Barbarians might assemble for the
occasional business of war or trade. Yet even these assemblies announce
some progress in the arts of society; a new breed of cattle was imported
from the southern provinces; and the spirit of commercial enterprise
pervaded the sea and land, from the Baltic to the Euxine, from the mouth
of the Oder to the port of Constantinople. In the days of idolatry and
barbarism, the Sclavonic city of Julin was frequented and enriched by
the Normans, who had prudently secured a free mart of purchase and
exchange.  From this harbor, at the entrance of the Oder, the corsair,
or merchant, sailed in forty-three days to the eastern shores of the
Baltic, the most distant nations were intermingled, and the holy groves
of Curland are saidto have been decorated with Grecianand Spanish gold.
Between the sea and Novogorod an easy intercourse was discovered; in the
summer, through a gulf, a lake, and a navigable river; in the winter
season, over the hard and level surface of boundless snows. From the
neighborhood of that city, the Russians descended the streams that fall
into the Borysthenes; their canoes, of a single tree, were laden with
slaves of every age, furs of every species, the spoil of their beehives,
and the hides of their cattle; and the whole produce of the North was
collected and discharged in the magazines of Kiow. The month of June was
the ordinary season of the departure of the fleet: the timber of the
canoes was framed into the oars and benches of more solid and capacious
boats; and they proceeded without obstacle down the Borysthenes, as far
as the seven or thirteen ridges of rocks, which traverse the bed, and
precipitate the waters, of the river. At the more shallow falls it was
sufficient to lighten the vessels; but the deeper cataracts were
impassable; and the mariners, who dragged their vessels and their slaves
six miles over land, were exposed in this toilsome journey to the
robbers of the desert.  At the first island below the falls, the
Russians celebrated the festival of their escape: at a second, near the
mouth of the river, they repaired their shattered vessels for the longer
and more perilous voyage of the Black Sea. If they steered along the
coast, the Danube was accessible; with a fair wind they could reach in
thirty-six or forty hours the opposite shores of Anatolia; and
Constantinople admitted the annual visit of the strangers of the North.
They returned at the stated season with a rich cargo of corn, wine, and
oil, the manufactures of Greece, and the spices of India. Some of their
countrymen resided in the capital and provinces; and the national
treaties protected the persons, effects, and privileges, of the Russian
merchant.

Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians. -- Part
III.

But the same communication which had been opened for the benefit, was
soon abused for the injury, of mankind. In a period of one hundred and
ninety years, the Russians made four attempts to plunder the treasures
of Constantinople: the event was various, but the motive, the means, and
the object, were the same in these naval expeditions.  The Russian
traders had seen the magnificence, and tasted the luxury of the city of
the Cæsars. A marvellous tale, and a scanty supply, excited the desires
of their savage countrymen: they envied the gifts of nature which their
climate denied; they coveted the works of art, which they were too lazy
to imitate and too indigent to purchase; the Varangian princes unfurled
the banners of piratical adventure, and their bravest soldiers were
drawn from the nations that dwelt in the northern isles of the ocean.
The image of their naval armaments was revived in the last century, in
the fleets of the Cossacks, which issued from the Borysthenes, to
navigate the same seas for a similar purpose.  The Greek appellation of
monoxyla, or single canoes, might justly be applied to the bottom of
their vessels. It was scooped out of the long stem of a beech or willow,
but the slight and narrow foundation was raised and continued on either
side with planks, till it attained the length of sixty, and the height
of about twelve, feet. These boats were built without a deck, but with
two rudders and a mast; to move with sails and oars; and to contain from
forty to seventy men, with their arms, and provisions of fresh water and
salt fish. The first trial of the Russians was made with two hundred
boats; but when the national force was exerted, they might arm against
Constantinople a thousand or twelve hundred vessels. Their fleet was not
much inferior to the royal navy of Agamemnon, but it was magnified in
the eyes of fear to ten or fifteen times the real proportion of its
strength and numbers. Had the Greek emperors been endowed with foresight
to discern, and vigor to prevent, perhaps they might have sealed with a
maritime force the mouth of the Borysthenes. Their indolence abandoned
the coast of Anatolia to the calamities of a piratical war, which, after
an interval of six hundred years, again infested the Euxine; but as long
as the capital was respected, the sufferings of a distant province
escaped the notice both of the prince and the historian. The storm which
had swept along from the Phasis and Trebizond, at length burst on the
Bosphorus of Thrace; a strait of fifteen miles, in which the rude
vessels of the Russians might have been stopped and destroyed by a more
skilful adversary. In their first enterprise  under the princes of Kiow,
they passed without opposition, and occupied the port of Constantinople
in the absence of the emperor Michael, the son of Theophilus. Through a
crowd of perils, he landed at the palace-stairs, and immediately
repaired to a church of the Virgin Mary.  By the advice of the
patriarch, her garment, a precious relic, was drawn from the sanctuary
and dipped in the sea; and a seasonable tempest, which determined the
retreat of the Russians, was devoutly ascribed to the mother of God.
The silence of the Greeks may inspire some doubt of the truth, or at
least of the importance, of the second attempt by Oleg, the guardian of
the sons of Ruric.  A strong barrier of arms and fortifications defended
the Bosphorus: they were eluded by the usual expedient of drawing the
boats over the isthmus; and this simple operation is described in the
national chronicles, as if the Russian fleet had sailed over dry land
with a brisk and favorable gale. The leader of the third armament, Igor,
the son of Ruric, had chosen a moment of weakness and decay, when the
naval powers of the empire were employed against the Saracens. But if
courage be not wanting, the instruments of defence are seldom deficient.
Fifteen broken and decayed galleys were boldly launched against the
enemy; but instead of the single tube of Greek fire usually planted on
the prow, the sides and stern of each vessel were abundantly supplied
with that liquid combustible. The engineers were dexterous; the weather
was propitious; many thousand Russians, who chose rather to be drowned
than burnt, leaped into the sea; and those who escaped to the Thracian
shore were inhumanly slaughtered by the peasants and soldiers. Yet one
third of the canoes escaped into shallow water; and the next spring Igor
was again prepared to retrieve his disgrace and claim his revenge.
After a long peace, Jaroslaus, the great grandson of Igor, resumed the
same project of a naval invasion. A fleet, under the command of his son,
was repulsed at the entrance of the Bosphorus by the same artificial
flames. But in the rashness of pursuit, the vanguard of the Greeks was
encompassed by an irresistible multitude of boats and men; their
provision of fire was probably exhausted; and twenty-four galleys were
either taken, sunk, or destroyed.

Yet the threats or calamities of a Russian war were more frequently
diverted by treaty than by arms. In these naval hostilities, every
disadvantage was on the side of the Greeks; their savage enemy afforded
no mercy: his poverty promised no spoil; his impenetrable retreat
deprived the conqueror of the hopes of revenge; and the pride or
weakness of empire indulged an opinion, that no honor could be gained or
lost in the intercourse with Barbarians. At first their demands were
high and inadmissible, three pounds of gold for each soldier or mariner
of the fleet: the Russian youth adhered to the design of conquest and
glory; but the counsels of moderation were recommended by the hoary
sages. "Be content," they said, "with the liberal offers of Cæsar; it is
not far better to obtain without a combat the possession of gold,
silver, silks, and all the objects of our desires? Are we sure of
victory? Can we conclude a treaty with the sea? We do not tread on the
land; we float on the abyss of water, and a common death hangs over our
heads."  The memory of these Arctic fleets that seemed to descend from
the polar circle left deep impression of terror on the Imperial city. By
the vulgar of every rank, it was asserted and believed, that an
equestrian statue in the square of Taurus was secretly inscribed with a
prophecy, how the Russians, in the last days, should become masters of
Constantinople.  In our own time, a Russian armament, instead of sailing
from the Borysthenes, has circumnavigated the continent of Europe; and
the Turkish capital has been threatened by a squadron of strong and
lofty ships of war, each of which, with its naval science and thundering
artillery, could have sunk or scattered a hundred canoes, such as those
of their ancestors. Perhaps the present generation may yet behold the
accomplishment of the prediction, of a rare prediction, of which the
style is unambiguous and the date unquestionable.

By land the Russians were less formidable than by sea; and as they
fought for the most part on foot, their irregular legions must often
have been broken and overthrown by the cavalry of the Scythian hordes.
Yet their growing towns, however slight and imperfect, presented a
shelter to the subject, and a barrier to the enemy: the monarchy of
Kiow, till a fatal partition, assumed the dominion of the North; and the
nations from the Volga to the Danube were subdued or repelled by the
arms of Swatoslaus,  the son of Igor, the son of Oleg, the son of Ruric.
The vigor of his mind and body was fortified by the hardships of a
military and savage life. Wrapped in a bear-skin, Swatoslaus usually
slept on the ground, his head reclining on a saddle; his diet was coarse
and frugal, and, like the heroes of Homer,  his meat (it was often
horse-flesh) was broiled or roasted on the coals. The exercise of war
gave stability and discipline to his army; and it may be presumed, that
no soldier was permitted to transcend the luxury of his chief. By an
embassy from Nicephorus, the Greek emperor, he was moved to undertake
the conquest of Bulgaria; and a gift of fifteen hundred pounds of gold
was laid at his feet to defray the expense, or reward the toils, of the
expedition. An army of sixty thousand men was assembled and embarked;
they sailed from the Borysthenes to the Danube; their landing was
effected on the Mæsian shore; and, after a sharp encounter, the swords
of the Russians prevailed against the arrows of the Bulgarian horse. The
vanquished king sunk into the grave; his children were made captive; and
his dominions, as far as Mount Hæmus, were subdued or ravaged by the
northern invaders. But instead of relinquishing his prey, and performing
his engagements, the Varangian prince was more disposed to advance than
to retire; and, had his ambition been crowned with success, the seat of
empire in that early period might have been transferred to a more
temperate and fruitful climate. Swatoslaus enjoyed and acknowledged the
advantages of his new position, in which he could unite, by exchange or
rapine, the various productions of the earth. By an easy navigation he
might draw from Russia the native commodities of furs, wax, and
hydromel: Hungary supplied him with a breed of horses and the spoils of
the West; and Greece abounded with gold, silver, and the foreign
luxuries, which his poverty had affected to disdain. The bands of
Patzinacites, Chozars, and Turks, repaired to the standard of victory;
and the ambassador of Nicephorus betrayed his trust, assumed the purple,
and promised to share with his new allies the treasures of the Eastern
world. From the banks of the Danube the Russian prince pursued his march
as far as Adrianople; a formal summons to evacuate the Roman province
was dismissed with contempt; and Swatoslaus fiercely replied, that
Constantinople might soon expect the presence of an enemy and a master.

Nicephorus could no longer expel the mischief which he had introduced;
but his throne and wife were inherited by John Zimisces,  who, in a
diminutive body, possessed the spirit and abilities of a hero. The first
victory of his lieutenants deprived the Russians of their foreign
allies, twenty thousand of whom were either destroyed by the sword, or
provoked to revolt, or tempted to desert. Thrace was delivered, but
seventy thousand Barbarians were still in arms; and the legions that had
been recalled from the new conquests of Syria, prepared, with the return
of the spring, to march under the banners of a warlike prince, who
declared himself the friend and avenger of the injured Bulgaria. The
passes of Mount Hæmus had been left unguarded; they were instantly
occupied; the Roman vanguard was formed of the immortals, (a proud
imitation of the Persian style;) the emperor led the main body of ten
thousand five hundred foot; and the rest of his forces followed in slow
and cautious array, with the baggage and military engines. The first
exploit of Zimisces was the reduction of Marcianopolis, or Peristhlaba,
in two days; the trumpets sounded; the walls were scaled; eight thousand
five hundred Russians were put to the sword; and the sons of the
Bulgarian king were rescued from an ignominious prison, and invested
with a nominal diadem. After these repeated losses, Swatoslaus retired
to the strong post of Drista, on the banks of the Danube, and was
pursued by an enemy who alternately employed the arms of celerity and
delay. The Byzantine galleys ascended the river, the legions completed a
line of circumvallation; and the Russian prince was encompassed,
assaulted, and famished, in the fortifications of the camp and city.
Many deeds of valor were performed; several desperate sallies were
attempted; nor was it till after a siege of sixty-five days that
Swatoslaus yielded to his adverse fortune. The liberal terms which he
obtained announce the prudence of the victor, who respected the valor,
and apprehended the despair, of an unconquered mind. The great duke of
Russia bound himself, by solemn imprecations, to relinquish all hostile
designs; a safe passage was opened for his return; the liberty of trade
and navigation was restored; a measure of corn was distributed to each
of his soldiers; and the allowance of twenty-two thousand measures
attests the loss and the remnant of the Barbarians. After a painful
voyage, they again reached the mouth of the Borysthenes; but their
provisions were exhausted; the season was unfavorable; they passed the
winter on the ice; and, before they could prosecute their march,
Swatoslaus was surprised and oppressed by the neighboring tribes with
whom the Greeks entertained a perpetual and useful correspondence.  Far
different was the return of Zimisces, who was received in his capital
like Camillus or Marius, the saviors of ancient Rome. But the merit of
the victory was attributed by the pious emperor to the mother of God;
and the image of the Virgin Mary, with the divine infant in her arms,
was placed on a triumphal car, adorned with the spoils of war, and the
ensigns of Bulgarian royalty. Zimisces made his public entry on
horseback; the diadem on his head, a crown of laurel in his hand; and
Constantinople was astonished to applaud the martial virtues of her
sovereign.

Photius of Constantinople, a patriarch, whose ambition was equal to his
curiosity, congratulates himself and the Greek church on the conversion
of the Russians.  Those fierce and bloody Barbarians had been persuaded,
by the voice of reason and religion, to acknowledge Jesus for their God,
the Christian missionaries for their teachers, and the Romans for their
friends and brethren. His triumph was transient and premature. In the
various fortune of their piratical adventures, some Russian chiefs might
allow themselves to be sprinkled with the waters of baptism; and a Greek
bishop, with the name of metropolitan, might administer the sacraments
in the church of Kiow, to a congregation of slaves and natives. But the
seed of the gospel was sown on a barren soil: many were the apostates,
the converts were few; and the baptism of Olga may be fixed as the æra
of Russian Christianity.  A female, perhaps of the basest origin, who
could revenge the death, and assume the sceptre, of her husband Igor,
must have been endowed with those active virtues which command the fear
and obedience of Barbarians. In a moment of foreign and domestic peace,
she sailed from Kiow to Constantinople; and the emperor Constantine
Porphyrogenitus has described, with minute diligence, the ceremonial of
her reception in his capital and palace. The steps, the titles, the
salutations, the banquet, the presents, were exquisitely adjusted to
gratify the vanity of the stranger, with due reverence to the superior
majesty of the purple.  In the sacrament of baptism, she received the
venerable name of the empress Helena; and her conversion might be
preceded or followed by her uncle, two interpreters, sixteen damsels of
a higher, and eighteen of a lower rank, twenty-two domestics or
ministers, and forty-four Russian merchants, who composed the retinue of
the great princess Olga. After her return to Kiow and Novogorod, she
firmly persisted in her new religion; but her labors in the propagation
of the gospel were not crowned with success; and both her family and
nation adhered with obstinacy or indifference to the gods of their
fathers. Her son Swatoslaus was apprehensive of the scorn and ridicule
of his companions; and her grandson Wolodomir devoted his youthful zeal
to multiply and decorate the monuments of ancient worship. The savage
deities of the North were still propitiated with human sacrifices: in
the choice of the victim, a citizen was preferred to a stranger, a
Christian to an idolater; and the father, who defended his son from the
sacerdotal knife, was involved in the same doom by the rage of a fanatic
tumult. Yet the lessons and example of the pious Olga had made a deep,
though secret, impression in the minds of the prince and people: the
Greek missionaries continued to preach, to dispute, and to baptize: and
the ambassadors or merchants of Russia compared the idolatry of the
woods with the elegant superstition of Constantinople. They had gazed
with admiration on the dome of St. Sophia: the lively pictures of saints
and martyrs, the riches of the altar, the number and vestments of the
priests, the pomp and order of the ceremonies; they were edified by the
alternate succession of devout silence and harmonious song; nor was it
difficult to persuade them, that a choir of angels descended each day
from heaven to join in the devotion of the Christians.  But the
conversion of Wolodomir was determined, or hastened, by his desire of a
Roman bride. At the same time, and in the city of Cherson, the rites of
baptism and marriage were celebrated by the Christian pontiff: the city
he restored to the emperor Basil, the brother of his spouse; but the
brazen gates were transported, as it is said, to Novogorod, and erected
before the first church as a trophy of his victory and faith.  At his
despotic command, Peround, the god of thunder, whom he had so long
adored, was dragged through the streets of Kiow; and twelve sturdy
Barbarians battered with clubs the misshapen image, which was
indignantly cast into the waters of the Borysthenes. The edict of
Wolodomir had proclaimed, that all who should refuse the rites of
baptism would be treated as the enemies of God and their prince; and the
rivers were instantly filled with many thousands of obedient Russians,
who acquiesced in the truth and excellence of a doctrine which had been
embraced by the great duke and his boyars. In the next generation, the
relics of Paganism were finally extirpated; but as the two brothers of
Wolodomir had died without baptism, their bones were taken from the
grave, and sanctified by an irregular and posthumous sacrament.

In the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries of the Christian æra, the
reign of the gospel and of the church was extended over Bulgaria,
Hungary, Bohemia, Saxony, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, and Russia.
The triumphs of apostolic zeal were repeated in the iron age of
Christianity; and the northern and eastern regions of Europe submitted
to a religion, more different in theory than in practice, from the
worship of their native idols. A laudable ambition excited the monks
both of Germany and Greece, to visit the tents and huts of the
Barbarians: poverty, hardships, and dangers, were the lot of the first
missionaries; their courage was active and patient; their motive pure
and meritorious; their present reward consisted in the testimony of
their conscience and the respect of a grateful people; but the fruitful
harvest of their toils was inherited and enjoyed by the proud and
wealthy prelates of succeeding times. The first conversions were free
and spontaneous: a holy life and an eloquent tongue were the only arms
of the missionaries; but the domestic fables of the Pagans were silenced
by the miracles and visions of the strangers; and the favorable temper
of the chiefs was accelerated by the dictates of vanity and interest.
The leaders of nations, who were saluted with the titles of kings and
saints,  held it lawful and pious to impose the Catholic faith on their
subjects and neighbors; the coast of the Baltic, from Holstein to the
Gulf of Finland, was invaded under the standard of the cross; and the
reign of idolatry was closed by the conversion of Lithuania in the
fourteenth century. Yet truth and candor must acknowledge, that the
conversion of the North imparted many temporal benefits both to the old
and the new Christians. The rage of war, inherent to the human species,
could not be healed by the evangelic precepts of charity and peace; and
the ambition of Catholic princes has renewed in every age the calamities
of hostile contention. But the admission of the Barbarians into the pale
of civil and ecclesiastical society delivered Europe from the
depredations, by sea and land, of the Normans, the Hungarians, and the
Russians, who learned to spare their brethren and cultivate their
possessions.  The establishment of law and order was promoted by the
influence of the clergy; and the rudiments of art and science were
introduced into the savage countries of the globe. The liberal piety of
the Russian princes engaged in their service the most skilful of the
Greeks, to decorate the cities and instruct the inhabitants: the dome
and the paintings of St. Sophia were rudely copied in the churches of
Kiow and Novogorod: the writings of the fathers were translated into the
Sclavonic idiom; and three hundred noble youths were invited or
compelled to attend the lessons of the college of Jaroslaus. It should
appear that Russia might have derived an early and rapid improvement
from her peculiar connection with the church and state of
Constantinople, which at that age so justly despised the ignorance of
the Latins. But the Byzantine nation was servile, solitary, and verging
to a hasty decline: after the fall of Kiow, the navigation of the
Borysthenes was forgotten; the great princes of Wolodomir and Moscow
were separated from the sea and Christendom; and the divided monarchy
was oppressed by the ignominy and blindness of Tartar servitude.  The
Sclavonic and Scandinavian kingdoms, which had been converted by the
Latin missionaries, were exposed, it is true, to the spiritual
jurisdiction and temporal claims of the popes;  but they were united in
language and religious worship, with each other, and with Rome; they
imbibed the free and generous spirit of the European republic, and
gradually shared the light of knowledge which arose on the western
world.

Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans.

Part I.

The Saracens, Franks, And Greeks, In Italy. -- First Adventures And
Settlement Of The Normans. -- Character And Conquest Of Robert Guiscard,
Duke Of Apulia -- Deliverance Of Sicily By His Brother Roger. --
Victories Of Robert Over The Emperors Of The East And West. -- Roger,
King Of Sicily, Invades Africa And Greece. -- The Emperor Manuel
Comnenus. -- Wars Of The Greeks And Normans. -- Extinction Of The
Normans.

The three great nations of the world, the Greeks, the Saracens, and the
Franks, encountered each other on the theatre of Italy.  The southern
provinces, which now compose the kingdom of Naples, were subject, for
the most part, to the Lombard dukes and princes of Beneventum;  so
powerful in war, that they checked for a moment the genius of
Charlemagne; so liberal in peace, that they maintained in their capital
an academy of thirty-two philosophers and grammarians. The division of
this flourishing state produced the rival principalities of Benevento,
Salerno, and Capua; and the thoughtless ambition or revenge of the
competitors invited the Saracens to the ruin of their common
inheritance. During a calamitous period of two hundred years, Italy was
exposed to a repetition of wounds, which the invaders were not capable
of healing by the union and tranquility of a perfect conquest. Their
frequent and almost annual squadrons issued from the port of Palermo,
and were entertained with too much indulgence by the Christians of
Naples: the more formidable fleets were prepared on the African coast;
and even the Arabs of Andalusia were sometimes tempted to assist or
oppose the Moslems of an adverse sect. In the revolution of human
events, a new ambuscade was concealed in the Caudine Forks, the fields
of Cannæwere bedewed a second time with the blood of the Africans, and
the sovereign of Rome again attacked or defended the walls of Capua and
Tarentum. A colony of Saracens had been planted at Bari, which commands
the entrance of the Adriatic Gulf; and their impartial depredations
provoked the resentment, and conciliated the union of the two emperors.
An offensive alliance was concluded between Basil the Macedonian, the
first of his race, and Lewis the great-grandson of Charlemagne;  and
each party supplied the deficiencies of his associate. It would have
been imprudent in the Byzantine monarch to transport his stationary
troops of Asia to an Italian campaign; and the Latin arms would have
been insufficient if his superior navy had not occupied the mouth of the
Gulf. The fortress of Bari was invested by the infantry of the Franks,
and by the cavalry and galleys of the Greeks; and, after a defence of
four years, the Arabian emir submitted to the clemency of Lewis, who
commanded in person the operations of the siege. This important conquest
had been achieved by the concord of the East and West; but their recent
amity was soon imbittered by the mutual complaints of jealousy and
pride. The Greeks assumed as their own the merit of the conquest and the
pomp of the triumph; extolled the greatness of their powers, and
affected to deride the intemperance and sloth of the handful of
Barbarians who appeared under the banners of the Carlovingian prince.
His reply is expressed with the eloquence of indignation and truth: "We
confess the magnitude of your preparation," says the great-grandson of
Charlemagne. "Your armies were indeed as numerous as a cloud of summer
locusts, who darken the day, flap their wings, and, after a short
flight, tumble weary and breathless to the ground. Like them, ye sunk
after a feeble effort; ye were vanquished by your own cowardice; and
withdrew from the scene of action to injure and despoil our Christian
subjects of the Sclavonian coast. We were few in number, and why were we
few? Because, after a tedious expectation of your arrival, I had
dismissed my host, and retained only a chosen band of warriors to
continue the blockade of the city. If they indulged their hospitable
feasts in the face of danger and death, did these feasts abate the vigor
of their enterprise? Is it by your fasting that the walls of Bari have
been overturned? Did not these valiant Franks, diminished as they were
by languor and fatigue, intercept and vanish the three most powerful
emirs of the Saracens? and did not their defeat precipitate the fall of
the city? Bari is now fallen; Tarentum trembles; Calabria will be
delivered; and, if we command the sea, the Island of Sicily may be
rescued from the hands of the infidels. My brother," accelerate (a name
most offensive to the vanity of the Greek,) "accelerate your naval
succors, respect your allies, and distrust your flatterers."

These lofty hopes were soon extinguished by the death of Lewis, and the
decay of the Carlovingian house; and whoever might deserve the honor,
the Greek emperors, Basil, and his son Leo, secured the advantage, of
the reduction of Bari The Italians of Apulia and Calabria were persuaded
or compelled to acknowledge their supremacy, and an ideal line from
Mount Garganus to the Bay of Salerno, leaves the far greater part of the
kingdom of Naples under the dominion of the Eastern empire. Beyond that
line, the dukes or republics of Amalfi  and Naples, who had never
forfeited their voluntary allegiance, rejoiced in the neighborhood of
their lawful sovereign; and Amalfi was enriched by supplying Europe with
the produce and manufactures of Asia. But the Lombard princes of
Benevento, Salerno, and Capua,  were reluctantly torn from the communion
of the Latin world, and too often violated their oaths of servitude and
tribute. The city of Bari rose to dignity and wealth, as the metropolis
of the new theme or province of Lombardy: the title of patrician, and
afterwards the singular name of Catapan,  was assigned to the supreme
governor; and the policy both of the church and state was modelled in
exact subordination to the throne of Constantinople. As long as the
sceptre was disputed by the princes of Italy, their efforts were feeble
and adverse; and the Greeks resisted or eluded the forces of Germany,
which descended from the Alps under the Imperial standard of the Othos.
The first and greatest of those Saxon princes was compelled to
relinquish the siege of Bari: the second, after the loss of his stoutest
bishops and barons, escaped with honor from the bloody field of Crotona.
On that day the scale of war was turned against the Franks by the valor
of the Saracens.  These corsairs had indeed been driven by the Byzantine
fleets from the fortresses and coasts of Italy; but a sense of interest
was more prevalent than superstition or resentment, and the caliph of
Egypt had transported forty thousand Moslems to the aid of his Christian
ally. The successors of Basil amused themselves with the belief, that
the conquest of Lombardy had been achieved, and was still preserved by
the justice of their laws, the virtues of their ministers, and the
gratitude of a people whom they had rescued from anarchy and oppression.
A series of rebellions might dart a ray of truth into the palace of
Constantinople; and the illusions of flattery were dispelled by the easy
and rapid success of the Norman adventurers.

The revolution of human affairs had produced in Apulia and Calabria a
melancholy contrast between the age of Pythagoras and the tenth century
of the Christian æra. At the former period, the coast of Great Greece
(as it was then styled) was planted with free and opulent cities: these
cities were peopled with soldiers, artists, and philosophers; and the
military strength of Tarentum; Sybaris, or Crotona, was not inferior to
that of a powerful kingdom. At the second æra, these once flourishing
provinces were clouded with ignorance impoverished by tyranny, and
depopulated by Barbarian war nor can we severely accuse the exaggeration
of a contemporary, that a fair and ample district was reduced to the
same desolation which had covered the earth after the general deluge.
Among the hostilities of the Arabs, the Franks, and the Greeks, in the
southern Italy, I shall select two or three anecdotes expressive of
their national manners. 1.It was the amusement of the Saracens to
profane, as well as to pillage, the monasteries and churches. At the
siege of Salerno, a Mussulman chief spread his couch on the
communion-table, and on that altar sacrificed each night the virginity
of a Christian nun. As he wrestled with a reluctant maid, a beam in the
roof was accidentally or dexterously thrown down on his head; and the
death of the lustful emir was imputed to the wrath of Christ, which was
at length awakened to the defence of his faithful spouse.  2.The
Saracens besieged the cities of Beneventum and Capua: after a vain
appeal to the successors of Charlemagne, the Lombards implored the
clemency and aid of the Greek emperor.  A fearless citizen dropped from
the walls, passed the intrenchments, accomplished his commission, and
fell into the hands of the Barbarians as he was returning with the
welcome news. They commanded him to assist their enterprise, and deceive
his countrymen, with the assurance that wealth and honors should be the
reward of his falsehood, and that his sincerity would be punished with
immediate death. He affected to yield, but as soon as he was conducted
within hearing of the Christians on the rampart, "Friends and brethren,"
he cried with a loud voice, "be bold and patient, maintain the city;
your sovereign is informed of your distress, and your deliverers are at
hand. I know my doom, and commit my wife and children to your
gratitude." The rage of the Arabs confirmed his evidence; and the
self-devoted patriot was transpierced with a hundred spears. He deserves
to live in the memory of the virtuous, but the repetition of the same
story in ancient and modern times, may sprinkle some doubts on the
reality of this generous deed.  3.The recital of a third incident may
provoke a smile amidst the horrors of war. Theobald, marquis of Camerino
and Spoleto,  supported the rebels of Beneventum; and his wanton cruelty
was not incompatible in that age with the character of a hero. His
captives of the Greek nation or party were castrated without mercy, and
the outrage was aggravated by a cruel jest, that he wished to present
the emperor with a supply of eunuchs, the most precious ornaments of the
Byzantine court. The garrison of a castle had been defeated in a sally,
and the prisoners were sentenced to the customary operation. But the
sacrifice was disturbed by the intrusion of a frantic female, who, with
bleeding cheeks dishevelled hair, and importunate clamors, compelled the
marquis to listen to her complaint. "Is it thus," she cried, 'ye
magnanimous heroes, that ye wage war against women, against women who
have never injured ye, and whose only arms are the distaff and the
loom?" Theobald denied the charge, and protested that, since the
Amazons, he had never heard of a female war. "And how," she furiously
exclaimed, "can you attack us more directly, how can you wound us in a
more vital part, than by robbing our husbands of what we most dearly
cherish, the source of our joys, and the hope of our posterity? The
plunder of our flocks and herds I have endured without a murmur, but
this fatal injury, this irreparable loss, subdues my patience, and calls
aloud on the justice of heaven and earth." A general laugh applauded her
eloquence; the savage Franks, inaccessible to pity, were moved by her
ridiculous, yet rational despair; and with the deliverance of the
captives, she obtained the restitution of her effects. As she returned
in triumph to the castle, she was overtaken by a messenger, to inquire,
in the name of Theobald, what punishment should be inflicted on her
husband, were he again taken in arms. "Should such," she answered
without hesitation, "be his guilt and misfortune, he has eyes, and a
nose, and hands, and feet. These are his own, and these he may deserve
to forfeit by his personal offences. But let my lord be pleased to spare
what his little handmaid presumes to claim as her peculiar and lawful
property."

The establishment of the Normans in the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily
is an event most romantic in its origin, and in its consequences most
important both to Italy and the Eastern empire. The broken provinces of
the Greeks, Lombards, and Saracens, were exposed to every invader, and
every sea and land were invaded by the adventurous spirit of the
Scandinavian pirates. After a long indulgence of rapine and slaughter, a
fair and ample territory was accepted, occupied, and named, by the
Normans of France: they renounced their gods for the God of the
Christians;  and the dukes of Normandy acknowledged themselves the
vassals of the successors of Charlemagne and Capet. The savage
fierceness which they had brought from the snowy mountains of Norway was
refined, without being corrupted, in a warmer climate; the companions of
Rollo insensibly mingled with the natives; they imbibed the manners,
language,  and gallantry, of the French nation; and in a martial age,
the Normans might claim the palm of valor and glorious achievements. Of
the fashionable superstitions, they embraced with ardor the pilgrimages
of Rome, Italy, and the Holy Land.  In this active devotion, the minds
and bodies were invigorated by exercise: danger was the incentive,
novelty the recompense; and the prospect of the world was decorated by
wonder, credulity, and ambitious hope. They confederated for their
mutual defence; and the robbers of the Alps, who had been allured by the
garb of a pilgrim, were often chastised by the arm of a warrior. In one
of these pious visits to the cavern of Mount Garganus in Apulia, which
had been sanctified by the apparition of the archangel Michael,  they
were accosted by a stranger in the Greek habit, but who soon revealed
himself as a rebel, a fugitive, and a mortal foe of the Greek empire.
His name was Melo; a noble citizen of Bari, who, after an unsuccessful
revolt, was compelled to seek new allies and avengers of his country.
The bold appearance of the Normans revived his hopes and solicited his
confidence: they listened to the complaints, and still more to the
promises, of the patriot. The assurance of wealth demonstrated the
justice of his cause; and they viewed, as the inheritance of the brave,
the fruitful land which was oppressed by effeminate tyrants. On their
return to Normandy, they kindled a spark of enterprise, and a small but
intrepid band was freely associated for the deliverance of Apulia. They
passed the Alps by separate roads, and in the disguise of pilgrims; but
in the neighborhood of Rome they were saluted by the chief of Bari, who
supplied the more indigent with arms and horses, and instantly led them
to the field of action. In the first conflict, their valor prevailed;
but in the second engagement they were overwhelmed by the numbers and
military engines of the Greeks, and indignantly retreated with their
faces to the enemy. * The unfortunate Melo ended his life a suppliant at
the court of Germany: his Norman followers, excluded from their native
and their promised land, wandered among the hills and valleys of Italy,
and earned their daily subsistence by the sword. To that formidable
sword the princes of Capua, Beneventum, Salerno, and Naples, alternately
appealed in their domestic quarrels; the superior spirit and discipline
of the Normans gave victory to the side which they espoused; and their
cautious policy observed the balance of power, lest the preponderance of
any rival state should render their aid less important, and their
service less profitable. Their first asylum was a strong camp in the
depth of the marshes of Campania: but they were soon endowed by the
liberality of the duke of Naples with a more plentiful and permanent
seat. Eight miles from his residence, as a bulwark against Capua, the
town of Aversa was built and fortified for their use; and they enjoyed
as their own the corn and fruits, the meadows and groves, of that
fertile district. The report of their success attracted every year new
swarms of pilgrims and soldiers: the poor were urged by necessity; the
rich were excited by hope; and the brave and active spirits of Normandy
were impatient of ease and ambitious of renown. The independent standard
of Aversa afforded shelter and encouragement to the outlaws of the
province, to every fugitive who had escaped from the injustice or
justice of his superiors; and these foreign associates were quickly
assimilated in manners and language to the Gallic colony. The first
leader of the Normans was Count Rainulf; and, in the origin of society,
preëminence of rank is the reward and the proof of superior merit.  *

Since the conquest of Sicily by the Arabs, the Grecian emperors had been
anxious to regain that valuable possession; but their efforts, however
strenuous, had been opposed by the distance and the sea. Their costly
armaments, after a gleam of success, added new pages of calamity and
disgrace to the Byzantine annals: twenty thousand of their best troops
were lost in a single expedition; and the victorious Moslems derided the
policy of a nation which intrusted eunuchs not only with the custody of
their women, but with the command of their men  After a reign of two
hundred years, the Saracens were ruined by their divisions.  The emir
disclaimed the authority of the king of Tunis; the people rose against
the emir; the cities were usurped by the chiefs; each meaner rebel was
independent in his village or castle; and the weaker of two rival
brothers implored the friendship of the Christians. In every service of
danger the Normans were prompt and useful; and five hundred knights, or
warriors on horseback, were enrolled by Arduin, the agent and
interpreter of the Greeks, under the standard of Maniaces, governor of
Lombardy. Before their landing, the brothers were reconciled; the union
of Sicily and Africa was restored; and the island was guarded to the
water's edge. The Normans led the van and the Arabs of Messina felt the
valor of an untried foe. In a second action the emir of Syracuse was
unhorsed and transpierced by the iron armof William of Hauteville. In a
third engagement, his intrepid companions discomfited the host of sixty
thousand Saracens, and left the Greeks no more than the labor of the
pursuit: a splendid victory; but of which the pen of the historian may
divide the merit with the lance of the Normans. It is, however, true,
that they essentially promoted the success of Maniaces, who reduced
thirteen cities, and the greater part of Sicily, under the obedience of
the emperor. But his military fame was sullied by ingratitude and
tyranny. In the division of the spoils, the deserts of his brave
auxiliaries were forgotten; and neither their avarice nor their pride
could brook this injurious treatment. They complained by the mouth of
their interpreter: their complaint was disregarded; their interpreter
was scourged; the sufferings were his; the insult and resentment
belonged to thosewhose sentiments he had delivered. Yet they dissembled
till they had obtained, or stolen, a safe passage to the Italian
continent: their brethren of Aversa sympathized in their indignation,
and the province of Apulia was invaded as the forfeit of the debt.
Above twenty years after the first emigration, the Normans took the
field with no more than seven hundred horse and five hundred foot; and
after the recall of the Byzantine legions  from the Sicilian war, their
numbers are magnified to the amount of threescore thousand men. Their
herald proposed the option of battle or retreat; "of battle," was the
unanimous cry of the Normans; and one of their stoutest warriors, with a
stroke of his fist, felled to the ground the horse of the Greek
messenger. He was dismissed with a fresh horse; the insult was concealed
from the Imperial troops; but in two successive battles they were more
fatally instructed of the prowess of their adversaries. In the plains of
Cannæ, the Asiatics fled before the adventurers of France; the duke of
Lombardy was made prisoner; the Apulians acquiesced in a new dominion;
and the four places of Bari, Otranto, Brundusium, and Tarentum, were
alone saved in the shipwreck of the Grecian fortunes. From this æra we
may date the establishment of the Norman power, which soon eclipsed the
infant colony of Aversa. Twelve counts  were chosen by the popular
suffrage; and age, birth, and merit, were the motives of their choice.
The tributes of their peculiar districts were appropriated to their use;
and each count erected a fortress in the midst of his lands, and at the
head of his vassals. In the centre of the province, the common
habitation of Melphi was reserved as the metropolis and citadel of the
republic; a house and separate quarter was allotted to each of the
twelve counts: and the national concerns were regulated by this military
senate. The first of his peers, their president and general, was
entitled count of Apulia; and this dignity was conferred on William of
the iron arm, who, in the language of the age, is styled a lion in
battle, a lamb in society, and an angel in council.  The manners of his
countrymen are fairly delineated by a contemporary and national
historian.  "The Normans," says Malaterra, "are a cunning and revengeful
people; eloquence and dissimulation appear to be their hereditary
qualities: they can stoop to flatter; but unless they are curbed by the
restraint of law, they indulge the licentiousness of nature and passion.
Their princes affect the praises of popular munificence; the people
observe the medium, or rather blond the extremes, of avarice and
prodigality; and in their eager thirst of wealth and dominion, they
despise whatever they possess, and hope whatever they desire. Arms and
horses, the luxury of dress, the exercises of hunting and hawking  are
the delight of the Normans; but, on pressing occasions, they can endure
with incredible patience the inclemency of every climate, and the toil
and absence of a military life."

Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans. -- Part II.

The Normans of Apulia were seated on the verge of the two empires; and,
according to the policy of the hour, they accepted the investiture of
their lands, from the sovereigns of Germany or Constantinople. But the
firmest title of these adventurers was the right of conquest: they
neither loved nor trusted; they were neither trusted nor beloved: the
contempt of the princes was mixed with fear, and the fear of the natives
was mingled with hatred and resentment. Every object of desire, a horse,
a woman, a garden, tempted and gratified the rapaciousness of the
strangers;  and the avarice of their chiefs was only colored by the more
specious names of ambition and glory. The twelve counts were sometimes
joined in the league of injustice: in their domestic quarrels they
disputed the spoils of the people: the virtues of William were buried in
his grave; and Drogo, his brother and successor, was better qualified to
lead the valor, than to restrain the violence, of his peers. Under the
reign of Constantine Monomachus, the policy, rather than benevolence, of
the Byzantine court, attempted to relieve Italy from this adherent
mischief, more grievous than a flight of Barbarians;  and Argyrus, the
son of Melo, was invested for this purpose with the most lofty titles
and the most ample commission. The memory of his father might recommend
him to the Normans; and he had already engaged their voluntary service
to quell the revolt of Maniaces, and to avenge their own and the public
injury. It was the design of Constantine to transplant the warlike
colony from the Italian provinces to the Persian war; and the son of
Melo distributed among the chiefs the gold and manufactures of Greece,
as the first-fruits of the Imperial bounty. But his arts were baffled by
the sense and spirit of the conquerors of Apulia: his gifts, or at least
his proposals, were rejected; and they unanimously refused to relinquish
their possessions and their hopes for the distant prospect of Asiatic
fortune. After the means of persuasion had failed, Argyrus resolved to
compel or to destroy: the Latin powers were solicited against the common
enemy; and an offensive alliance was formed of the pope and the two
emperors of the East and West. The throne of St. Peter was occupied by
Leo the Ninth, a simple saint,  of a temper most apt to deceive himself
and the world, and whose venerable character would consecrate with the
name of piety the measures least compatible with the practice of
religion. His humanity was affected by the complaints, perhaps the
calumnies, of an injured people: the impious Normans had interrupted the
payment of tithes; and the temporal sword might be lawfully unsheathed
against the sacrilegious robbers, who were deaf to the censures of the
church. As a German of noble birth and royal kindred, Leo had free
access to the court and confidence of the emperor Henry the Third; and
in search of arms and allies, his ardent zeal transported him from
Apulia to Saxony, from the Elbe to the Tyber. During these hostile
preparations, Argyrus indulged himself in the use of secret and guilty
weapons: a crowd of Normans became the victims of public or private
revenge; and the valiant Drogo was murdered in a church. But his spirit
survived in his brother Humphrey, the third count of Apulia. The
assassins were chastised; and the son of Melo, overthrown and wounded,
was driven from the field, to hide his shame behind the walls of Bari,
and to await the tardy succor of his allies.

But the power of Constantine was distracted by a Turkish war; the mind
of Henry was feeble and irresolute; and the pope, instead of repassing
the Alps with a German army, was accompanied only by a guard of seven
hundred Swabians and some volunteers of Lorraine. In his long progress
from Mantua to Beneventum, a vile and promiscuous multitude of Italians
was enlisted under the holy standard:  the priest and the robber slept
in the same tent; the pikes and crosses were intermingled in the front;
and the martial saint repeated the lessons of his youth in the order of
march, of encampment, and of combat. The Normans of Apulia could muster
in the field no more than three thousand horse, with a handful of
infantry: the defection of the natives intercepted their provisions and
retreat; and their spirit, incapable of fear, was chilled for a moment
by superstitious awe. On the hostile approach of Leo, they knelt without
disgrace or reluctance before their spiritual father. But the pope was
inexorable; his lofty Germans affected to deride the diminutive stature
of their adversaries; and the Normans were informed that death or exile
was their only alternative. Flight they disdained, and, as many of them
had been three days without tasting food, they embraced the assurance of
a more easy and honorable death. They climbed the hill of Civitella,
descended into the plain, and charged in three divisions the army of the
pope. On the left, and in the centre, Richard count of Aversa, and
Robert the famous Guiscard, attacked, broke, routed, and pursued the
Italian multitudes, who fought without discipline, and fled without
shame. A harder trial was reserved for the valor of Count Humphrey, who
led the cavalry of the right wing. The Germans  have been described as
unskillful in the management of the horse and the lance, but on foot
they formed a strong and impenetrable phalanx; and neither man, nor
steed, nor armor, could resist the weight of their long and two-handed
swords. After a severe conflict, they were encompassed by the squadrons
returning from the pursuit; and died in the ranks with the esteem of
their foes, and the satisfaction of revenge. The gates of Civitella were
shut against the flying pope, and he was overtaken by the pious
conquerors, who kissed his feet, to implore his blessing and the
absolution of their sinful victory. The soldiers beheld in their enemy
and captive the vicar of Christ; and, though we may suppose the policy
of the chiefs, it is probable that they were infected by the popular
superstition. In the calm of retirement, the well-meaning pope deplored
the effusion of Christian blood, which must be imputed to his account:
he felt, that he had been the author of sin and scandal; and as his
undertaking had failed, the indecency of his military character was
universally condemned.  With these dispositions, he listened to the
offers of a beneficial treaty; deserted an alliance which he had
preached as the cause of God; and ratified the past and future conquests
of the Normans. By whatever hands they had been usurped, the provinces
of Apulia and Calabria were a part of the donation of Constantine and
the patrimony of St. Peter: the grant and the acceptance confirmed the
mutual claims of the pontiff and the adventurers. They promised to
support each other with spiritual and temporal arms; a tribute or
quitrent of twelve pence was afterwards stipulated for every ploughland;
and since this memorable transaction, the kingdom of Naples has remained
above seven hundred years a fief of the Holy See.

The pedigree of Robert of Guiscard  is variously deduced from the
peasants and the dukes of Normandy: from the peasants, by the pride and
ignorance of a Grecian princess;  from the dukes, by the ignorance and
flattery of the Italian subjects.  His genuine descent may be ascribed
to the second or middle order of private nobility.  He sprang from a
race of valvassorsor bannerets, of the diocese of Coutances, in the
Lower Normandy: the castle of Hauteville was their honorable seat: his
father Tancred was conspicuous in the court and army of the duke; and
his military service was furnished by ten soldiers or knights. Two
marriages, of a rank not unworthy of his own, made him the father of
twelve sons, who were educated at home by the impartial tenderness of
his second wife. But a narrow patrimony was insufficient for this
numerous and daring progeny; they saw around the neighborhood the
mischiefs of poverty and discord, and resolved to seek in foreign wars a
more glorious inheritance. Two only remained to perpetuate the race, and
cherish their father's age: their ten brothers, as they successfully
attained the vigor of manhood, departed from the castle, passed the
Alps, and joined the Apulian camp of the Normans. The elder were
prompted by native spirit; their success encouraged their younger
brethren, and the three first in seniority, William, Drogo, and
Humphrey, deserved to be the chiefs of their nation and the founders of
the new republic. Robert was the eldest of the seven sons of the second
marriage; and even the reluctant praise of his foes has endowed him with
the heroic qualities of a soldier and a statesman. His lofty stature
surpassed the tallest of his army: his limbs were cast in the true
proportion of strength and gracefulness; and to the decline of life, he
maintained the patient vigor of health and the commanding dignity of his
form. His complexion was ruddy, his shoulders were broad, his hair and
beard were long and of a flaxen color, his eyes sparkled with fire, and
his voice, like that of Achilles, could impress obedience and terror
amidst the tumult of battle. In the ruder ages of chivalry, such
qualifications are not below the notice of the poet or historians: they
may observe that Robert, at once, and with equal dexterity, could wield
in the right hand his sword, his lance in the left; that in the battle
of Civitella he was thrice unhorsed; and that in the close of that
memorable day he was adjudged to have borne away the prize of valor from
the warriors of the two armies.  His boundless ambition was founded on
the consciousness of superior worth: in the pursuit of greatness, he was
never arrested by the scruples of justice, and seldom moved by the
feelings of humanity: though not insensible of fame, the choice of open
or clandestine means was determined only by his present advantage. The
surname of Guiscardwas applied to this master of political wisdom, which
is too often confounded with the practice of dissimulation and deceit;
and Robert is praised by the Apulian poet for excelling the cunning of
Ulysses and the eloquence of Cicero. Yet these arts were disguised by an
appearance of military frankness: in his highest fortune, he was
accessible and courteous to his fellow-soldiers; and while he indulged
the prejudices of his new subjects, he affected in his dress and manners
to maintain the ancient fashion of his country. He grasped with a
rapacious, that he might distribute with a liberal, hand: his primitive
indigence had taught the habits of frugality; the gain of a merchant was
not below his attention; and his prisoners were tortured with slow and
unfeeling cruelty, to force a discovery of their secret treasure.
According to the Greeks, he departed from Normandy with only five
followers on horseback and thirty on foot; yet even this allowance
appears too bountiful: the sixth son of Tancred of Hauteville passed the
Alps as a pilgrim; and his first military band was levied among the
adventurers of Italy. His brothers and countrymen had divided the
fertile lands of Apulia; but they guarded their shares with the jealousy
of avarice; the aspiring youth was driven forwards to the mountains of
Calabria, and in his first exploits against the Greeks and the natives,
it is not easy to discriminate the hero from the robber. To surprise a
castle or a convent, to ensnare a wealthy citizen, to plunder the
adjacent villages for necessary food, were the obscure labors which
formed and exercised the powers of his mind and body. The volunteers of
Normandy adhered to his standard; and, under his command, the peasants
of Calabria assumed the name and character of Normans.

As the genius of Robert expanded with his fortune, he awakened the
jealousy of his elder brother, by whom, in a transient quarrel, his life
was threatened and his liberty restrained. After the death of Humphrey,
the tender age of his sons excluded them from the command; they were
reduced to a private estate, by the ambition of their guardian and
uncle; and Guiscard was exalted on a buckler, and saluted count of
Apulia and general of the republic. With an increase of authority and of
force, he resumed the conquest of Calabria, and soon aspired to a rank
that should raise him forever above the heads of his equals. By some
acts of rapine or sacrilege, he had incurred a papal excommunication;
but Nicholas the Second was easily persuaded that the divisions of
friends could terminate only in their mutual prejudice; that the Normans
were the faithful champions of the Holy See; and it was safer to trust
the alliance of a prince than the caprice of an aristocracy. A synod of
one hundred bishops was convened at Melphi; and the count interrupted an
important enterprise to guard the person and execute the decrees of the
Roman pontiff. His gratitude and policy conferred on Robert and his
posterity the ducal title,  with the investiture of Apulia, Calabria,
and all the lands, both in Italy and Sicily, which his sword could
rescue from the schismatic Greeks and the unbelieving Saracens.  This
apostolic sanction might justify his arms; but the obedience of a free
and victorious people could not be transferred without their consent;
and Guiscard dissembled his elevation till the ensuing campaign had been
illustrated by the conquest of Consenza and Reggio. In the hour of
triumph, he assembled his troops, and solicited the Normans to confirm
by their suffrage the judgment of the vicar of Christ: the soldiers
hailed with joyful acclamations their valiant duke; and the counts, his
former equals, pronounced the oath of fidelity with hollow smiles and
secret indignation. After this inauguration, Robert styled himself, "By
the grace of God and St. Peter, duke of Apulia, Calabria, and hereafter
of Sicily;" and it was the labor of twenty years to deserve and realize
these lofty appellations. Such tardy progress, in a narrow space, may
seem unworthy of the abilities of the chief and the spirit of the
nation; but the Normans were few in number; their resources were scanty;
their service was voluntary and precarious. The bravest designs of the
duke were sometimes opposed by the free voice of his parliament of
barons: the twelve counts of popular election conspired against his
authority; and against their perfidious uncle, the sons of Humphrey
demanded justice and revenge. By his policy and vigor, Guiscard
discovered their plots, suppressed their rebellions, and punished the
guilty with death or exile: but in these domestic feuds, his years, and
the national strength, were unprofitably consumed. After the defeat of
his foreign enemies, the Greeks, Lombards, and Saracens, their broken
forces retreated to the strong and populous cities of the sea-coast.
They excelled in the arts of fortification and defence; the Normans were
accustomed to serve on horseback in the field, and their rude attempts
could only succeed by the efforts of persevering courage. The resistance
of Salerno was maintained above eight months; the siege or blockade of
Bari lasted near four years. In these actions the Norman duke was the
foremost in every danger; in every fatigue the last and most patient. As
he pressed the citadel of Salerno, a huge stone from the rampart
shattered one of his military engines; and by a splinter he was wounded
in the breast. Before the gates of Bari, he lodged in a miserable hut or
barrack, composed of dry branches, and thatched with straw; a perilous
station, on all sides open to the inclemency of the winter and the
spears of the enemy.

The Italian conquests of Robert correspond with the limits of the
present kingdom of Naples; and the countries united by his arms have not
been dissevered by the revolutions of seven hundred years.  The monarchy
has been composed of the Greek provinces of Calabria and Apulia, of the
Lombard principality of Salerno, the republic of Amalphi, and the inland
dependencies of the large and ancient duchy of Beneventum. Three
districts only were exempted from the common law of subjection; the
first forever, the two last till the middle of the succeeding century.
The city and immediate territory of Benevento had been transferred, by
gift or exchange, from the German emperor to the Roman pontiff; and
although this holy land was sometimes invaded, the name of St. Peter was
finally more potent than the sword of the Normans. Their first colony of
Aversa subdued and held the state of Capua; and her princes were reduced
to beg their bread before the palace of their fathers. The dukes of
Naples, the present metropolis, maintained the popular freedom, under
the shadow of the Byzantine empire. Among the new acquisitions of
Guiscard, the science of Salerno,  and the trade of Amalphi,  may detain
for a moment the curiosity of the reader. I. Of the learned faculties,
jurisprudence implies the previous establishment of laws and property;
and theology may perhaps be superseded by the full light of religion and
reason. But the savage and the sage must alike implore the assistance of
physic; and, if our diseases are inflamed by luxury, the mischiefs of
blows and wounds would be more frequent in the ruder ages of society.
The treasures of Grecian medicine had been communicated to the Arabian
colonies of Africa, Spain, and Sicily; and in the intercourse of peace
and war, a spark of knowledge had been kindled and cherished at Salerno,
an illustrious city, in which the men were honest and the women
beautiful.  A school, the first that arose in the darkness of Europe,
was consecrated to the healing art: the conscience of monks and bishops
was reconciled to that salutary and lucrative profession; and a crowd of
patients, of the most eminent rank, and most distant climates, invited
or visited the physicians of Salerno. They were protected by the Norman
conquerors; and Guiscard, though bred in arms, could discern the merit
and value of a philosopher. After a pilgrimage of thirty-nine years,
Constantine, an African Christian, returned from Bagdad, a master of the
language and learning of the Arabians; and Salerno was enriched by the
practice, the lessons, and the writings of the pupil of Avicenna. The
school of medicine has long slept in the name of a university; but her
precepts are abridged in a string of aphorisms, bound together in the
Leonine verses, or Latin rhymes, of the twelfth century.  II. Seven
miles to the west of Salerno, and thirty to the south of Naples, the
obscure town of Amalphi displayed the power and rewards of industry. The
land, however fertile, was of narrow extent; but the sea was accessible
and open: the inhabitants first assumed the office of supplying the
western world with the manufactures and productions of the East; and
this useful traffic was the source of their opulence and freedom. The
government was popular, under the administration of a duke and the
supremacy of the Greek emperor. Fifty thousand citizens were numbered in
the walls of Amalphi; nor was any city more abundantly provided with
gold, silver, and the objects of precious luxury. The mariners who
swarmed in her port, excelled in the theory and practice of navigation
and astronomy: and the discovery of the compass, which has opened the
globe, is owing to their ingenuity or good fortune. Their trade was
extended to the coasts, or at least to the commodities, of Africa,
Arabia, and India: and their settlements in Constantinople, Antioch,
Jerusalem, and Alexandria, acquired the privileges of independent
colonies.  After three hundred years of prosperity, Amalphi was
oppressed by the arms of the Normans, and sacked by the jealousy of
Pisa; but the poverty of one thousand * fisherman is yet dignified by
the remains of an arsenal, a cathedral, and the palaces of royal
merchants.

Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans. -- Part III.

Roger, the twelfth and last of the sons of Tancred, had been long
detained in Normandy by his own and his father' age. He accepted the
welcome summons; hastened to the Apulian camp; and deserved at first the
esteem, and afterwards the envy, of his elder brother. Their valor and
ambition were equal; but the youth, the beauty, the elegant manners, of
Roger engaged the disinterested love of the soldiers and people. So
scanty was his allowance for himself and forty followers, that he
descended from conquest to robbery, and from robbery to domestic theft;
and so loose were the notions of property, that, by his own historian,
at his special command, he is accused of stealing horses from a stable
at Melphi.  His spirit emerged from poverty and disgrace: from these
base practices he rose to the merit and glory of a holy war; and the
invasion of Sicily was seconded by the zeal and policy of his brother
Guiscard. After the retreat of the Greeks, the idolaters, a most
audacious reproach of the Catholics, had retrieved their losses and
possessions; but the deliverance of the island, so vainly undertaken by
the forces of the Eastern empire, was achieved by a small and private
band of adventurers.  In the first attempt, Roger braved, in an open
boat, the real and fabulous dangers of Scylla and Charybdis; landed with
only sixty soldiers on a hostile shore; drove the Saracens to the gates
of Messina and safely returned with the spoils of the adjacent country.
In the fortress of Trani, his active and patient courage were equally
conspicuous. In his old age he related with pleasure, that, by the
distress of the siege, himself, and the countess his wife, had been
reduced to a single cloak or mantle, which they wore alternately; that
in a sally his horse had been slain, and he was dragged away by the
Saracens; but that he owed his rescue to his good sword, and had
retreated with his saddle on his back, lest the meanest trophy might be
left in the hands of the miscreants. In the siege of Trani, three
hundred Normans withstood and repulsed the forces of the island. In the
field of Ceramio, fifty thousand horse and foot were overthrown by one
hundred and thirty-six Christian soldiers, without reckoning St. George,
who fought on horseback in the foremost ranks. The captive banners, with
four camels, were reserved for the successor of St. Peter; and had these
barbaric spoils been exposed, not in the Vatican, but in the Capitol,
they might have revived the memory of the Punic triumphs. These
insufficient numbers of the Normans most probably denote their knights,
the soldiers of honorable and equestrian rank, each of whom was attended
by five or six followers in the field;  yet, with the aid of this
interpretation, and after every fair allowance on the side of valor,
arms, and reputation, the discomfiture of so many myriads will reduce
the prudent reader to the alternative of a miracle or a fable. The Arabs
of Sicily derived a frequent and powerful succor from their countrymen
of Africa: in the siege of Palermo, the Norman cavalry was assisted by
the galleys of Pisa; and, in the hour of action, the envy of the two
brothers was sublimed to a generous and invincible emulation. After a
war of thirty years,  Roger, with the title of great count, obtained the
sovereignty of the largest and most fruitful island of the
Mediterranean; and his administration displays a liberal and enlightened
mind, above the limits of his age and education. The Moslems were
maintained in the free enjoyment of their religion and property:  a
philosopher and physician of Mazara, of the race of Mahomet, harangued
the conqueror, and was invited to court; his geography of the seven
climates was translated into Latin; and Roger, after a diligent perusal,
preferred the work of the Arabian to the writings of the Grecian
Ptolemy.  A remnant of Christian natives had promoted the success of the
Normans: they were rewarded by the triumph of the cross. The island was
restored to the jurisdiction of the Roman pontiff; new bishops were
planted in the principal cities; and the clergy was satisfied by a
liberal endowment of churches and monasteries. Yet the Catholic hero
asserted the rights of the civil magistrate. Instead of resigning the
investiture of benefices, he dexterously applied to his own profit the
papal claims: the supremacy of the crown was secured and enlarged, by
the singular bull, which declares the princes of Sicily hereditary and
perpetual legates of the Holy See.

To Robert Guiscard, the conquest of Sicily was more glorious than
beneficial: the possession of Apulia and Calabria was inadequate to his
ambition; and he resolved to embrace or create the first occasion of
invading, perhaps of subduing, the Roman empire of the East.  From his
first wife, the partner of his humble fortune, he had been divorced
under the pretence of consanguinity; and her son Bohemond was destined
to imitate, rather than to succeed, his illustrious father. The second
wife of Guiscard was the daughter of the princes of Salerno; the
Lombards acquiesced in the lineal succession of their son Roger; their
five daughters were given in honorable nuptials,  and one of them was
betrothed, in a tender age, to Constantine, a beautiful youth, the son
and heir of the emperor Michael.  But the throne of Constantinople was
shaken by a revolution: the Imperial family of Ducas was confined to the
palace or the cloister; and Robert deplored, and resented, the disgrace
of his daughter and the expulsion of his ally. A Greek, who styled
himself the father of Constantine, soon appeared at Salerno, and related
the adventures of his fall and flight. That unfortunate friend was
acknowledged by the duke, and adorned with the pomp and titles of
Imperial dignity: in his triumphal progress through Apulia and Calabria,
Michael  was saluted with the tears and acclamations of the people; and
Pope Gregory the Seventh exhorted the bishops to preach, and the
Catholics to fight, in the pious work of his restoration. His
conversations with Robert were frequent and familiar; and their mutual
promises were justified by the valor of the Normans and the treasures of
the East. Yet this Michael, by the confession of the Greeks and Latins,
was a pageant and an impostor; a monk who had fled from his convent, or
a domestic who had served in the palace. The fraud had been contrived by
the subtle Guiscard; and he trusted, that after this pretender had given
a decent color to his arms, he would sink, at the nod of the conqueror,
into his primitive obscurity. But victory was the only argument that
could determine the belief of the Greeks; and the ardor of the Latins
was much inferior to their credulity: the Norman veterans wished to
enjoy the harvest of their toils, and the unwarlike Italians trembled at
the known and unknown dangers of a transmarine expedition. In his new
levies, Robert exerted the influence of gifts and promises, the terrors
of civil and ecclesiastical authority; and some acts of violence might
justify the reproach, that age and infancy were pressed without
distinction into the service of their unrelenting prince. After two
years' incessant preparations the land and naval forces were assembled
at Otranto, at the heel, or extreme promontory, of Italy; and Robert was
accompanied by his wife, who fought by his side, his son Bohemond, and
the representative of the emperor Michael. Thirteen hundred knights  of
Norman race or discipline, formed the sinews of the army, which might be
swelled to thirty thousand  followers of every denomination. The men,
the horses, the arms, the engines, the wooden towers, covered with raw
hides, were embarked on board one hundred and fifty vessels: the
transports had been built in the ports of Italy, and the galleys were
supplied by the alliance of the republic of Ragusa.

At the mouth of the Adriatic Gulf, the shores of Italy and Epirus
incline towards each other. The space between Brundusium and Durazzo,
the Roman passage, is no more than one hundred miles;  at the last
station of Otranto, it is contracted to fifty;  and this narrow distance
had suggested to Pyrrhus and Pompey the sublime or extravagant idea of a
bridge. Before the general embarkation, the Norman duke despatched
Bohemond with fifteen galleys to seize or threaten the Isle of Corfu, to
survey the opposite coast, and to secure a harbor in the neighborhood of
Vallona for the landing of the troops. They passed and landed without
perceiving an enemy; and this successful experiment displayed the
neglect and decay of the naval power of the Greeks. The islands of
Epirus and the maritime towns were subdued by the arms or the name of
Robert, who led his fleet and army from Corfu (I use the modern
appellation) to the siege of Durazzo. That city, the western key of the
empire, was guarded by ancient renown, and recent fortifications, by
George Palæologus, a patrician, victorious in the Oriental wars, and a
numerous garrison of Albanians and Macedonians, who, in every age, have
maintained the character of soldiers. In the prosecution of his
enterprise, the courage of Guiscard was assailed by every form of danger
and mischance. In the most propitious season of the year, as his fleet
passed along the coast, a storm of wind and snow unexpectedly arose: the
Adriatic was swelled by the raging blast of the south, and a new
shipwreck confirmed the old infamy of the Acroceraunian rocks.  The
sails, the masts, and the oars, were shattered or torn away; the sea and
shore were covered with the fragments of vessels, with arms and dead
bodies; and the greatest part of the provisions were either drowned or
damaged. The ducal galley was laboriously rescued from the waves, and
Robert halted seven days on the adjacent cape, to collect the relics of
his loss, and revive the drooping spirits of his soldiers. The Normans
were no longer the bold and experienced mariners who had explored the
ocean from Greenland to Mount Atlas, and who smiled at the petty dangers
of the Mediterranean. They had wept during the tempest; they were
alarmed by the hostile approach of the Venetians, who had been solicited
by the prayers and promises of the Byzantine court. The first day's
action was not disadvantageous to Bohemond, a beardless youth,  who led
the naval powers of his father. All night the galleys of the republic
lay on their anchors in the form of a crescent; and the victory of the
second day was decided by the dexterity of their evolutions, the station
of their archers, the weight of their javelins, and the borrowed aid of
the Greek fire. The Apulian and Ragusian vessels fled to the shore,
several were cut from their cables, and dragged away by the conqueror;
and a sally from the town carried slaughter and dismay to the tents of
the Norman duke. A seasonable relief was poured into Durazzo, and as
soon as the besiegers had lost the command of the sea, the islands and
maritime towns withdrew from the camp the supply of tribute and
provision. That camp was soon afflicted with a pestilential disease;
five hundred knights perished by an inglorious death; and the list of
burials (if all could obtain a decent burial) amounted to ten thousand
persons. Under these calamities, the mind of Guiscard alone was firm and
invincible; and while he collected new forces from Apulia and Sicily, he
battered, or scaled, or sapped, the walls of Durazzo. But his industry
and valor were encountered by equal valor and more perfect industry. A
movable turret, of a size and capacity to contain five hundred soldiers,
had been rolled forwards to the foot of the rampart: but the descent of
the door or drawbridge was checked by an enormous beam, and the wooden
structure was constantly consumed by artificial flames.

While the Roman empire was attacked by the Turks in the East, east, and
the Normans in the West, the aged successor of Michael surrendered the
sceptre to the hands of Alexius, an illustrious captain, and the founder
of the Comnenian dynasty. The princess Anne, his daughter and historian,
observes, in her affected style, that even Hercules was unequal to a
double combat; and, on this principle, she approves a hasty peace with
the Turks, which allowed her father to undertake in person the relief of
Durazzo. On his accession, Alexius found the camp without soldiers, and
the treasury without money; yet such were the vigor and activity of his
measures, that in six months he assembled an army of seventy thousand
men,  and performed a march of five hundred miles. His troops were
levied in Europe and Asia, from Peloponnesus to the Black Sea; his
majesty was displayed in the silver arms and rich trappings of the
companies of Horse-guards; and the emperor was attended by a train of
nobles and princes, some of whom, in rapid succession, had been clothed
with the purple, and were indulged by the lenity of the times in a life
of affluence and dignity. Their youthful ardor might animate the
multitude; but their love of pleasure and contempt of subordination were
pregnant with disorder and mischief; and their importunate clamors for
speedy and decisive action disconcerted the prudence of Alexius, who
might have surrounded and starved the besieging army. The enumeration of
provinces recalls a sad comparison of the past and present limits of the
Roman world: the raw levies were drawn together in haste and terror; and
the garrisons of Anatolia, or Asia Minor, had been purchased by the
evacuation of the cities which were immediately occupied by the Turks.
The strength of the Greek army consisted in the Varangians, the
Scandinavian guards, whose numbers were recently augmented by a colony
of exiles and volunteers from the British Island of Thule. Under the
yoke of the Norman conqueror, the Danes and English were oppressed and
united; a band of adventurous youths resolved to desert a land of
slavery; the sea was open to their escape; and, in their long
pilgrimage, they visited every coast that afforded any hope of liberty
and revenge. They were entertained in the service of the Greek emperor;
and their first station was in a new city on the Asiatic shore: but
Alexius soon recalled them to the defence of his person and palace; and
bequeathed to his successors the inheritance of their faith and valor.
The name of a Norman invader revived the memory of their wrongs: they
marched with alacrity against the national foe, and panted to regain in
Epirus the glory which they had lost in the battle of Hastings. The
Varangians were supported by some companies of Franks or Latins; and the
rebels, who had fled to Constantinople from the tyranny of Guiscard,
were eager to signalize their zeal and gratify their revenge. In this
emergency, the emperor had not disdained the impure aid of the
Paulicians or Manichæans of Thrace and Bulgaria; and these heretics
united with the patience of martyrdom the spirit and discipline of
active valor.  The treaty with the sultan had procured a supply of some
thousand Turks; and the arrows of the Scythian horse were opposed to the
lances of the Norman cavalry. On the report and distant prospect of
these formidable numbers, Robert assembled a council of his principal
officers. "You behold," said he, "your danger: it is urgent and
inevitable. The hills are covered with arms and standards; and the
emperor of the Greeks is accustomed to wars and triumphs. Obedience and
union are our only safety; and I am ready to yield the command to a more
worthy leader." The vote and acclamation even of his secret enemies,
assured him, in that perilous moment, of their esteem and confidence;
and the duke thus continued: "Let us trust in the rewards of victory,
and deprive cowardice of the means of escape. Let us burn our vessels
and our baggage, and give battle on this spot, as if it were the place
of our nativity and our burial." The resolution was unanimously
approved; and, without confining himself to his lines, Guiscard awaited
in battle-array the nearer approach of the enemy. His rear was covered
by a small river; his right wing extended to the sea; his left to the
hills: nor was he conscious, perhaps, that on the same ground Cæsar and
Pompey had formerly disputed the empire of the world.

Against the advice of his wisest captains, Alexius resolved to risk the
event of a general action, and exhorted the garrison of Durazzo to
assist their own deliverance by a well-timed sally from the town. He
marched in two columns to surprise the Normans before daybreak on two
different sides: his light cavalry was scattered over the plain; the
archers formed the second line; and the Varangians claimed the honors of
the vanguard. In the first onset, the battle-axes of the strangers made
a deep and bloody impression on the army of Guiscard, which was now
reduced to fifteen thousand men. The Lombards and Calabrians
ignominiously turned their backs; they fled towards the river and the
sea; but the bridge had been broken down to check the sally of the
garrison, and the coast was lined with the Venetian galleys, who played
their engines among the disorderly throng. On the verge of ruin, they
were saved by the spirit and conduct of their chiefs. Gaita, the wife of
Robert, is painted by the Greeks as a warlike Amazon, a second Pallas;
less skilful in arts, but not less terrible in arms, than the Athenian
goddess:  though wounded by an arrow, she stood her ground, and strove,
by her exhortation and example, to rally the flying troops.  Her female
voice was seconded by the more powerful voice and arm of the Norman
duke, as calm in action as he was magnanimous in council: "Whither," he
cried aloud, "whither do ye fly? Your enemy is implacable; and death is
less grievous than servitude." The moment was decisive: as the
Varangians advanced before the line, they discovered the nakedness of
their flanks: the main battle of the duke, of eight hundred knights,
stood firm and entire; they couched their lances, and the Greeks deplore
the furious and irresistible shock of the French cavalry.  Alexius was
not deficient in the duties of a soldier or a general; but he no sooner
beheld the slaughter of the Varangians, and the flight of the Turks,
than he despised his subjects, and despaired of his fortune. The
princess Anne, who drops a tear on this melancholy event, is reduced to
praise the strength and swiftness of her father's horse, and his
vigorous struggle when he was almost overthrown by the stroke of a
lance, which had shivered the Imperial helmet. His desperate valor broke
through a squadron of Franks who opposed his flight; and after wandering
two days and as many nights in the mountains, he found some repose, of
body, though not of mind, in the walls of Lychnidus. The victorious
Robert reproached the tardy and feeble pursuit which had suffered the
escape of so illustrious a prize: but he consoled his disappointment by
the trophies and standards of the field, the wealth and luxury of the
Byzantine camp, and the glory of defeating an army five times more
numerous than his own. A multitude of Italians had been the victims of
their own fears; but only thirty of his knights were slain in this
memorable day. In the Roman host, the loss of Greeks, Turks, and
English, amounted to five or six thousand:  the plain of Durazzo was
stained with noble and royal blood; and the end of the impostor Michael
was more honorable than his life.

It is more than probable that Guiscard was not afflicted by the loss of
a costly pageant, which had merited only the contempt and derision of
the Greeks. After their defeat, they still persevered in the defence of
Durazzo; and a Venetian commander supplied the place of George
Palæologus, who had been imprudently called away from his station. The
tents of the besiegers were converted into barracks, to sustain the
inclemency of the winter; and in answer to the defiance of the garrison,
Robert insinuated, that his patience was at least equal to their
obstinacy.  Perhaps he already trusted to his secret correspondence with
a Venetian noble, who sold the city for a rich and honorable marriage.
At the dead of night, several rope-ladders were dropped from the walls;
the light Calabrians ascended in silence; and the Greeks were awakened
by the name and trumpets of the conqueror. Yet they defended the streets
three days against an enemy already master of the rampart; and near
seven months elapsed between the first investment and the final
surrender of the place. From Durazzo, the Norman duke advanced into the
heart of Epirus or Albania; traversed the first mountains of Thessaly;
surprised three hundred English in the city of Castoria; approached
Thessalonica; and made Constantinople tremble. A more pressing duty
suspended the prosecution of his ambitious designs. By shipwreck,
pestilence, and the sword, his army was reduced to a third of the
original numbers; and instead of being recruited from Italy, he was
informed, by plaintive epistles, of the mischiefs and dangers which had
been produced by his absence: the revolt of the cities and barons of
Apulia; the distress of the pope; and the approach or invasion of Henry
king of Germany. Highly presuming that his person was sufficient for the
public safety, he repassed the sea in a single brigantine, and left the
remains of the army under the command of his son and the Norman counts,
exhorting Bohemond to respect the freedom of his peers, and the counts
to obey the authority of their leader. The son of Guiscard trod in the
footsteps of his father; and the two destroyers are compared, by the
Greeks, to the caterpillar and the locust, the last of whom devours
whatever has escaped the teeth of the former.  After winning two battles
against the emperor, he descended into the plain of Thessaly, and
besieged Larissa, the fabulous realm of Achilles,  which contained the
treasure and magazines of the Byzantine camp. Yet a just praise must not
be refused to the fortitude and prudence of Alexius, who bravely
struggled with the calamities of the times. In the poverty of the state,
he presumed to borrow the superfluous ornaments of the churches: the
desertion of the Manichæans was supplied by some tribes of Moldavia: a
reënforcement of seven thousand Turks replaced and revenged the loss of
their brethren; and the Greek soldiers were exercised to ride, to draw
the bow, and to the daily practice of ambuscades and evolutions. Alexius
had been taught by experience, that the formidable cavalry of the Franks
on foot was unfit for action, and almost incapable of motion;  his
archers were directed to aim their arrows at the horse rather than the
man; and a variety of spikes and snares were scattered over the ground
on which he might expect an attack. In the neighborhood of Larissa the
events of war were protracted and balanced. The courage of Bohemond was
always conspicuous, and often successful; but his camp was pillaged by a
stratagem of the Greeks; the city was impregnable; and the venal or
discontented counts deserted his standard, betrayed their trusts, and
enlisted in the service of the emperor. Alexius returned to
Constantinople with the advantage, rather than the honor, of victory.
After evacuating the conquests which he could no longer defend, the son
of Guiscard embarked for Italy, and was embraced by a father who
esteemed his merit, and sympathized in his misfortune.

Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans. -- Part IV.

Of the Latin princes, the allies of Alexius and enemies of Robert, the
most prompt and powerful was Henry the Third or Fourth, king of Germany
and Italy, and future emperor of the West. The epistle of the Greek
monarch  to his brother is filled with the warmest professions of
friendship, and the most lively desire of strengthening their alliance
by every public and private tie. He congratulates Henry on his success
in a just and pious war; and complains that the prosperity of his own
empire is disturbed by the audacious enterprises of the Norman Robert.
The lists of his presents expresses the manners of the age -- a radiated
crown of gold, a cross set with pearls to hang on the breast, a case of
relics, with the names and titles of the saints, a vase of crystal, a
vase of sardonyx, some balm, most probably of Mecca, and one hundred
pieces of purple. To these he added a more solid present, of one hundred
and forty-four thousand Byzantines of gold, with a further assurance of
two hundred and sixteen thousand, so soon as Henry should have entered
in arms the Apulian territories, and confirmed by an oath the league
against the common enemy. The German,  who was already in Lombardy at
the head of an army and a faction, accepted these liberal offers, and
marched towards the south: his speed was checked by the sound of the
battle of Durazzo; but the influence of his arms, or name, in the hasty
return of Robert, was a full equivalent for the Grecian bribe. Henry was
the severe adversary of the Normans, the allies and vassals of Gregory
the Seventh, his implacable foe. The long quarrel of the throne and
mitre had been recently kindled by the zeal and ambition of that haughty
priest:  the king and the pope had degraded each other; and each had
seated a rival on the temporal or spiritual throne of his antagonist.
After the defeat and death of his Swabian rebel, Henry descended into
Italy, to assume the Imperial crown, and to drive from the Vatican the
tyrant of the church.  But the Roman people adhered to the cause of
Gregory: their resolution was fortified by supplies of men and money
from Apulia; and the city was thrice ineffectually besieged by the king
of Germany. In the fourth year he corrupted, as it is said, with
Byzantine gold, the nobles of Rome, whose estates and castles had been
ruined by the war. The gates, the bridges, and fifty hostages, were
delivered into his hands: the anti-pope, Clement the Third, was
consecrated in the Lateran: the grateful pontiff crowned his protector
in the Vatican; and the emperor Henry fixed his residence in the
Capitol, as the lawful successor of Augustus and Charlemagne. The ruins
of the Septizonium were still defended by the nephew of Gregory: the
pope himself was invested in the castle of St. Angelo; and his last hope
was in the courage and fidelity of his Norman vassal. Their friendship
had been interrupted by some reciprocal injuries and complaints; but, on
this pressing occasion, Guiscard was urged by the obligation of his
oath, by his interest, more potent than oaths, by the love of fame, and
his enmity to the two emperors. Unfurling the holy banner, he resolved
to fly to the relief of the prince of the apostles: the most numerous of
his armies, six thousand horse, and thirty thousand foot, was instantly
assembled; and his march from Salerno to Rome was animated by the public
applause and the promise of the divine favor. Henry, invincible in
sixty-six battles, trembled at his approach; recollected some
indispensable affairs that required his presence in Lombardy; exhorted
the Romans to persevere in their allegiance; and hastily retreated three
days before the entrance of the Normans. In less than three years, the
son of Tancred of Hauteville enjoyed the glory of delivering the pope,
and of compelling the two emperors, of the East and West, to fly before
his victorious arms.  But the triumph of Robert was clouded by the
calamities of Rome. By the aid of the friends of Gregory, the walls had
been perforated or scaled; but the Imperial faction was still powerful
and active; on the third day, the people rose in a furious tumult; and a
hasty word of the conqueror, in his defence or revenge, was the signal
of fire and pillage.  The Saracens of Sicily, the subjects of Roger, and
auxiliaries of his brother, embraced this fair occasion of rifling and
profaning the holy city of the Christians: many thousands of the
citizens, in the sight, and by the allies, of their spiritual father
were exposed to violation, captivity, or death; and a spacious quarter
of the city, from the Lateran to the Coliseum, was consumed by the
flames, and devoted to perpetual solitude.  From a city, where he was
now hated, and might be no longer feared, Gregory retired to end his
days in the palace of Salerno. The artful pontiff might flatter the
vanity of Guiscard with the hope of a Roman or Imperial crown; but this
dangerous measure, which would have inflamed the ambition of the Norman,
must forever have alienated the most faithful princes of Germany.

The deliverer and scourge of Rome might have indulged himself in a
season of repose; but in the same year of the flight of the German
emperor, the indefatigable Robert resumed the design of his eastern
conquests. The zeal or gratitude of Gregory had promised to his valor
the kingdoms of Greece and Asia;  his troops were assembled in arms,
flushed with success, and eager for action. Their numbers, in the
language of Homer, are compared by Anna to a swarm of bees;  yet the
utmost and moderate limits of the powers of Guiscard have been already
defined; they were contained on this second occasion in one hundred and
twenty vessels; and as the season was far advanced, the harbor of
Brundusium  was preferred to the open road of Otranto. Alexius,
apprehensive of a second attack, had assiduously labored to restore the
naval forces of the empire; and obtained from the republic of Venice an
important succor of thirty-six transports, fourteen galleys, and nine
galiots or ships of extra-ordinary strength and magnitude. Their
services were liberally paid by the license or monopoly of trade, a
profitable gift of many shops and houses in the port of Constantinople,
and a tribute to St. Mark, the more acceptable, as it was the produce of
a tax on their rivals at Amalphi. By the union of the Greeks and
Venetians, the Adriatic was covered with a hostile fleet; but their own
neglect, or the vigilance of Robert, the change of a wind, or the
shelter of a mist, opened a free passage; and the Norman troops were
safely disembarked on the coast of Epirus. With twenty strong and
well-appointed galleys, their intrepid duke immediately sought the
enemy, and though more accustomed to fight on horseback, he trusted his
own life, and the lives of his brother and two sons, to the event of a
naval combat. The dominion of the sea was disputed in three engagements,
in sight of the Isle of Corfu: in the two former, the skill and numbers
of the allies were superior; but in the third, the Normans obtained a
final and complete victory.  The light brigantines of the Greeks were
scattered in ignominious flight: the nine castles of the Venetians
maintained a more obstinate conflict; seven were sunk, two were taken;
two thousand five hundred captives implored in vain the mercy of the
victor; and the daughter of Alexius deplores the loss of thirteen
thousand of his subjects or allies. The want of experience had been
supplied by the genius of Guiscard; and each evening, when he had
sounded a retreat, he calmly explored the causes of his repulse, and
invented new methods how to remedy his own defects, and to baffle the
advantages of the enemy. The winter season suspended his progress: with
the return of spring he again aspired to the conquest of Constantinople;
but, instead of traversing the hills of Epirus, he turned his arms
against Greece and the islands, where the spoils would repay the labor,
and where the land and sea forces might pursue their joint operations
with vigor and effect. But, in the Isle of Cephalonia, his projects were
fatally blasted by an epidemical disease: Robert himself, in the
seventieth year of his age, expired in his tent; and a suspicion of
poison was imputed, by public rumor, to his wife, or to the Greek
emperor.  This premature death might allow a boundless scope for the
imagination of his future exploits; and the event sufficiently declares,
that the Norman greatness was founded on his life.  Without the
appearance of an enemy, a victorious army dispersed or retreated in
disorder and consternation; and Alexius, who had trembled for his
empire, rejoiced in his deliverance. The galley which transported the
remains of Guiscard was ship-wrecked on the Italian shore; but the
duke's body was recovered from the sea, and deposited in the sepulchre
of Venusia,  a place more illustrious for the birth of Horace  than for
the burial of the Norman heroes. Roger, his second son and successor,
immediately sunk to the humble station of a duke of Apulia: the esteem
or partiality of his father left the valiant Bohemond to the inheritance
of his sword. The national tranquillity was disturbed by his claims,
till the first crusade against the infidels of the East opened a more
splendid field of glory and conquest.

Of human life, the most glorious or humble prospects are alike and soon
bounded by the sepulchre. The male line of Robert Guiscard was
extinguished, both in Apulia and at Antioch, in the second generation;
but his younger brother became the father of a line of kings; and the
son of the great count was endowed with the name, the conquests, and the
spirit, of the first Roger.  The heir of that Norman adventurer was born
in Sicily; and, at the age of only four years, he succeeded to the
sovereignty of the island, a lot which reason might envy, could she
indulge for a moment the visionary, though virtuous wish of dominion.
Had Roger been content with his fruitful patrimony, a happy and grateful
people might have blessed their benefactor; and if a wise administration
could have restored the prosperous times of the Greek colonies,  the
opulence and power of Sicily alone might have equalled the widest scope
that could be acquired and desolated by the sword of war. But the
ambition of the great count was ignorant of these noble pursuits; it was
gratified by the vulgar means of violence and artifice. He sought to
obtain the undivided possession of Palermo, of which one moiety had been
ceded to the elder branch; struggled to enlarge his Calabrian limits
beyond the measure of former treaties; and impatiently watched the
declining health of his cousin William of Apulia, the grandson of
Robert. On the first intelligence of his premature death, Roger sailed
from Palermo with seven galleys, cast anchor in the Bay of Salerno,
received, after ten days' negotiation, an oath of fidelity from the
Norman capital, commanded the submission of the barons, and extorted a
legal investiture from the reluctant popes, who could not long endure
either the friendship or enmity of a powerful vassal. The sacred spot of
Benevento was respectfully spared, as the patrimony of St. Peter; but
the reduction of Capua and Naples completed the design of his uncle
Guiscard; and the sole inheritance of the Norman conquests was possessed
by the victorious Roger. A conscious superiority of power and merit
prompted him to disdain the titles of duke and of count; and the Isle of
Sicily, with a third perhaps of the continent of Italy, might form the
basis of a kingdom  which would only yield to the monarchies of France
and England. The chiefs of the nation who attended his coronation at
Palermo might doubtless pronounce under what name he should reign over
them; but the example of a Greek tyrant or a Saracen emir was
insufficient to justify his regal character; and the nine kings of the
Latin world  might disclaim their new associate, unless he were
consecrated by the authority of the supreme pontiff. The pride of
Anacletus was pleased to confer a title, which the pride of the Norman
had stooped to solicit;  but his own legitimacy was attacked by the
adverse election of Innocent the Second; and while Anacletus sat in the
Vatican, the successful fugitive was acknowledged by the nations of
Europe. The infant monarchy of Roger was shaken, and almost overthrown,
by the unlucky choice of an ecclesiastical patron; and the sword of
Lothaire the Second of Germany, the excommunications of Innocent, the
fleets of Pisa, and the zeal of St. Bernard, were united for the ruin of
the Sicilian robber. After a gallant resistance, the Norman prince was
driven from the continent of Italy: a new duke of Apulia was invested by
the pope and the emperor, each of whom held one end of the gonfanon, or
flagstaff, as a token that they asserted their right, and suspended
their quarrel. But such jealous friendship was of short and precarious
duration: the German armies soon vanished in disease and desertion:  the
Apulian duke, with all his adherents, was exterminated by a conqueror
who seldom forgave either the dead or the living; like his predecessor
Leo the Ninth, the feeble though haughty pontiff became the captive and
friend of the Normans; and their reconciliation was celebrated by the
eloquence of Bernard, who now revered the title and virtues of the king
of Sicily.

As a penance for his impious war against the successor of St. Peter,
that monarch might have promised to display the banner of the cross, and
he accomplished with ardor a vow so propitious to his interest and
revenge. The recent injuries of Sicily might provoke a just retaliation
on the heads of the Saracens: the Normans, whose blood had been mingled
with so many subject streams, were encouraged to remember and emulate
the naval trophies of their fathers, and in the maturity of their
strength they contended with the decline of an African power. When the
Fatimite caliph departed for the conquest of Egypt, he rewarded the real
merit and apparent fidelity of his servant Joseph with a gift of his
royal mantle, and forty Arabian horses, his palace with its sumptuous
furniture, and the government of the kingdoms of Tunis and Algiers. The
Zeirides,  the descendants of Joseph, forgot their allegiance and
gratitude to a distant benefactor, grasped and abused the fruits of
prosperity; and after running the little course of an Oriental dynasty,
were now fainting in their own weakness. On the side of the land, they
were pressed by the Almohades, the fanatic princes of Morocco, while the
sea-coast was open to the enterprises of the Greeks and Franks, who,
before the close of the eleventh century, had extorted a ransom of two
hundred thousand pieces of gold. By the first arms of Roger, the island
or rock of Malta, which has been since ennobled by a military and
religious colony, was inseparably annexed to the crown of Sicily.
Tripoli,  a strong and maritime city, was the next object of his attack;
and the slaughter of the males, the captivity of the females, might be
justified by the frequent practice of the Moslems themselves. The
capital of the Zeirides was named Africa from the country, and Mahadia
from the Arabian founder: it is strongly built on a neck of land, but
the imperfection of the harbor is not compensated by the fertility of
the adjacent plain. Mahadia was besieged by George the Sicilian admiral,
with a fleet of one hundred and fifty galleys, amply provided with men
and the instruments of mischief: the sovereign had fled, the Moorish
governor refused to capitulate, declined the last and irresistible
assault, and secretly escaping with the Moslem inhabitants abandoned the
place and its treasures to the rapacious Franks. In successive
expeditions, the king of Sicily or his lieutenants reduced the cities of
Tunis, Safax, Capsia, Bona, and a long tract of the sea-coast;  the
fortresses were garrisoned, the country was tributary, and a boast that
it held Africa in subjection might be inscribed with some flattery on
the sword of Roger.  After his death, that sword was broken; and these
transmarine possessions were neglected, evacuated, or lost, under the
troubled reign of his successor.  The triumphs of Scipio and Belisarius
have proved, that the African continent is neither inaccessible nor
invincible; yet the great princes and powers of Christendom have
repeatedly failed in their armaments against the Moors, who may still
glory in the easy conquest and long servitude of Spain.

Since the decease of Robert Guiscard, the Normans had relinquished,
above sixty years, their hostile designs against the empire of the East.
The policy of Roger solicited a public and private union with the Greek
princes, whose alliance would dignify his regal character: he demanded
in marriage a daughter of the Comnenian family, and the first steps of
the treaty seemed to promise a favorable event. But the contemptuous
treatment of his ambassadors exasperated the vanity of the new monarch;
and the insolence of the Byzantine court was expiated, according to the
laws of nations, by the sufferings of a guiltless people.  With the
fleet of seventy galleys, George, the admiral of Sicily, appeared before
Corfu; and both the island and city were delivered into his hands by the
disaffected inhabitants, who had yet to learn that a siege is still more
calamitous than a tribute. In this invasion, of some moment in the
annals of commerce, the Normans spread themselves by sea, and over the
provinces of Greece; and the venerable age of Athens, Thebes, and
Corinth, was violated by rapine and cruelty. Of the wrongs of Athens, no
memorial remains. The ancient walls, which encompassed, without
guarding, the opulence of Thebes, were scaled by the Latin Christians;
but their sole use of the gospel was to sanctify an oath, that the
lawful owners had not secreted any relic of their inheritance or
industry. On the approach of the Normans, the lower town of Corinth was
evacuated; the Greeks retired to the citadel, which was seated on a
lofty eminence, abundantly watered by the classic fountain of Pirene; an
impregnable fortress, if the want of courage could be balanced by any
advantages of art or nature. As soon as the besiegers had surmounted the
labor (their sole labor) of climbing the hill, their general, from the
commanding eminence, admired his own victory, and testified his
gratitude to Heaven, by tearing from the altar the precious image of
Theodore, the tutelary saint. The silk weavers of both sexes, whom
George transported to Sicily, composed the most valuable part of the
spoil; and in comparing the skilful industry of the mechanic with the
sloth and cowardice of the soldier, he was heard to exclaim that the
distaff and loom were the only weapons which the Greeks were capable of
using. The progress of this naval armament was marked by two conspicuous
events, the rescue of the king of France, and the insult of the
Byzantine capital. In his return by sea from an unfortunate crusade,
Louis the Seventh was intercepted by the Greeks, who basely violated the
laws of honor and religion. The fortunate encounter of the Norman fleet
delivered the royal captive; and after a free and honorable
entertainment in the court of Sicily, Louis continued his journey to
Rome and Paris.  In the absence of the emperor, Constantinople and the
Hellespont were left without defence and without the suspicion of
danger. The clergy and people (for the soldiers had followed the
standard of Manuel) were astonished and dismayed at the hostile
appearance of a line of galleys, which boldly cast anchor in the front
of the Imperial city. The forces of the Sicilian admiral were inadequate
to the siege or assault of an immense and populous metropolis; but
George enjoyed the glory of humbling the Greek arrogance, and of marking
the path of conquest to the navies of the West. He landed some soldiers
to rifle the fruits of the royal gardens, and pointed with silver, or
most probably with fire, the arrows which he discharged against the
palace of the Cæsars.  This playful outrage of the pirates of Sicily,
who had surprised an unguarded moment, Manuel affected to despise, while
his martial spirit, and the forces of the empire, were awakened to
revenge. The Archipelago and Ionian Sea were covered with his squadrons
and those of Venice; but I know not by what favorable allowance of
transports, victuallers, and pinnaces, our reason, or even our fancy,
can be reconciled to the stupendous account of fifteen hundred vessels,
which is proposed by a Byzantine historian. These operations were
directed with prudence and energy: in his homeward voyage George lost
nineteen of his galleys, which were separated and taken: after an
obstinate defence, Corfu implored the clemency of her lawful sovereign;
nor could a ship, a soldier, of the Norman prince, be found, unless as a
captive, within the limits of the Eastern empire. The prosperity and the
health of Roger were already in a declining state: while he listened in
his palace of Palermo to the messengers of victory or defeat, the
invincible Manuel, the foremost in every assault, was celebrated by the
Greeks and Latins as the Alexander or the Hercules of the age.

Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans. -- Part V.

A prince of such a temper could not be satisfied with having repelled
the insolence of a Barbarian. It was the right and duty, it might be the
interest and glory, of Manuel to restore the ancient majesty of the
empire, to recover the provinces of Italy and Sicily, and to chastise
this pretended king, the grandson of a Norman vassal.  The natives of
Calabria were still attached to the Greek language and worship, which
had been inexorably proscribed by the Latin clergy: after the loss of
her dukes, Apulia was chained as a servile appendage to the crown of
Sicily; the founder of the monarchy had ruled by the sword; and his
death had abated the fear, without healing the discontent, of his
subjects: the feudal government was always pregnant with the seeds of
rebellion; and a nephew of Roger himself invited the enemies of his
family and nation. The majesty of the purple, and a series of Hungarian
and Turkish wars, prevented Manuel from embarking his person in the
Italian expedition. To the brave and noble Palæologus, his lieutenant,
the Greek monarch intrusted a fleet and army: the siege of Bari was his
first exploit; and, in every operation, gold as well as steel was the
instrument of victory. Salerno, and some places along the western coast,
maintained their fidelity to the Norman king; but he lost in two
campaigns the greater part of his continental possessions; and the
modest emperor, disdaining all flattery and falsehood, was content with
the reduction of three hundred cities or villages of Apulia and
Calabria, whose names and titles were inscribed on all the walls of the
palace. The prejudices of the Latins were gratified by a genuine or
fictitious donation under the seal of the German Cæsars;  but the
successor of Constantine soon renounced this ignominious pretence,
claimed the indefeasible dominion of Italy, and professed his design of
chasing the Barbarians beyond the Alps. By the artful speeches, liberal
gifts, and unbounded promises, of their Eastern ally, the free cities
were encouraged to persevere in their generous struggle against the
despotism of Frederic Barbarossa: the walls of Milan were rebuilt by the
contributions of Manuel; and he poured, says the historian, a river of
gold into the bosom of Ancona, whose attachment to the Greeks was
fortified by the jealous enmity of the Venetians.  The situation and
trade of Ancona rendered it an important garrison in the heart of Italy:
it was twice besieged by the arms of Frederic; the imperial forces were
twice repulsed by the spirit of freedom; that spirit was animated by the
ambassador of Constantinople; and the most intrepid patriots, the most
faithful servants, were rewarded by the wealth and honors of the
Byzantine court.  The pride of Manuel disdained and rejected a Barbarian
colleague; his ambition was excited by the hope of stripping the purple
from the German usurpers, and of establishing, in the West, as in the
East, his lawful title of sole emperor of the Romans. With this view, he
solicited the alliance of the people and the bishop of Rome. Several of
the nobles embraced the cause of the Greek monarch; the splendid
nuptials of his niece with Odo Frangipani secured the support of that
powerful family,  and his royal standard or image was entertained with
due reverence in the ancient metropolis.  During the quarrel between
Frederic and Alexander the Third, the pope twice received in the Vatican
the ambassadors of Constantinople. They flattered his piety by the
long-promised union of the two churches, tempted the avarice of his
venal court, and exhorted the Roman pontiff to seize the just
provocation, the favorable moment, to humble the savage insolence of the
Alemanni and to acknowledge the true representative of Constantine and
Augustus.

But these Italian conquests, this universal reign, soon escaped from the
hand of the Greek emperor. His first demands were eluded by the prudence
of Alexander the Third, who paused on this deep and momentous
revolution;  nor could the pope be seduced by a personal dispute to
renounce the perpetual inheritance of the Latin name. After the reunion
with Frederic, he spoke a more peremptory language, confirmed the acts
of his predecessors, excommunicated the adherents of Manuel, and
pronounced the final separation of the churches, or at least the
empires, of Constantinople and Rome.  The free cities of Lombardy no
longer remembered their foreign benefactor, and without preserving the
friendship of Ancona, he soon incurred the enmity of Venice.  By his own
avarice, or the complaints of his subjects, the Greek emperor was
provoked to arrest the persons, and confiscate the effects, of the
Venetian merchants. This violation of the public faith exasperated a
free and commercial people: one hundred galleys were launched and armed
in as many days; they swept the coasts of Dalmatia and Greece: but after
some mutual wounds, the war was terminated by an agreement, inglorious
to the empire, insufficient for the republic; and a complete vengeance
of these and of fresh injuries was reserved for the succeeding
generation. The lieutenant of Manuel had informed his sovereign that he
was strong enough to quell any domestic revolt of Apulia and Calabria;
but that his forces were inadequate to resist the impending attack of
the king of Sicily. His prophecy was soon verified: the death of
Palæologus devolved the command on several chiefs, alike eminent in
rank, alike defective in military talents; the Greeks were oppressed by
land and sea; and a captive remnant that escaped the swords of the
Normans and Saracens, abjured all future hostility against the person or
dominions of their conqueror.  Yet the king of Sicily esteemed the
courage and constancy of Manuel, who had landed a second army on the
Italian shore; he respectfully addressed the new Justinian; solicited a
peace or truce of thirty years, accepted as a gift the regal title; and
acknowledged himself the military vassal of the Roman empire.  The
Byzantine Cæsars acquiesced in this shadow of dominion, without
expecting, perhaps without desiring, the service of a Norman army; and
the truce of thirty years was not disturbed by any hostilities between
Sicily and Constantinople. About the end of that period, the throne of
Manuel was usurped by an inhuman tyrant, who had deserved the abhorrence
of his country and mankind: the sword of William the Second, the
grandson of Roger, was drawn by a fugitive of the Comnenian race; and
the subjects of Andronicus might salute the strangers as friends, since
they detested their sovereign as the worst of enemies. The Latin
historians  expatiate on the rapid progress of the four counts who
invaded Romania with a fleet and army, and reduced many castles and
cities to the obedience of the king of Sicily. The Greeks  accuse and
magnify the wanton and sacrilegious cruelties that were perpetrated in
the sack of Thessalonica, the second city of the empire. The former
deplore the fate of those invincible but unsuspecting warriors who were
destroyed by the arts of a vanquished foe. The latter applaud, in songs
of triumph, the repeated victories of their countrymen on the Sea of
Marmora or Propontis, on the banks of the Strymon, and under the walls
of Durazzo. A revolution which punished the crimes of Andronicus, had
united against the Franks the zeal and courage of the successful
insurgents: ten thousand were slain in battle, and Isaac Angelus, the
new emperor, might indulge his vanity or vengeance in the treatment of
four thousand captives. Such was the event of the last contest between
the Greeks and Normans: before the expiration of twenty years, the rival
nations were lost or degraded in foreign servitude; and the successors
of Constantine did not long survive to insult the fall of the Sicilian
monarchy.

The sceptre of Roger successively devolved to his son and grandson: they
might be confounded under the name of William: they are strongly
discriminated by the epithets of the badand the good; but these
epithets, which appear to describe the perfection of vice and virtue,
cannot strictly be applied to either of the Norman princes. When he was
roused to arms by danger and shame, the first William did not degenerate
from the valor of his race; but his temper was slothful; his manners
were dissolute; his passions headstrong and mischievous; and the monarch
is responsible, not only for his personal vices, but for those of Majo,
the great admiral, who abused the confidence, and conspired against the
life, of his benefactor. From the Arabian conquest, Sicily had imbibed a
deep tincture of Oriental manners; the despotism, the pomp, and even the
harem, of a sultan; and a Christian people was oppressed and insulted by
the ascendant of the eunuchs, who openly professed, or secretly
cherished, the religion of Mahomet. An eloquent historian of the times
has delineated the misfortunes of his country:  the ambition and fall of
the ungrateful Majo; the revolt and punishment of his assassins; the
imprisonment and deliverance of the king himself; the private feuds that
arose from the public confusion; and the various forms of calamity and
discord which afflicted Palermo, the island, and the continent, during
the reign of William the First, and the minority of his son. The youth,
innocence, and beauty of William the Second,  endeared him to the
nation: the factions were reconciled; the laws were revived; and from
the manhood to the premature death of that amiable prince, Sicily
enjoyed a short season of peace, justice, and happiness, whose value was
enhanced by the remembrance of the past and the dread of futurity. The
legitimate male posterity of Tancred of Hauteville was extinct in the
person of the second William; but his aunt, the daughter of Roger, had
married the most powerful prince of the age; and Henry the Sixth, the
son of Frederic Barbarossa, descended from the Alps to claim the
Imperial crown and the inheritance of his wife. Against the unanimous
wish of a free people, this inheritance could only be acquired by arms;
and I am pleased to transcribe the style and sense of the historian
Falcandus, who writes at the moment, and on the spot, with the feelings
of a patriot, and the prophetic eye of a statesman. "Constantia, the
daughter of Sicily, nursed from her cradle in the pleasures and plenty,
and educated in the arts and manners, of this fortunate isle, departed
long since to enrich the Barbarians with our treasures, and now returns,
with her savage allies, to contaminate the beauties of her venerable
parent. Already I behold the swarms of angry Barbarians: our opulent
cities, the places flourishing in a long peace, are shaken with fear,
desolated by slaughter, consumed by rapine, and polluted by intemperance
and lust. I see the massacre or captivity of our citizens, the rapes of
our virgins and matrons.  In this extremity (he interrogates a friend)
how must the Sicilians act? By the unanimous election of a king of valor
and experience, Sicily and Calabria might yet be preserved;  for in the
levity of the Apulians, ever eager for new revolutions, I can repose
neither confidence nor hope.  Should Calabria be lost, the lofty towers,
the numerous youth, and the naval strength, of Messina,  might guard the
passage against a foreign invader. If the savage Germans coalesce with
the pirates of Messina; if they destroy with fire the fruitful region,
so often wasted by the fires of Mount Ætna,  what resource will be left
for the interior parts of the island, these noble cities which should
never be violated by the hostile footsteps of a Barbarian?  Catana has
again been overwhelmed by an earthquake: the ancient virtue of Syracuse
expires in poverty and solitude;  but Palermo is still crowned with a
diadem, and her triple walls enclose the active multitudes of Christians
and Saracens. If the two nations, under one king, can unite for their
common safety, they may rush on the Barbarians with invincible arms. But
if the Saracens, fatigued by a repetition of injuries, should now retire
and rebel; if they should occupy the castles of the mountains and
sea-coast, the unfortunate Christians, exposed to a double attack, and
placed as it were between the hammer and the anvil, must resign
themselves to hopeless and inevitable servitude."  We must not forget,
that a priest here prefers his country to his religion; and that the
Moslems, whose alliance he seeks, were still numerous and powerful in
the state of Sicily.

The hopes, or at least the wishes, of Falcandus were at first gratified
by the free and unanimous election of Tancred, the grandson of the first
king, whose birth was illegitimate, but whose civil and military virtues
shone without a blemish. During four years, the term of his life and
reign, he stood in arms on the farthest verge of the Apulian frontier,
against the powers of Germany; and the restitution of a royal captive,
of Constantia herself, without injury or ransom, may appear to surpass
the most liberal measure of policy or reason. After his decease, the
kingdom of his widow and infant son fell without a struggle; and Henry
pursued his victorious march from Capua to Palermo. The political
balance of Italy was destroyed by his success; and if the pope and the
free cities had consulted their obvious and real interest, they would
have combined the powers of earth and heaven to prevent the dangerous
union of the German empire with the kingdom of Sicily. But the subtle
policy, for which the Vatican has so often been praised or arraigned,
was on this occasion blind and inactive; and if it were true that
Celestine the Third had kicked away the Imperial crown from the head of
the prostrate Henry,  such an act of impotent pride could serve only to
cancel an obligation and provoke an enemy. The Genoese, who enjoyed a
beneficial trade and establishment in Sicily, listened to the promise of
his boundless gratitude and speedy departure:  their fleet commanded the
straits of Messina, and opened the harbor of Palermo; and the first act
of his government was to abolish the privileges, and to seize the
property, of these imprudent allies. The last hope of Falcandus was
defeated by the discord of the Christians and Mahometans: they fought in
the capital; several thousands of the latter were slain; but their
surviving brethren fortified the mountains, and disturbed above thirty
years the peace of the island. By the policy of Frederic the Second,
sixty thousand Saracens were transplanted to Nocera in Apulia. In their
wars against the Roman church, the emperor and his son Mainfroy were
strengthened and disgraced by the service of the enemies of Christ; and
this national colony maintained their religion and manners in the heart
of Italy, till they were extirpated, at the end of the thirteenth
century, by the zeal and revenge of the house of Anjou.  All the
calamities which the prophetic orator had deplored were surpassed by the
cruelty and avarice of the German conqueror. He violated the royal
sepulchres, * and explored the secret treasures of the palace, Palermo,
and the whole kingdom: the pearls and jewels, however precious, might be
easily removed; but one hundred and sixty horses were laden with the
gold and silver of Sicily.  The young king, his mother and sisters, and
the nobles of both sexes, were separately confined in the fortresses of
the Alps; and, on the slightest rumor of rebellion, the captives were
deprived of life, of their eyes, or of the hope of posterity. Constantia
herself was touched with sympathy for the miseries of her country; and
the heiress of the Norman line might struggle to check her despotic
husband, and to save the patrimony of her new-born son, of an emperor so
famous in the next age under the name of Frederic the Second. Ten years
after this revolution, the French monarchs annexed to their crown the
duchy of Normandy: the sceptre of her ancient dukes had been
transmitted, by a granddaughter of William the Conqueror, to the house
of Plantagenet; and the adventurous Normans, who had raised so many
trophies in France, England, and Ireland, in Apulia, Sicily, and the
East, were lost, either in victory or servitude, among the vanquished
nations.

Chapter LVII: The Turks.

Part I.

The Turks Of The House Of Seljuk. -- Their Revolt Against Mahmud
Conqueror Of Hindostan. -- Togrul Subdues Persia, And Protects The
Caliphs. -- Defeat And Captivity Of The Emperor Romanus Diogenes By Alp
Arslan. -- Power And Magnificence Of Malek Shah. -- Conquest Of Asia
Minor And Syria. -- State And Oppression Of Jerusalem. -- Pilgrimages To
The Holy Sepulchre.

From the Isle of Sicily, the reader must transport himself beyond the
Caspian Sea, to the original seat of the Turks or Turkmans, against whom
the first crusade was principally directed. Their Scythian empire of the
sixth century was long since dissolved; but the name was still famous
among the Greeks and Orientals; and the fragments of the nation, each a
powerful and independent people, were scattered over the desert from
China to the Oxus and the Danube: the colony of Hungarians was admitted
into the republic of Europe, and the thrones of Asia were occupied by
slaves and soldiers of Turkish extraction. While Apulia and Sicily were
subdued by the Norman lance, a swarm of these northern shepherds
overspread the kingdoms of Persia; their princes of the race of Seljuk
erected a splendid and solid empire from Samarcand to the confines of
Greece and Egypt; and the Turks have maintained their dominion in Asia
Minor, till the victorious crescent has been planted on the dome of St.
Sophia.

One of the greatest of the Turkish princes was Mahmood or Mahmud,  the
Gaznevide, who reigned in the eastern provinces of Persia, one thousand
years after the birth of Christ. His father Sebectagi was the slave of
the slave of the slave of the commander of the faithful. But in this
descent of servitude, the first degree was merely titular, since it was
filled by the sovereign of Transoxiana and Chorasan, who still paid a
nominal allegiance to the caliph of Bagdad. The second rank was that of
a minister of state, a lieutenant of the Samanides,  who broke, by his
revolt, the bonds of political slavery. But the third step was a state
of real and domestic servitude in the family of that rebel; from which
Sebectagi, by his courage and dexterity, ascended to the supreme command
of the city and provinces of Gazna,  as the son-in-law and successor of
his grateful master. The falling dynasty of the Samanides was at first
protected, and at last overthrown, by their servants; and, in the public
disorders, the fortune of Mahmud continually increased. From him the
title of Sultanwas first invented; and his kingdom was enlarged from
Transoxiana to the neighborhood of Ispahan, from the shores of the
Caspian to the mouth of the Indus. But the principal source of his fame
and riches was the holy war which he waged against the Gentoos of
Hindostan. In this foreign narrative I may not consume a page; and a
volume would scarcely suffice to recapitulate the battles and sieges of
his twelve expeditions. Never was the Mussulman hero dismayed by the
inclemency of the seasons, the height of the mountains, the breadth of
the rivers, the barrenness of the desert, the multitudes of the enemy,
or the formidable array of their elephants of war.  The sultan of Gazna
surpassed the limits of the conquests of Alexander: after a march of
three months, over the hills of Cashmir and Thibet, he reached the
famous city of Kinnoge,  on the Upper Ganges; and, in a naval combat on
one of the branches of the Indus, he fought and vanquished four thousand
boats of the natives. Delhi, Lahor, and Multan, were compelled to open
their gates: the fertile kingdom of Guzarat attracted his ambition and
tempted his stay; and his avarice indulged the fruitless project of
discovering the golden and aromatic isles of the Southern Ocean. On the
payment of a tribute, the rajahspreserved their dominions; the people,
their lives and fortunes; but to the religion of Hindostan the zealous
Mussulman was cruel and inexorable: many hundred temples, or pagodas,
were levelled with the ground; many thousand idols were demolished; and
the servants of the prophet were stimulated and rewarded by the precious
materials of which they were composed. The pagoda of Sumnat was situate
on the promontory of Guzarat, in the neighborhood of Diu, one of the
last remaining possessions of the Portuguese.  It was endowed with the
revenue of two thousand villages; two thousand Brahmins were consecrated
to the service of the Deity, whom they washed each morning and evening
in water from the distant Ganges: the subordinate ministers consisted of
three hundred musicians, three hundred barbers, and five hundred dancing
girls, conspicuous for their birth or beauty. Three sides of the temple
were protected by the ocean, the narrow isthmus was fortified by a
natural or artificial precipice; and the city and adjacent country were
peopled by a nation of fanatics. They confessed the sins and the
punishment of Kinnoge and Delhi; but if the impious stranger should
presume to approach theirholy precincts, he would surely be overwhelmed
by a blast of the divine vengeance. By this challenge, the faith of
Mahmud was animated to a personal trial of the strength of this Indian
deity. Fifty thousand of his worshippers were pierced by the spear of
the Moslems; the walls were scaled; the sanctuary was profaned; and the
conqueror aimed a blow of his iron mace at the head of the idol. The
trembling Brahmins are said to have offered ten millions * sterling for
his ransom; and it was urged by the wisest counsellors, that the
destruction of a stone image would not change the hearts of the Gentoos;
and that such a sum might be dedicated to the relief of the true
believers. "Your reasons," replied the sultan, "are specious and strong;
but never in the eyes of posterity shall Mahmud appear as a merchant of
idols." * He repeated his blows, and a treasure of pearls and rubies,
concealed in the belly of the statue, explained in some degree the
devout prodigality of the Brahmins. The fragments of the idol were
distributed to Gazna, Mecca, and Medina. Bagdad listened to the edifying
tale; and Mahmud was saluted by the caliph with the title of guardian of
the fortune and faith of Mahomet.

From the paths of blood (and such is the history of nations) I cannot
refuse to turn aside to gather some flowers of science or virtue. The
name of Mahmud the Gaznevide is still venerable in the East: his
subjects enjoyed the blessings of prosperity and peace; his vices were
concealed by the veil of religion; and two familiar examples will
testify his justice and magnanimity. I. As he sat in the Divan, an
unhappy subject bowed before the throne to accuse the insolence of a
Turkish soldier who had driven him from his house and bed. "Suspend your
clamors," said Mahmud; "inform me of his next visit, and ourself in
person will judge and punish the offender." The sultan followed his
guide, invested the house with his guards, and extinguishing the
torches, pronounced the death of the criminal, who had been seized in
the act of rapine and adultery. After the execution of his sentence, the
lights were rekindled, Mahmud fell prostrate in prayer, and rising from
the ground, demanded some homely fare, which he devoured with the
voraciousness of hunger. The poor man, whose injury he had avenged, was
unable to suppress his astonishment and curiosity; and the courteous
monarch condescended to explain the motives of this singular behavior.
"I had reason to suspect that none, except one of my sons, could dare to
perpetrate such an outrage; and I extinguished the lights, that my
justice might be blind and inexorable. My prayer was a thanksgiving on
the discovery of the offender; and so painful was my anxiety, that I had
passed three days without food since the first moment of your
complaint." II. The sultan of Gazna had declared war against the dynasty
of the Bowides, the sovereigns of the western Persia: he was disarmed by
an epistle of the sultana mother, and delayed his invasion till the
manhood of her son.  "During the life of my husband," said the artful
regent, "I was ever apprehensive of your ambition: he was a prince and a
soldier worthy of your arms. He is now no more his sceptre has passed to
a woman and a child, and you dare notattack their infancy and weakness.
How inglorious would be your conquest, how shameful your defeat! and yet
the event of war is in the hand of the Almighty." Avarice was the only
defect that tarnished the illustrious character of Mahmud; and never has
that passion been more richly satiated. * The Orientals exceed the
measure of credibility in the account of millions of gold and silver,
such as the avidity of man has never accumulated; in the magnitude of
pearls, diamonds, and rubies, such as have never been produced by the
workmanship of nature.  Yet the soil of Hindostan is impregnated with
precious minerals: her trade, in every age, has attracted the gold and
silver of the world; and her virgin spoils were rifled by the first of
the Mahometan conquerors. His behavior, in the last days of his life,
evinces the vanity of these possessions, so laboriously won, so
dangerously held, and so inevitably lost. He surveyed the vast and
various chambers of the treasury of Gazna, burst into tears, and again
closed the doors, without bestowing any portion of the wealth which he
could no longer hope to preserve. The following day he reviewed the
state of his military force; one hundred thousand foot, fifty-five
thousand horse, and thirteen hundred elephants of battle.  He again wept
the instability of human greatness; and his grief was imbittered by the
hostile progress of the Turkmans, whom he had introduced into the heart
of his Persian kingdom.

In the modern depopulation of Asia, the regular operation of government
and agriculture is confined to the neighborhood of cities; and the
distant country is abandoned to the pastoral tribes of Arabs, Curds, and
Turkmans.  Of the last-mentioned people, two considerable branches
extend on either side of the Caspian Sea: the western colony can muster
forty thousand soldiers; the eastern, less obvious to the traveller, but
more strong and populous, has increased to the number of one hundred
thousand families. In the midst of civilized nations, they preserve the
manners of the Scythian desert, remove their encampments with a change
of seasons, and feed their cattle among the ruins of palaces and
temples. Their flocks and herds are their only riches; their tents,
either black or white, according to the color of the banner, are covered
with felt, and of a circular form; their winter apparel is a sheep-skin;
a robe of cloth or cotton their summer garment: the features of the men
are harsh and ferocious; the countenance of their women is soft and
pleasing. Their wandering life maintains the spirit and exercise of
arms; they fight on horseback; and their courage is displayed in
frequent contests with each other and with their neighbors. For the
license of pasture they pay a slight tribute to the sovereign of the
land; but the domestic jurisdiction is in the hands of the chiefs and
elders. The first emigration of the Eastern Turkmans, the most ancient
of the race, may be ascribed to the tenth century of the Christian æra.
In the decline of the caliphs, and the weakness of their lieutenants,
the barrier of the Jaxartes was often violated; in each invasion, after
the victory or retreat of their countrymen, some wandering tribe,
embracing the Mahometan faith, obtained a free encampment in the
spacious plains and pleasant climate of Transoxiana and Carizme. The
Turkish slaves who aspired to the throne encouraged these emigrations
which recruited their armies, awed their subjects and rivals, and
protected the frontier against the wilder natives of Turkestan; and this
policy was abused by Mahmud the Gaznevide beyond the example of former
times. He was admonished of his error by the chief of the race of
Seljuk, who dwelt in the territory of Bochara. The sultan had inquired
what supply of men he could furnish for military service. "If you send,"
replied Ismael, "one of these arrows into our camp, fifty thousand of
your servants will mount on horseback." -- "And if that number,"
continued Mahmud, "should not be sufficient?" -- "Send this second arrow
to the horde of Balik, and you will find fifty thousand more." -- "But,"
said the Gaznevide, dissembling his anxiety, "if I should stand in need
of the whole force of your kindred tribes?" -- "Despatch my bow," was
the last reply of Ismael, "and as it is circulated around, the summons
will be obeyed by two hundred thousand horse." The apprehension of such
formidable friendship induced Mahmud to transport the most obnoxious
tribes into the heart of Chorasan, where they would be separated from
their brethren of the River Oxus, and enclosed on all sides by the walls
of obedient cities. But the face of the country was an object of
temptation rather than terror; and the vigor of government was relaxed
by the absence and death of the sultan of Gazna. The shepherds were
converted into robbers; the bands of robbers were collected into an army
of conquerors: as far as Ispahan and the Tigris, Persia was afflicted by
their predatory inroads; and the Turkmans were not ashamed or afraid to
measure their courage and numbers with the proudest sovereigns of Asia.
Massoud, the son and successor of Mahmud, had too long neglected the
advice of his wisest Omrahs. "Your enemies," they repeatedly urged,
"were in their origin a swarm of ants; they are now little snakes; and,
unless they be instantly crushed, they will acquire the venom and
magnitude of serpents." After some alternatives of truce and hostility,
after the repulse or partial success of his lieutenants, the sultan
marched in person against the Turkmans, who attacked him on all sides
with barbarous shouts and irregular onset. "Massoud," says the Persian
historian,  "plunged singly to oppose the torrent of gleaming arms,
exhibiting such acts of gigantic force and valor as never king had
before displayed. A few of his friends, roused by his words and actions,
and that innate honor which inspires the brave, seconded their lord so
well, that wheresoever he turned his fatal sword, the enemies were mowed
down, or retreated before him. But now, when victory seemed to blow on
his standard, misfortune was active behind it; for when he looked round,
be beheld almost his whole army, excepting that body he commanded in
person, devouring the paths of flight." The Gaznevide was abandoned by
the cowardice or treachery of some generals of Turkish race; and this
memorable day of Zendecan  founded in Persia the dynasty of the shepherd
kings.

The victorious Turkmans immediately proceeded to the election of a king;
and, if the probable tale of a Latin historian  deserves any credit,
they determined by lot the choice of their new master. A number of
arrows were successively inscribed with the name of a tribe, a family,
and a candidate; they were drawn from the bundle by the hand of a child;
and the important prize was obtained by Togrul Beg, the son of Michael
the son of Seljuk, whose surname was immortalized in the greatness of
his posterity. The sultan Mahmud, who valued himself on his skill in
national genealogy, professed his ignorance of the family of Seljuk; yet
the father of that race appears to have been a chief of power and
renown.  For a daring intrusion into the harem of his prince. Seljuk was
banished from Turkestan: with a numerous tribe of his friends and
vassals, he passed the Jaxartes, encamped in the neighborhood of
Samarcand, embraced the religion of Mahomet, and acquired the crown of
martyrdom in a war against the infidels. His age, of a hundred and seven
years, surpassed the life of his son, and Seljuk adopted the care of his
two grandsons, Togrul and Jaafar; the eldest of whom, at the age of
forty-five, was invested with the title of Sultan, in the royal city of
Nishabur. The blind determination of chance was justified by the virtues
of the successful candidate. It would be superfluous to praise the valor
of a Turk; and the ambition of Togrul  was equal to his valor. By his
arms, the Gasnevides were expelled from the eastern kingdoms of Persia,
and gradually driven to the banks of the Indus, in search of a softer
and more wealthy conquest. In the West he annihilated the dynasty of the
Bowides; and the sceptre of Irak passed from the Persian to the Turkish
nation. The princes who had felt, or who feared, the Seljukian arrows,
bowed their heads in the dust; by the conquest of Aderbijan, or Media,
he approached the Roman confines; and the shepherd presumed to despatch
an ambassador, or herald, to demand the tribute and obedience of the
emperor of Constantinople.  In his own dominions, Togrul was the father
of his soldiers and people; by a firm and equal administration, Persia
was relieved from the evils of anarchy; and the same hands which had
been imbrued in blood became the guardians of justice and the public
peace. The more rustic, perhaps the wisest, portion of the Turkmans
continued to dwell in the tents of their ancestors; and, from the Oxus
to the Euphrates, these military colonies were protected and propagated
by their native princes. But the Turks of the court and city were
refined by business and softened by pleasure: they imitated the dress,
language, and manners of Persia; and the royal palaces of Nishabur and
Rei displayed the order and magnificence of a great monarchy. The most
deserving of the Arabians and Persians were promoted to the honors of
the state; and the whole body of the Turkish nation embraced, with
fervor and sincerity, the religion of Mahomet. The northern swarms of
Barbarians, who overspread both Europe and Asia, have been
irreconcilably separated by the consequences of a similar conduct. Among
the Moslems, as among the Christians, their vague and local traditions
have yielded to the reason and authority of the prevailing system, to
the fame of antiquity, and the consent of nations. But the triumph of
the Koran is more pure and meritorious, as it was not assisted by any
visible splendor of worship which might allure the Pagans by some
resemblance of idolatry. The first of the Seljukian sultans was
conspicuous by his zeal and faith: each day he repeated the five prayers
which are enjoined to the true believers; of each week, the two first
days were consecrated by an extraordinary fast; and in every city a
mosch was completed, before Togrul presumed to lay the foundations of a
palace.

With the belief of the Koran, the son of Seljuk imbibed a lively
reverence for the successor of the prophet. But that sublime character
was still disputed by the caliphs of Bagdad and Egypt, and each of the
rivals was solicitous to prove his title in the judgment of the strong,
though illiterate Barbarians. Mahmud the Gaznevide had declared himself
in favor of the line of Abbas; and had treated with indignity the robe
of honor which was presented by the Fatimite ambassador. Yet the
ungrateful Hashemite had changed with the change of fortune; he
applauded the victory of Zendecan, and named the Seljukian sultan his
temporal vicegerent over the Moslem world. As Togrul executed and
enlarged this important trust, he was called to the deliverance of the
caliph Cayem, and obeyed the holy summons, which gave a new kingdom to
his arms.  In the palace of Bagdad, the commander of the faithful still
slumbered, a venerable phantom. His servant or master, the prince of the
Bowides, could no longer protect him from the insolence of meaner
tyrants; and the Euphrates and Tigris were oppressed by the revolt of
the Turkish and Arabian emirs. The presence of a conqueror was implored
as a blessing; and the transient mischiefs of fire and sword were
excused as the sharp but salutary remedies which alone could restore the
health of the republic. At the head of an irresistible force, the sultan
of Persia marched from Hamadan: the proud were crushed, the prostrate
were spared; the prince of the Bowides disappeared; the heads of the
most obstinate rebels were laid at the feet of Togrul; and he inflicted
a lesson of obedience on the people of Mosul and Bagdad. After the
chastisement of the guilty, and the restoration of peace, the royal
shepherd accepted the reward of his labors; and a solemn comedy
represented the triumph of religious prejudice over Barbarian power.
The Turkish sultan embarked on the Tigris, landed at the gate of Racca,
and made his public entry on horseback. At the palace-gate he
respectfully dismounted, and walked on foot, preceded by his emirs
without arms. The caliph was seated behind his black veil: the black
garment of the Abbassides was cast over his shoulders, and he held in
his hand the staff of the apostle of God. The conqueror of the East
kissed the ground, stood some time in a modest posture, and was led
towards the throne by the vizier and interpreter. After Togrul had
seated himself on another throne, his commission was publicly read,
which declared him the temporal lieutenant of the vicar of the prophet.
He was successively invested with seven robes of honor, and presented
with seven slaves, the natives of the seven climates of the Arabian
empire. His mystic veil was perfumed with musk; two crowns * were placed
on his head; two cimeters were girded to his side, as the symbols of a
double reign over the East and West. After this inauguration, the sultan
was prevented from prostrating himself a second time; but he twice
kissed the hand of the commander of the faithful, and his titles were
proclaimed by the voice of heralds and the applause of the Moslems. In a
second visit to Bagdad, the Seljukian prince again rescued the caliph
from his enemies and devoutly, on foot, led the bridle of his mule from
the prison to the palace. Their alliance was cemented by the marriage of
Togrul's sister with the successor of the prophet. Without reluctance he
had introduced a Turkish virgin into his harem; but Cayem proudly
refused his daughter to the sultan, disdained to mingle the blood of the
Hashemites with the blood of a Scythian shepherd; and protracted the
negotiation many months, till the gradual diminution of his revenue
admonished him that he was still in the hands of a master. The royal
nuptials were followed by the death of Togrul himself;   as he left no
children, his nephew Alp Arslan succeeded to the title and prerogatives
of sultan; and his name, after that of the caliph, was pronounced in the
public prayers of the Moslems. Yet in this revolution, the Abbassides
acquired a larger measure of liberty and power. On the throne of Asia,
the Turkish monarchs were less jealous of the domestic administration of
Bagdad; and the commanders of the faithful were relieved from the
ignominious vexations to which they had been exposed by the presence and
poverty of the Persian dynasty.

Chapter LVII: The Turks. -- Part II.

Since the fall of the caliphs, the discord and degeneracy of the
Saracens respected the Asiatic provinces of Rome; which, by the
victories of Nicephorus, Zimisces, and Basil, had been extended as far
as Antioch and the eastern boundaries of Armenia. Twenty-five years
after the death of Basil, his successors were suddenly assaulted by an
unknown race of Barbarians, who united the Scythian valor with the
fanaticism of new proselytes, and the art and riches of a powerful
monarchy.  The myriads of Turkish horse overspread a frontier of six
hundred miles from Tauris to Arzeroum, and the blood of one hundred and
thirty thousand Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian
prophet. Yet the arms of Togrul did not make any deep or lasting
impression on the Greek empire. The torrent rolled away from the open
country; the sultan retired without glory or success from the siege of
an Armenian city; the obscure hostilities were continued or suspended
with a vicissitude of events; and the bravery of the Macedonian legions
renewed the fame of the conqueror of Asia.  The name of Alp Arslan, the
valiant lion, is expressive of the popular idea of the perfection of
man; and the successor of Togrul displayed the fierceness and generosity
of the royal animal. He passed the Euphrates at the head of the Turkish
cavalry, and entered Cæsarea, the metropolis of Cappadocia, to which he
had been attracted by the fame and wealth of the temple of St. Basil.
The solid structure resisted the destroyer: but he carried away the
doors of the shrine incrusted with gold and pearls, and profaned the
relics of the tutelar saint, whose mortal frailties were now covered by
the venerable rust of antiquity. The final conquest of Armenia and
Georgia was achieved by Alp Arslan. In Armenia, the title of a kingdom,
and the spirit of a nation, were annihilated: the artificial
fortifications were yielded by the mercenaries of Constantinople; by
strangers without faith, veterans without pay or arms, and recruits
without experience or discipline. The loss of this important frontier
was the news of a day; and the Catholics were neither surprised nor
displeased, that a people so deeply infected with the Nestorian and
Eutychian errors had been delivered by Christ and his mother into the
hands of the infidels.  The woods and valleys of Mount Caucasus were
more strenuously defended by the native Georgians  or Iberians; but the
Turkish sultan and his son Malek were indefatigable in this holy war:
their captives were compelled to promise a spiritual, as well as
temporal, obedience; and, instead of their collars and bracelets, an
iron horseshoe, a badge of ignominy, was imposed on the infidels who
still adhered to the worship of their fathers. The change, however, was
not sincere or universal; and, through ages of servitude, the Georgians
have maintained the succession of their princes and bishops. But a race
of men, whom nature has cast in her most perfect mould, is degraded by
poverty, ignorance, and vice; their profession, and still more their
practice, of Christianity is an empty name; and if they have emerged
from heresy, it is only because they are too illiterate to remember a
metaphysical creed.

The false or genuine magnanimity of Mahmud the Gaznevide was not
imitated by Alp Arslan; and he attacked without scruple the Greek
empress Eudocia and her children. His alarming progress compelled her to
give herself and her sceptre to the hand of a soldier; and Romanus
Diogenes was invested with the Imperial purple. His patriotism, and
perhaps his pride, urged him from Constantinople within two months after
his accession; and the next campaign he most scandalously took the field
during the holy festival of Easter. In the palace, Diogenes was no more
than the husband of Eudocia: in the camp, he was the emperor of the
Romans, and he sustained that character with feeble resources and
invincible courage. By his spirit and success the soldiers were taught
to act, the subjects to hope, and the enemies to fear. The Turks had
penetrated into the heart of Phrygia; but the sultan himself had
resigned to his emirs the prosecution of the war; and their numerous
detachments were scattered over Asia in the security of conquest. Laden
with spoil, and careless of discipline, they were separately surprised
and defeated by the Greeks: the activity of the emperor seemed to
multiply his presence: and while they heard of his expedition to
Antioch, the enemy felt his sword on the hills of Trebizond. In three
laborious campaigns, the Turks were driven beyond the Euphrates; in the
fourth and last, Romanus undertook the deliverance of Armenia. The
desolation of the land obliged him to transport a supply of two months'
provisions; and he marched forwards to the siege of Malazkerd,  an
important fortress in the midway between the modern cities of Arzeroum
and Van. His army amounted, at the least, to one hundred thousand men.
The troops of Constantinople were reënforced by the disorderly
multitudes of Phrygia and Cappadocia; but the real strength was composed
of the subjects and allies of Europe, the legions of Macedonia, and the
squadrons of Bulgaria; the Uzi, a Moldavian horde, who were themselves
of the Turkish race;  and, above all, the mercenary and adventurous
bands of French and Normans. Their lances were commanded by the valiant
Ursel of Baliol, the kinsman or father of the Scottish kings,  and were
allowed to excel in the exercise of arms, or, according to the Greek
style, in the practice of the Pyrrhic dance.

On the report of this bold invasion, which threatened his hereditary
dominions, Alp Arslan flew to the scene of action at the head of forty
thousand horse.  His rapid and skilful evolutions distressed and
dismayed the superior numbers of the Greeks; and in the defeat of
Basilacius, one of their principal generals, he displayed the first
example of his valor and clemency. The imprudence of the emperor had
separated his forces after the reduction of Malazkerd. It was in vain
that he attempted to recall the mercenary Franks: they refused to obey
his summons; he disdained to await their return: the desertion of the
Uzi filled his mind with anxiety and suspicion; and against the most
salutary advice he rushed forwards to speedy and decisive action. Had he
listened to the fair proposals of the sultan, Romanus might have secured
a retreat, perhaps a peace; but in these overtures he supposed the fear
or weakness of the enemy, and his answer was conceived in the tone of
insult and defiance. "If the Barbarian wishes for peace, let him
evacuate the ground which he occupies for the encampment of the Romans,
and surrender his city and palace of Rei as a pledge of his sincerity."
Alp Arslan smiled at the vanity of the demand, but he wept the death of
so many faithful Moslems; and, after a devout prayer, proclaimed a free
permission to all who were desirous of retiring from the field. With his
own hands he tied up his horse's tail, exchanged his bow and arrows for
a mace and cimeter, clothed himself in a white garment, perfumed his
body with musk, and declared that if he were vanquished, that spot
should be the place of his burial.  The sultan himself had affected to
cast away his missile weapons: but his hopes of victory were placed in
the arrows of the Turkish cavalry, whose squadrons were loosely
distributed in the form of a crescent. Instead of the successive lines
and reserves of the Grecian tactics, Romulus led his army in a single
and solid phalanx, and pressed with vigor and impatience the artful and
yielding resistance of the Barbarians. In this desultory and fruitless
combat he spent the greater part of a summer's day, till prudence and
fatigue compelled him to return to his camp. But a retreat is always
perilous in the face of an active foe; and no sooner had the standard
been turned to the rear than the phalanx was broken by the base
cowardice, or the baser jealousy, of Andronicus, a rival prince, who
disgraced his birth and the purple of the Cæsars.  The Turkish squadrons
poured a cloud of arrows on this moment of confusion and lassitude; and
the horns of their formidable crescent were closed in the rear of the
Greeks. In the destruction of the army and pillage of the camp, it would
be needless to mention the number of the slain or captives. The
Byzantine writers deplore the loss of an inestimable pearl: they forgot
to mention, that in this fatal day the Asiatic provinces of Rome were
irretrievably sacrificed.

As long as a hope survived, Romanus attempted to rally and save the
relics of his army. When the centre, the Imperial station, was left
naked on all sides, and encompassed by the victorious Turks, he still,
with desperate courage, maintained the fight till the close of day, at
the head of the brave and faithful subjects who adhered to his standard.
They fell around him; his horse was slain; the emperor was wounded; yet
he stood alone and intrepid, till he was oppressed and bound by the
strength of multitudes. The glory of this illustrious prize was disputed
by a slave and a soldier; a slave who had seen him on the throne of
Constantinople, and a soldier whose extreme deformity had been excused
on the promise of some signal service. Despoiled of his arms, his
jewels, and his purple, Romanus spent a dreary and perilous night on the
field of battle, amidst a disorderly crowd of the meaner Barbarians. In
the morning the royal captive was presented to Alp Arslan, who doubted
of his fortune, till the identity of the person was ascertained by the
report of his ambassadors, and by the more pathetic evidence of
Basilacius, who embraced with tears the feet of his unhappy sovereign.
The successor of Constantine, in a plebeian habit, was led into the
Turkish divan, and commanded to kiss the ground before the lord of Asia.
He reluctantly obeyed; and Alp Arslan, starting from his throne, is said
to have planted his foot on the neck of the Roman emperor.  But the fact
is doubtful; and if, in this moment of insolence, the sultan complied
with the national custom, the rest of his conduct has extorted the
praise of his bigoted foes, and may afford a lesson to the most
civilized ages. He instantly raised the royal captive from the ground;
and thrice clasping his hand with tender sympathy, assured him, that his
life and dignity should be inviolate in the hands of a prince who had
learned to respect the majesty of his equals and the vicissitudes of
fortune. From the divan, Romanus was conducted to an adjacent tent,
where he was served with pomp and reverence by the officers of the
sultan, who, twice each day, seated him in the place of honor at his own
table. In a free and familiar conversation of eight days, not a word,
not a look, of insult escaped from the conqueror; but he severely
censured the unworthy subjects who had deserted their valiant prince in
the hour of danger, and gently admonished his antagonist of some errors
which he had committed in the management of the war. In the
preliminaries of negotiation, Alp Arslan asked him what treatment he
expected to receive, and the calm indifference of the emperor displays
the freedom of his mind. "If you are cruel," said he, "you will take my
life; if you listen to pride, you will drag me at your chariot-wheels;
if you consult your interest, you will accept a ransom, and restore me
to my country." "And what," continued the sultan, "would have been your
own behavior, had fortune smiled on your arms?" The reply of the Greek
betrays a sentiment, which prudence, and even gratitude, should have
taught him to suppress. "Had I vanquished," he fiercely said, "I would
have inflicted on thy body many a stripe." The Turkish conqueror smiled
at the insolence of his captive observed that the Christian law
inculcated the love of enemies and forgiveness of injuries; and nobly
declared, that he would not imitate an example which he condemned. After
mature deliberation, Alp Arslan dictated the terms of liberty and peace,
a ransom of a million, * an annual tribute of three hundred and sixty
thousand pieces of gold,  the marriage of the royal children, and the
deliverance of all the Moslems, who were in the power of the Greeks.
Romanus, with a sigh, subscribed this treaty, so disgraceful to the
majesty of the empire; he was immediately invested with a Turkish robe
of honor; his nobles and patricians were restored to their sovereign;
and the sultan, after a courteous embrace, dismissed him with rich
presents and a military guard. No sooner did he reach the confines of
the empire, than he was informed that the palace and provinces had
disclaimed their allegiance to a captive: a sum of two hundred thousand
pieces was painfully collected; and the fallen monarch transmitted this
part of his ransom, with a sad confession of his impotence and disgrace.
The generosity, or perhaps the ambition, of the sultan, prepared to
espouse the cause of his ally; but his designs were prevented by the
defeat, imprisonment, and death, of Romanus Diogenes.

In the treaty of peace, it does not appear that Alp Arslan extorted any
province or city from the captive emperor; and his revenge was satisfied
with the trophies of his victory, and the spoils of Anatolia, from
Antioch to the Black Sea. The fairest part of Asia was subject to his
laws: twelve hundred princes, or the sons of princes, stood before his
throne; and two hundred thousand soldiers marched under his banners. The
sultan disdained to pursue the fugitive Greeks; but he meditated the
more glorious conquest of Turkestan, the original seat of the house of
Seljuk. He moved from Bagdad to the banks of the Oxus; a bridge was
thrown over the river; and twenty days were consumed in the passage of
his troops. But the progress of the great king was retarded by the
governor of Berzem; and Joseph the Carizmian presumed to defend his
fortress against the powers of the East. When he was produced a captive
in the royal tent, the sultan, instead of praising his valor, severely
reproached his obstinate folly: and the insolent replies of the rebel
provoked a sentence, that he should be fastened to four stakes, and left
to expire in that painful situation. At this command, the desperate
Carizmian, drawing a dagger, rushed headlong towards the throne: the
guards raised their battle-axes; their zeal was checked by Alp Arslan,
the most skilful archer of the age: he drew his bow, but his foot
slipped, the arrow glanced aside, and he received in his breast the
dagger of Joseph, who was instantly cut in pieces. The wound was mortal;
and the Turkish prince bequeathed a dying admonition to the pride of
kings. "In my youth," said Alp Arslan, "I was advised by a sage to
humble myself before God; to distrust my own strength; and never to
despise the most contemptible foe. I have neglected these lessons; and
my neglect has been deservedly punished. Yesterday, as from an eminence
I beheld the numbers, the discipline, and the spirit, of my armies, the
earth seemed to tremble under my feet; and I said in my heart, Surely
thou art the king of the world, the greatest and most invincible of
warriors. These armies are no longer mine; and, in the confidence of my
personal strength, I now fall by the hand of an assassin."  Alp Arslan
possessed the virtues of a Turk and a Mussulman; his voice and stature
commanded the reverence of mankind; his face was shaded with long
whiskers; and his ample turban was fashioned in the shape of a crown.
The remains of the sultan were deposited in the tomb of the Seljukian
dynasty; and the passenger might read and meditate this useful
inscription:  "O ye who have seen the glory of Alp Arslan exalted to the
heavens, repair to Maru, and you will behold it buried in the dust." The
annihilation of the inscription, and the tomb itself, more forcibly
proclaims the instability of human greatness.

During the life of Alp Arslan, his eldest son had been acknowledged as
the future sultan of the Turks. On his father's death the inheritance
was disputed by an uncle, a cousin, and a brother: they drew their
cimeters, and assembled their followers; and the triple victory of Malek
Shah  established his own reputation and the right of primogeniture. In
every age, and more especially in Asia, the thirst of power has inspired
the same passions, and occasioned the same disorders; but, from the long
series of civil war, it would not be easy to extract a sentiment more
pure and magnanimous than is contained in the saying of the Turkish
prince. On the eve of the battle, he performed his devotions at Thous,
before the tomb of the Imam Riza. As the sultan rose from the ground, he
asked his vizier Nizam, who had knelt beside him, what had been the
object of his secret petition: "That your arms may be crowned with
victory," was the prudent, and most probably the sincere, answer of the
minister. "For my part," replied the generous Malek, "I implored the
Lord of Hosts that he would take from me my life and crown, if my
brother be more worthy than myself to reign over the Moslems." The
favorable judgment of heaven was ratified by the caliph; and for the
first time, the sacred title of Commander of the Faithful was
communicated to a Barbarian. But this Barbarian, by his personal merit,
and the extent of his empire, was the greatest prince of his age. After
the settlement of Persia and Syria, he marched at the head of
innumerable armies to achieve the conquest of Turkestan, which had been
undertaken by his father. In his passage of the Oxus, the boatmen, who
had been employed in transporting some troops, complained, that their
payment was assigned on the revenues of Antioch. The sultan frowned at
this preposterous choice; but he smiled at the artful flattery of his
vizier. "It was not to postpone their reward, that I selected those
remote places, but to leave a memorial to posterity, that, under your
reign, Antioch and the Oxus were subject to the same sovereign." But
this description of his limits was unjust and parsimonious: beyond the
Oxus, he reduced to his obedience the cities of Bochara, Carizme, and
Samarcand, and crushed each rebellious slave, or independent savage, who
dared to resist. Malek passed the Sihon or Jaxartes, the last boundary
of Persian civilization: the hordes of Turkestan yielded to his
supremacy: his name was inserted on the coins, and in the prayers of
Cashgar, a Tartar kingdom on the extreme borders of China. From the
Chinese frontier, he stretched his immediate jurisdiction or feudatory
sway to the west and south, as far as the mountains of Georgia, the
neighborhood of Constantinople, the holy city of Jerusalem, and the
spicy groves of Arabia Felix. Instead of resigning himself to the luxury
of his harem, the shepherd king, both in peace and war, was in action
and in the field. By the perpetual motion of the royal camp, each
province was successively blessed with his presence; and he is said to
have perambulated twelve times the wide extent of his dominions, which
surpassed the Asiaticreign of Cyrus and the caliphs. Of these
expeditions, the most pious and splendid was the pilgrimage of Mecca:
the freedom and safety of the caravans were protected by his arms; the
citizens and pilgrims were enriched by the profusion of his alms; and
the desert was cheered by the places of relief and refreshment, which he
instituted for the use of his brethren. Hunting was the pleasure, and
even the passion, of the sultan, and his train consisted of forty-seven
thousand horses; but after the massacre of a Turkish chase, for each
piece of game, he bestowed a piece of gold on the poor, a slight
atonement, at the expense of the people, for the cost and mischief of
the amusement of kings. In the peaceful prosperity of his reign, the
cities of Asia were adorned with palaces and hospitals with moschs and
colleges; few departed from his Divan without reward, and none without
justice. The language and literature of Persia revived under the house
of Seljuk;  and if Malek emulated the liberality of a Turk less potent
than himself,  his palace might resound with the songs of a hundred
poets. The sultan bestowed a more serious and learned care on the
reformation of the calendar, which was effected by a general assembly of
the astronomers of the East. By a law of the prophet, the Moslems are
confined to the irregular course of the lunar months; in Persia, since
the age of Zoroaster, the revolution of the sun has been known and
celebrated as an annual festival;  but after the fall of the Magian
empire, the intercalation had been neglected; the fractions of minutes
and hours were multiplied into days; and the date of the springs was
removed from the sign of Aries to that of Pisces. The reign of Malek was
illustrated by the Gelalanæra; and all errors, either past or future,
were corrected by a computation of time, which surpasses the Julian, and
approaches the accuracy of the Gregorian, style.

In a period when Europe was plunged in the deepest barbarism, the light
and splendor of Asia may be ascribed to the docility rather than the
knowledge of the Turkish conquerors. An ample share of their wisdom and
virtue is due to a Persian vizier, who ruled the empire under the reigns
of Alp Arslan and his son. Nizam, one of the most illustrious ministers
of the East, was honored by the caliph as an oracle of religion and
science; he was trusted by the sultan as the faithful vicegerent of his
power and justice. After an administration of thirty years, the fame of
the vizier, his wealth, and even his services, were transformed into
crimes. He was overthrown by the insidious arts of a woman and a rival;
and his fall was hastened by a rash declaration, that his cap and
ink-horn, the badges of his office, were connected by the divine decree
with the throne and diadem of the sultan. At the age of ninety-three
years, the venerable statesman was dismissed by his master, accused by
his enemies, and murdered by a fanatic: * the last words of Nizam
attested his innocence, and the remainder of Malek's life was short and
inglorious. From Ispahan, the scene of this disgraceful transaction, the
sultan moved to Bagdad, with the design of transplanting the caliph, and
of fixing his own residence in the capital of the Moslem world. The
feeble successor of Mahomet obtained a respite of ten days; and before
the expiration of the term, the Barbarian was summoned by the angel of
death. His ambassadors at Constantinople had asked in marriage a Roman
princess; but the proposal was decently eluded; and the daughter of
Alexius, who might herself have been the victim, expresses her
abhorrence of his unnatural conjunction.  The daughter of the sultan was
bestowed on the caliph Moctadi, with the imperious condition, that,
renouncing the society of his wives and concubines, he should forever
confine himself to this honorable alliance.

Chapter LVII: The Turks. -- Part III.

The greatness and unity of the Turkish empire expired in the person of
Malek Shah. His vacant throne was disputed by his brother and his four
sons;  and, after a series of civil wars, the treaty which reconciled
the surviving candidates confirmed a lasting separation in the
Persiandynasty, the eldest and principal branch of the house of Seljuk.
The three younger dynasties were those of Kerman, of Syria, and of Roum:
the first of these commanded an extensive, though obscure,  dominion on
the shores of the Indian Ocean:  the second expelled the Arabian princes
of Aleppo and Damascus; and the third, our peculiar care, invaded the
Roman provinces of Asia Minor. The generous policy of Malek contributed
to their elevation: he allowed the princes of his blood, even those whom
he had vanquished in the field, to seek new kingdoms worthy of their
ambition; nor was he displeased that they should draw away the more
ardent spirits, who might have disturbed the tranquillity of his reign.
As the supreme head of his family and nation, the great sultan of Persia
commanded the obedience and tribute of his royal brethren: the thrones
of Kerman and Nice, of Aleppo and Damascus; the Atabeks, and emirs of
Syria and Mesopotamia, erected their standards under the shadow of his
sceptre:  and the hordes of Turkmans overspread the plains of the
Western Asia. After the death of Malek, the bands of union and
subordination were relaxed and finally dissolved: the indulgence of the
house of Seljuk invested their slaves with the inheritance of kingdoms;
and, in the Oriental style, a crowd of princes arose from the dust of
their feet.

A prince of the royal line, Cutulmish, * the son of Izrail, the son of
Seljuk, had fallen in a battle against Alp Arslan and the humane victor
had dropped a tear over his grave. His five sons, strong in arms,
ambitious of power, and eager for revenge, unsheathed their cimeters
against the son of Alp Arslan. The two armies expected the signal when
the caliph, forgetful of the majesty which secluded him from vulgar
eyes, interposed his venerable mediation. "Instead of shedding the blood
of your brethren, your brethren both in descent and faith, unite your
forces in a holy war against the Greeks, the enemies of God and his
apostle." They listened to his voice; the sultan embraced his rebellious
kinsmen; and the eldest, the valiant Soliman, accepted the royal
standard, which gave him the free conquest and hereditary command of the
provinces of the Roman empire, from Arzeroum to Constantinople, and the
unknown regions of the West.  Accompanied by his four brothers, he
passed the Euphrates; the Turkish camp was soon seated in the
neighborhood of Kutaieh in Phrygia; and his flying cavalry laid waste
the country as far as the Hellespont and the Black Sea. Since the
decline of the empire, the peninsula of Asia Minor had been exposed to
the transient, though destructive, inroads of the Persians and Saracens;
but the fruits of a lasting conquest were reserved for the Turkish
sultan; and his arms were introduced by the Greeks, who aspired to reign
on the ruins of their country. Since the captivity of Romanus, six years
the feeble son of Eudocia had trembled under the weight of the Imperial
crown, till the provinces of the East and West were lost in the same
month by a double rebellion: of either chief Nicephorus was the common
name; but the surnames of Bryennius and Botoniates distinguish the
European and Asiatic candidates. Their reasons, or rather their
promises, were weighed in the Divan; and, after some hesitation, Soliman
declared himself in favor of Botoniates, opened a free passage to his
troops in their march from Antioch to Nice, and joined the banner of the
Crescent to that of the Cross. After his ally had ascended the throne of
Constantinople, the sultan was hospitably entertained in the suburb of
Chrysopolis or Scutari; and a body of two thousand Turks was transported
into Europe, to whose dexterity and courage the new emperor was indebted
for the defeat and captivity of his rival, Bryennius. But the conquest
of Europe was dearly purchased by the sacrifice of Asia: Constantinople
was deprived of the obedience and revenue of the provinces beyond the
Bosphorus and Hellespont; and the regular progress of the Turks, who
fortified the passes of the rivers and mountains, left not a hope of
their retreat or expulsion. Another candidate implored the aid of the
sultan: Melissenus, in his purple robes and red buskins, attended the
motions of the Turkish camp; and the desponding cities were tempted by
the summons of a Roman prince, who immediately surrendered them into the
hands of the Barbarians. These acquisitions were confirmed by a treaty
of peace with the emperor Alexius: his fear of Robert compelled him to
seek the friendship of Soliman; and it was not till after the sultan's
death that he extended as far as Nicomedia, about sixty miles from
Constantinople, the eastern boundary of the Roman world. Trebizond
alone, defended on either side by the sea and mountains, preserved at
the extremity of the Euxine the ancient character of a Greek colony, and
the future destiny of a Christian empire.

Since the first conquests of the caliphs, the establishment of the Turks
in Anatolia or Asia Minor was the most deplorable loss which the church
and empire had sustained. By the propagation of the Moslem faith,
Soliman deserved the name of Gazi, a holy champion; and his new
kingdoms, of the Romans, or of Roum, was added to the tables of Oriental
geography. It is described as extending from the Euphrates to
Constantinople, from the Black Sea to the confines of Syria; pregnant
with mines of silver and iron, of alum and copper, fruitful in corn and
wine, and productive of cattle and excellent horses.  The wealth of
Lydia, the arts of the Greeks, the splendor of the Augustan age, existed
only in books and ruins, which were equally obscure in the eyes of the
Scythian conquerors. Yet, in the present decay, Anatolia still contains
somewealthy and populous cities; and, under the Byzantine empire, they
were far more flourishing in numbers, size, and opulence. By the choice
of the sultan, Nice, the metropolis of Bithynia, was preferred for his
palace and fortress: the seat of the Seljukian dynasty of Roum was
planted one hundred miles from Constantinople; and the divinity of
Christ was denied and derided in the same temple in which it had been
pronounced by the first general synod of the Catholics. The unity of
God, and the mission of Mahomet, were preached in the moschs; the
Arabian learning was taught in the schools; the Cadhis judged according
to the law of the Koran; the Turkish manners and language prevailed in
the cities; and Turkman camps were scattered over the plains and
mountains of Anatolia. On the hard conditions of tribute and servitude,
the Greek Christians might enjoy the exercise of their religion; but
their most holy churches were profaned; their priests and bishops were
insulted;  they were compelled to suffer the triumph of the Pagans, and
the apostasy of their brethren; many thousand children were marked by
the knife of circumcision; and many thousand captives were devoted to
the service or the pleasures of their masters.  After the loss of Asia,
Antioch still maintained her primitive allegiance to Christ and Cæsar;
but the solitary province was separated from all Roman aid, and
surrounded on all sides by the Mahometan powers. The despair of
Philaretus the governor prepared the sacrifice of his religion and
loyalty, had not his guilt been prevented by his son, who hastened to
the Nicene palace, and offered to deliver this valuable prize into the
hands of Soliman. The ambitious sultan mounted on horseback, and in
twelve nights (for he reposed in the day) performed a march of six
hundred miles. Antioch was oppressed by the speed and secrecy of his
enterprise; and the dependent cities, as far as Laodicea and the
confines of Aleppo,  obeyed the example of the metropolis. From Laodicea
to the Thracian Bosphorus, or arm of St. George, the conquests and reign
of Soliman extended thirty days' journey in length, and in breadth about
ten or fifteen, between the rocks of Lycia and the Black Sea.  The
Turkish ignorance of navigation protected, for a while, the inglorious
safety of the emperor; but no sooner had a fleet of two hundred ships
been constructed by the hands of the captive Greeks, than Alexius
trembled behind the walls of his capital. His plaintive epistles were
dispersed over Europe, to excite the compassion of the Latins, and to
paint the danger, the weakness, and the riches of the city of
Constantine.

But the most interesting conquest of the Seljukian Turks was that of
Jerusalem,  which soon became the theatre of nations. In their
capitulation with Omar, the inhabitants had stipulated the assurance of
their religion and property; but the articles were interpreted by a
master against whom it was dangerous to dispute; and in the four hundred
years of the reign of the caliphs, the political climate of Jerusalem
was exposed to the vicissitudes of storm and sunshine.  By the increase
of proselytes and population, the Mahometans might excuse the usurpation
of three fourths of the city: but a peculiar quarter was resolved for
the patriarch with his clergy and people; a tribute of two pieces of
gold was the price of protection; and the sepulchre of Christ, with the
church of the Resurrection, was still left in the hands of his votaries.
Of these votaries, the most numerous and respectable portion were
strangers to Jerusalem: the pilgrimages to the Holy Land had been
stimulated, rather than suppressed, by the conquest of the Arabs; and
the enthusiasm which had always prompted these perilous journeys, was
nourished by the congenial passions of grief and indignation. A crowd of
pilgrims from the East and West continued to visit the holy sepulchre,
and the adjacent sanctuaries, more especially at the festival of Easter;
and the Greeks and Latins, the Nestorians and Jacobites, the Copts and
Abyssinians, the Armenians and Georgians, maintained the chapels, the
clergy, and the poor of their respective communions. The harmony of
prayer in so many various tongues, the worship of so many nations in the
common temple of their religion, might have afforded a spectacle of
edification and peace; but the zeal of the Christian sects was
imbittered by hatred and revenge; and in the kingdom of a suffering
Messiah, who had pardoned his enemies, they aspired to command and
persecute their spiritual brethren. The preëminence was asserted by the
spirit and numbers of the Franks; and the greatness of Charlemagne
protected both the Latin pilgrims and the Catholics of the East. The
poverty of Carthage, Alexandria, and Jerusalem, was relieved by the alms
of that pious emperor; and many monasteries of Palestine were founded or
restored by his liberal devotion. Harun Alrashid, the greatest of the
Abbassides, esteemed in his Christian brother a similar supremacy of
genius and power: their friendship was cemented by a frequent
intercourse of gifts and embassies; and the caliph, without resigning
the substantial dominion, presented the emperor with the keys of the
holy sepulchre, and perhaps of the city of Jerusalem. In the decline of
the Carlovingian monarchy, the republic of Amalphi promoted the interest
of trade and religion in the East. Her vessels transported the Latin
pilgrims to the coasts of Egypt and Palestine, and deserved, by their
useful imports, the favor and alliance of the Fatimite caliphs:  an
annual fair was instituted on Mount Calvary: and the Italian merchants
founded the convent and hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, the cradle of
the monastic and military order, which has since reigned in the isles of
Rhodes and of Malta. Had the Christian pilgrims been content to revere
the tomb of a prophet, the disciples of Mahomet, instead of blaming,
would have imitated, their piety: but these rigid Unitarianswere
scandalized by a worship which represents the birth, death, and
resurrection, of a God; the Catholic images were branded with the name
of idols; and the Moslems smiled with indignation  at the miraculous
flame which was kindled on the eve of Easter in the holy sepulchre.
This pious fraud, first devised in the ninth century,  was devoutly
cherished by the Latin crusaders, and is annually repeated by the clergy
of the Greek, Armenian, and Coptic sects,  who impose on the credulous
spectators  for their own benefit, and that of their tyrants. In every
age, a principle of toleration has been fortified by a sense of
interest: and the revenue of the prince and his emir was increased each
year, by the expense and tribute of so many thousand strangers.

The revolution which transferred the sceptre from the Abbassides to the
Fatimites was a benefit, rather than an injury, to the Holy Land. A
sovereign resident in Egypt was more sensible of the importance of
Christian trade; and the emirs of Palestine were less remote from the
justice and power of the throne. But the third of these Fatimite caliphs
was the famous Hakem,  a frantic youth, who was delivered by his impiety
and despotism from the fear either of God or man; and whose reign was a
wild mixture of vice and folly. Regardless of the most ancient customs
of Egypt, he imposed on the women an absolute confinement; the restraint
excited the clamors of both sexes; their clamors provoked his fury; a
part of Old Cairo was delivered to the flames and the guards and
citizens were engaged many days in a bloody conflict. At first the
caliph declared himself a zealous Mussulman, the founder or benefactor
of moschs and colleges: twelve hundred and ninety copies of the Koran
were transcribed at his expense in letters of gold; and his edict
extirpated the vineyards of the Upper Egypt. But his vanity was soon
flattered by the hope of introducing a new religion; he aspired above
the fame of a prophet, and styled himself the visible image of the Most
High God, who, after nine apparitions on earth, was at length manifest
in his royal person. At the name of Hakem, the lord of the living and
the dead, every knee was bent in religious adoration: his mysteries were
performed on a mountain near Cairo: sixteen thousand converts had signed
his profession of faith; and at the present hour, a free and warlike
people, the Druses of Mount Libanus, are persuaded of the life and
divinity of a madman and tyrant.  In his divine character, Hakem hated
the Jews and Christians, as the servants of his rivals; while some
remains of prejudice or prudence still pleaded in favor of the law of
Mahomet. Both in Egypt and Palestine, his cruel and wanton persecution
made some martyrs and many apostles: the common rights and special
privileges of the sectaries were equally disregarded; and a general
interdict was laid on the devotion of strangers and natives. The temple
of the Christian world, the church of the Resurrection, was demolished
to its foundations; the luminous prodigy of Easter was interrupted, and
much profane labor was exhausted to destroy the cave in the rock which
properly constitutes the holy sepulchre. At the report of this
sacrilege, the nations of Europe were astonished and afflicted: but
instead of arming in the defence of the Holy Land, they contented
themselves with burning, or banishing, the Jews, as the secret advisers
of the impious Barbarian.  Yet the calamities of Jerusalem were in some
measure alleviated by the inconstancy or repentance of Hakem himself;
and the royal mandate was sealed for the restitution of the churches,
when the tyrant was assassinated by the emissaries of his sister. The
succeeding caliphs resumed the maxims of religion and policy: a free
toleration was again granted; with the pious aid of the emperor of
Constantinople, the holy sepulchre arose from its ruins; and, after a
short abstinence, the pilgrims returned with an increase of appetite to
the spiritual feast.  In the sea-voyage of Palestine, the dangers were
frequent, and the opportunities rare: but the conversion of Hungary
opened a safe communication between Germany and Greece. The charity of
St. Stephen, the apostle of his kingdom, relieved and conducted his
itinerant brethren;  and from Belgrade to Antioch, they traversed
fifteen hundred miles of a Christian empire. Among the Franks, the zeal
of pilgrimage prevailed beyond the example of former times: and the
roads were covered with multitudes of either sex, and of every rank, who
professed their contempt of life, so soon as they should have kissed the
tomb of their Redeemer. Princes and prelates abandoned the care of their
dominions; and the numbers of these pious caravans were a prelude to the
armies which marched in the ensuing age under the banner of the cross.
About thirty years before the first crusade, the arch bishop of Mentz,
with the bishops of Utrecht, Bamberg, and Ratisbon, undertook this
laborious journey from the Rhine to the Jordan; and the multitude of
their followers amounted to seven thousand persons. At Constantinople,
they were hospitably entertained by the emperor; but the ostentation of
their wealth provoked the assault of the wild Arabs: they drew their
swords with scrupulous reluctance, and sustained siege in the village of
Capernaum, till they were rescued by the venal protection of the
Fatimite emir. After visiting the holy places, they embarked for Italy,
but only a remnant of two thousand arrived in safety in their native
land. Ingulphus, a secretary of William the Conqueror, was a companion
of this pilgrimage: he observes that they sailed from Normandy, thirty
stout and well-appointed horsemen; but that they repassed the Alps,
twenty miserable palmers, with the staff in their hand, and the wallet
at their back.

After the defeat of the Romans, the tranquillity of the Fatimite caliphs
was invaded by the Turks.  One of the lieutenants of Malek Shah, Atsiz
the Carizmian, marched into Syria at the head of a powerful army, and
reduced Damascus by famine and the sword. Hems, and the other cities of
the province, acknowledged the caliph of Bagdad and the sultan of
Persia; and the victorious emir advanced without resistance to the banks
of the Nile: the Fatimite was preparing to fly into the heart of Africa;
but the negroes of his guard and the inhabitants of Cairo made a
desperate sally, and repulsed the Turk from the confines of Egypt. In
his retreat he indulged the license of slaughter and rapine: the judge
and notaries of Jerusalem were invited to his camp; and their execution
was followed by the massacre of three thousand citizens. The cruelty or
the defeat of Atsiz was soon punished by the sultan Toucush, the brother
of Malek Shah, who, with a higher title and more formidable powers,
asserted the dominion of Syria and Palestine. The house of Seljuk
reigned about twenty years in Jerusalem;  but the hereditary command of
the holy city and territory was intrusted or abandoned to the emir
Ortok, the chief of a tribe of Turkmans, whose children, after their
expulsion from Palestine, formed two dynasties on the borders of Armenia
and Assyria.  The Oriental Christians and the Latin pilgrims deplored a
revolution, which, instead of the regular government and old alliance of
the caliphs, imposed on their necks the iron yoke of the strangers of
the North.  In his court and camp the great sultan had adopted in some
degree the arts and manners of Persia; but the body of the Turkish
nation, and more especially the pastoral tribes, still breathed the
fierceness of the desert. From Nice to Jerusalem, the western countries
of Asia were a scene of foreign and domestic hostility; and the
shepherds of Palestine, who held a precarious sway on a doubtful
frontier, had neither leisure nor capacity to await the slow profits of
commercial and religious freedom. The pilgrims, who, through innumerable
perils, had reached the gates of Jerusalem, were the victims of private
rapine or public oppression, and often sunk under the pressure of famine
and disease, before they were permitted to salute the holy sepulchre. A
spirit of native barbarism, or recent zeal, prompted the Turkmans to
insult the clergy of every sect: the patriarch was dragged by the hair
along the pavement, and cast into a dungeon, to extort a ransom from the
sympathy of his flock; and the divine worship in the church of the
Resurrection was often disturbed by the savage rudeness of its masters.
The pathetic tale excited the millions of the West to march under the
standard of the cross to the relief of the Holy Land; and yet how
trifling is the sum of these accumulated evils, if compared with the
single act of the sacrilege of Hakem, which had been so patiently
endured by the Latin Christians! A slighter provocation inflamed the
more irascible temper of their descendants: a new spirit had arisen of
religious chivalry and papal dominion; a nerve was touched of exquisite
feeling; and the sensation vibrated to the heart of Europe.

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade.

Part I.

Origin And Numbers Of The First Crusade. -- Characters Of The Latin
Princes. -- Their March To Constantinople. -- Policy Of The Greek
Emperor Alexius. -- Conquest Of Nice, Antioch, And Jerusalem, By The
Franks. -- Deliverance Of The Holy Sepulchre. -- Godfrey Of Bouillon,
First King Of Jerusalem. -- Institutions Of The French Or Latin Kingdom.

About twenty years after the conquest of Jerusalem by the Turks, the
holy sepulchre was visited by a hermit of the name of Peter, a native of
Amiens, in the province of Picardy  in France. His resentment and
sympathy were excited by his own injuries and the oppression of the
Christian name; he mingled his tears with those of the patriarch, and
earnestly inquired, if no hopes of relief could be entertained from the
Greek emperors of the East. The patriarch exposed the vices and weakness
of the successors of Constantine. "I will rouse," exclaimed the hermit,
"the martial nations of Europe in your cause;" and Europe was obedient
to the call of the hermit. The astonished patriarch dismissed him with
epistles of credit and complaint; and no sooner did he land at Bari,
than Peter hastened to kiss the feet of the Roman pontiff. His stature
was small, his appearance contemptible; but his eye was keen and lively;
and he possessed that vehemence of speech, which seldom fails to impart
the persuasion of the soul.  He was born of a gentleman's family, (for
we must now adopt a modern idiom,) and his military service was under
the neighboring counts of Boulogne, the heroes of the first crusade. But
he soon relinquished the sword and the world; and if it be true, that
his wife, however noble, was aged and ugly, he might withdraw, with the
less reluctance, from her bed to a convent, and at length to a
hermitage. * In this austere solitude, his body was emaciated, his fancy
was inflamed; whatever he wished, he believed; whatever he believed, he
saw in dreams and revelations. From Jerusalem the pilgrim returned an
accomplished fanatic; but as he excelled in the popular madness of the
times, Pope Urban the Second received him as a prophet, applauded his
glorious design, promised to support it in a general council, and
encouraged him to proclaim the deliverance of the Holy Land. Invigorated
by the approbation of the pontiff, his zealous missionary traversed.
with speed and success, the provinces of Italy and France. His diet was
abstemious, his prayers long and fervent, and the alms which he received
with one hand, he distributed with the other: his head was bare, his
feet naked, his meagre body was wrapped in a coarse garment; he bore and
displayed a weighty crucifix; and the ass on which he rode was
sanctified, in the public eye, by the service of the man of God. He
preached to innumerable crowds in the churches, the streets, and the
highways: the hermit entered with equal confidence the palace and the
cottage; and the people (for all was people) was impetuously moved by
his call to repentance and arms. When he painted the sufferings of the
natives and pilgrims of Palestine, every heart was melted to compassion;
every breast glowed with indignation, when he challenged the warriors of
the age to defend their brethren, and rescue their Savior: his ignorance
of art and language was compensated by sighs, and tears, and
ejaculations; and Peter supplied the deficiency of reason by loud and
frequent appeals to Christ and his mother, to the saints and angels of
paradise, with whom he had personally conversed.  The most perfect
orator of Athens might have envied the success of his eloquence; the
rustic enthusiast inspired the passions which he felt, and Christendom
expected with impatience the counsels and decrees of the supreme
pontiff.

The magnanimous spirit of Gregory the Seventh had already embraced the
design of arming Europe against Asia; the ardor of his zeal and ambition
still breathes in his epistles: from either side of the Alps, fifty
thousand Catholics had enlisted under the banner of St. Peter;  and his
successor reveals his intention of marching at their head against the
impious sectaries of Mahomet. But the glory or reproach of executing,
though not in person, this holy enterprise, was reserved for Urban the
Second,  the most faithful of his disciples. He undertook the conquest
of the East, whilst the larger portion of Rome was possessed and
fortified by his rival Guibert of Ravenna, who contended with Urban for
the name and honors of the pontificate. He attempted to unite the powers
of the West, at a time when the princes were separated from the church,
and the people from their princes, by the excommunication which himself
and his predecessors had thundered against the emperor and the king of
France. Philip the First, of France, supported with patience the
censures which he had provoked by his scandalous life and adulterous
marriage. Henry the Fourth, of Germany, asserted the right of
investitures, the prerogative of confirming his bishops by the delivery
of the ring and crosier. But the emperor's party was crushed in Italy by
the arms of the Normans and the Countess Mathilda; and the long quarrel
had been recently envenomed by the revolt of his son Conrad and the
shame of his wife,  who, in the synods of Constance and Placentia,
confessed the manifold prostitutions to which she had been exposed by a
husband regardless of her honor and his own.  So popular was the cause
of Urban, so weighty was his influence, that the council which he
summoned at Placentia  was composed of two hundred bishops of Italy,
France, Burgandy, Swabia, and Bavaria. Four thousand of the clergy, and
thirty thousand of the laity, attended this important meeting; and, as
the most spacious cathedral would have been inadequate to the multitude,
the session of seven days was held in a plain adjacent to the city. The
ambassadors of the Greek emperor, Alexius Comnenus, were introduced to
plead the distress of their sovereign, and the danger of Constantinople,
which was divided only by a narrow sea from the victorious Turks, the
common enemies of the Christian name. In their suppliant address they
flattered the pride of the Latin princes; and, appealing at once to
their policy and religion, exhorted them to repel the Barbarians on the
confines of Asia, rather than to expect them in the heart of Europe. At
the sad tale of the misery and perils of their Eastern brethren, the
assembly burst into tears; the most eager champions declared their
readiness to march; and the Greek ambassadors were dismissed with the
assurance of a speedy and powerful succor. The relief of Constantinople
was included in the larger and most distant project of the deliverance
of Jerusalem; but the prudent Urban adjourned the final decision to a
second synod, which he proposed to celebrate in some city of France in
the autumn of the same year. The short delay would propagate the flame
of enthusiasm; and his firmest hope was in a nation of soldiers  still
proud of the preëminence of their name, and ambitious to emulate their
hero Charlemagne,  who, in the popular romance of Turpin,  had achieved
the conquest of the Holy Land. A latent motive of affection or vanity
might influence the choice of Urban: he was himself a native of France,
a monk of Clugny, and the first of his countrymen who ascended the
throne of St. Peter. The pope had illustrated his family and province;
nor is there perhaps a more exquisite gratification than to revisit, in
a conspicuous dignity, the humble and laborious scenes of our youth.

It may occasion some surprise that the Roman pontiff should erect, in
the heart of France, the tribunal from whence he hurled his anathemas
against the king; but our surprise will vanish so soon as we form a just
estimate of a king of France of the eleventh century.  Philip the First
was the great-grandson of Hugh Capet, the founder of the present race,
who, in the decline of Charlemagne's posterity, added the regal title to
his patrimonial estates of Paris and Orleans. In this narrow compass, he
was possessed of wealth and jurisdiction; but in the rest of France,
Hugh and his first descendants were no more than the feudal lords of
about sixty dukes and counts, of independent and hereditary power,  who
disdained the control of laws and legal assemblies, and whose disregard
of their sovereign was revenged by the disobedience of their inferior
vassals. At Clermont, in the territories of the count of Auvergne,  the
pope might brave with impunity the resentment of Philip; and the council
which he convened in that city was not less numerous or respectable than
the synod of Placentia.  Besides his court and council of Roman
cardinals, he was supported by thirteen archbishops and two hundred and
twenty-five bishops: the number of mitred prelates was computed at four
hundred; and the fathers of the church were blessed by the saints and
enlightened by the doctors of the age. From the adjacent kingdoms, a
martial train of lords and knights of power and renown attended the
council,  in high expectation of its resolves; and such was the ardor of
zeal and curiosity, that the city was filled, and many thousands, in the
month of November, erected their tents or huts in the open field. A
session of eight days produced some useful or edifying canons for the
reformation of manners; a severe censure was pronounced against the
license of private war; the Truce of God  was confirmed, a suspension of
hostilities during four days of the week; women and priests were placed
under the safeguard of the church; and a protection of three years was
extended to husbandmen and merchants, the defenceless victims of
military rapine. But a law, however venerable be the sanction, cannot
suddenly transform the temper of the times; and the benevolent efforts
of Urban deserve the less praise, since he labored to appease some
domestic quarrels that he might spread the flames of war from the
Atlantic to the Euphrates. From the synod of Placentia, the rumor of his
great design had gone forth among the nations: the clergy on their
return had preached in every diocese the merit and glory of the
deliverance of the Holy Land; and when the pope ascended a lofty
scaffold in the market-place of Clermont, his eloquence was addressed to
a well-prepared and impatient audience. His topics were obvious, his
exhortation was vehement, his success inevitable. The orator was
interrupted by the shout of thousands, who with one voice, and in their
rustic idiom, exclaimed aloud, "God wills it, God wills it."  "It is
indeed the will of God," replied the pope; "and let this memorable word,
the inspiration surely of the Holy Spirit, be forever adopted as your
cry of battle, to animate the devotion and courage of the champions of
Christ. His cross is the symbol of your salvation; wear it, a red, a
bloody cross, as an external mark, on your breasts or shoulders, as a
pledge of your sacred and irrevocable engagement." The proposal was
joyfully accepted; great numbers, both of the clergy and laity,
impressed on their garments the sign of the cross,  and solicited the
pope to march at their head. This dangerous honor was declined by the
more prudent successor of Gregory, who alleged the schism of the church,
and the duties of his pastoral office, recommending to the faithful, who
were disqualified by sex or profession, by age or infirmity, to aid,
with their prayers and alms, the personal service of their robust
brethren. The name and powers of his legate he devolved on Adhemar
bishop of Puy, the first who had received the cross at his hands. The
foremost of the temporal chiefs was Raymond count of Thoulouse, whose
ambassadors in the council excused the absence, and pledged the honor,
of their master. After the confession and absolution of their sins, the
champions of the cross were dismissed with a superfluous admonition to
invite their countrymen and friends; and their departure for the Holy
Land was fixed to the festival of the Assumption, the fifteenth of
August, of the ensuing year.

So familiar, and as it were so natural to man, is the practice of
violence, that our indulgence allows the slightest provocation, the most
disputable right, as a sufficient ground of national hostility. But the
name and nature of a holy wardemands a more rigorous scrutiny; nor can
we hastily believe, that the servants of the Prince of Peace would
unsheathe the sword of destruction, unless the motive were pure, the
quarrel legitimate, and the necessity inevitable. The policy of an
action may be determined from the tardy lessons of experience; but,
before we act, our conscience should be satisfied of the justice and
propriety of our enterprise. In the age of the crusades, the Christians,
both of the East and West, were persuaded of their lawfulness and merit;
their arguments are clouded by the perpetual abuse of Scripture and
rhetoric; but they seem to insist on the right of natural and religious
defence, their peculiar title to the Holy Land, and the impiety of their
Pagan and Mahometan foes.  I. The right of a just defence may fairly
include our civil and spiritual allies: it depends on the existence of
danger; and that danger must be estimated by the twofold consideration
of the malice, and the power, of our enemies. A pernicious tenet has
been imputed to the Mahometans, the duty of extirpatingall other
religions by the sword. This charge of ignorance and bigotry is refuted
by the Koran, by the history of the Mussulman conquerors, and by their
public and legal toleration of the Christian worship. But it cannot be
denied, that the Oriental churches are depressed under their iron yoke;
that, in peace and war, they assert a divine and indefeasible claim of
universal empire; and that, in their orthodox creed, the unbelieving
nations are continually threatened with the loss of religion or liberty.
In the eleventh century, the victorious arms of the Turks presented a
real and urgent apprehension of these losses. They had subdued, in less
than thirty years, the kingdoms of Asia, as far as Jerusalem and the
Hellespont; and the Greek empire tottered on the verge of destruction.
Besides an honest sympathy for their brethren, the Latins had a right
and interest in the support of Constantinople, the most important
barrier of the West; and the privilege of defence must reach to prevent,
as well as to repel, an impending assault. But this salutary purpose
might have been accomplished by a moderate succor; and our calmer reason
must disclaim the innumerable hosts, and remote operations, which
overwhelmed Asia and depopulated Europe. * II. Palestine could add
nothing to the strength or safety of the Latins; and fanaticism alone
could pretend to justify the conquest of that distant and narrow
province. The Christians affirmed that their inalienable title to the
promised land had been sealed by the blood of their divine Savior; it
was their right and duty to rescue their inheritance from the unjust
possessors, who profaned his sepulchre, and oppressed the pilgrimage of
his disciples. Vainly would it be alleged that the preëminence of
Jerusalem, and the sanctity of Palestine, have been abolished with the
Mosaic law; that the God of the Christians is not a local deity, and
that the recovery of Bethlem or Calvary, his cradle or his tomb, will
not atone for the violation of the moral precepts of the gospel. Such
arguments glance aside from the leaden shield of superstition; and the
religious mind will not easily relinquish its hold on the sacred ground
of mystery and miracle. III. But the holy wars which have been waged in
every climate of the globe, from Egypt to Livonia, and from Peru to
Hindostan, require the support of some more general and flexible tenet.
It has been often supposed, and sometimes affirmed, that a difference of
religion is a worthy cause of hostility; that obstinate unbelievers may
be slain or subdued by the champions of the cross; and that grace is the
sole fountain of dominion as well as of mercy. * Above four hundred
years before the first crusade, the eastern and western provinces of the
Roman empire had been acquired about the same time, and in the same
manner, by the Barbarians of Germany and Arabia. Time and treaties had
legitimated the conquest of the ChristianFranks; but in the eyes of
their subjects and neighbors, the Mahometan princes were still tyrants
and usurpers, who, by the arms of war or rebellion, might be lawfully
driven from their unlawful possession.

As the manners of the Christians were relaxed, their discipline of
penance  was enforced; and with the multiplication of sins, the remedies
were multiplied. In the primitive church, a voluntary and open
confession prepared the work of atonement. In the middle ages, the
bishops and priests interrogated the criminal; compelled him to account
for his thoughts, words, and actions; and prescribed the terms of his
reconciliation with God. But as this discretionary power might
alternately be abused by indulgence and tyranny, a rule of discipline
was framed, to inform and regulate the spiritual judges. This mode of
legislation was invented by the Greeks; their penitentialswere
translated, or imitated, in the Latin church; and, in the time of
Charlemagne, the clergy of every diocese were provided with a code,
which they prudently concealed from the knowledge of the vulgar. In this
dangerous estimate of crimes and punishments, each case was supposed,
each difference was remarked, by the experience or penetration of the
monks; some sins are enumerated which innocence could not have
suspected, and others which reason cannot believe; and the more ordinary
offences of fornication and adultery, of perjury and sacrilege, of
rapine and murder, were expiated by a penance, which, according to the
various circumstances, was prolonged from forty days to seven years.
During this term of mortification, the patient was healed, the criminal
was absolved, by a salutary regimen of fasts and prayers: the disorder
of his dress was expressive of grief and remorse; and he humbly
abstained from all the business and pleasure of social life. But the
rigid execution of these laws would have depopulated the palace, the
camp, and the city; the Barbarians of the West believed and trembled;
but nature often rebelled against principle; and the magistrate labored
without effect to enforce the jurisdiction of the priest. A literal
accomplishment of penance was indeed impracticable: the guilt of
adultery was multiplied by daily repetition; that of homicide might
involve the massacre of a whole people; each act was separately
numbered; and, in those times of anarchy and vice, a modest sinner might
easily incur a debt of three hundred years. His insolvency was relieved
by a commutation, or indulgence: a year of penance was appreciated at
twenty-six solidiof silver, about four pounds sterling, for the rich; at
three solidi, or nine shillings, for the indigent: and these alms were
soon appropriated to the use of the church, which derived, from the
redemption of sins, an inexhaustible source of opulence and dominion. A
debt of three hundred years, or twelve hundred pounds, was enough to
impoverish a plentiful fortune; the scarcity of gold and silver was
supplied by the alienation of land; and the princely donations of Pepin
and Charlemagne are expressly given for the remedyof their soul. It is a
maxim of the civil law, that whosoever cannot pay with his purse, must
pay with his body; and the practice of flagellation was adopted by the
monks, a cheap, though painful equivalent. By a fantastic arithmetic, a
year of penance was taxed at three thousand lashes;  and such was the
skill and patience of a famous hermit, St. Dominic of the iron Cuirass,
that in six days he could discharge an entire century, by a whipping of
three hundred thousand stripes. His example was followed by many
penitents of both sexes; and, as a vicarious sacrifice was accepted, a
sturdy disciplinarian might expiate on his own back the sins of his
benefactors.  These compensations of the purse and the person
introduced, in the eleventh century, a more honorable mode of
satisfaction. The merit of military service against the Saracens of
Africa and Spain had been allowed by the predecessors of Urban the
Second. In the council of Clermont, that pope proclaimed a plenary
indulgenceto those who should enlist under the banner of the cross; the
absolution of all their sins, and a full receipt for allthat might be
due of canonical penance.  The cold philosophy of modern times is
incapable of feeling the impression that was made on a sinful and
fanatic world. At the voice of their pastor, the robber, the incendiary,
the homicide, arose by thousands to redeem their souls, by repeating on
the infidels the same deeds which they had exercised against their
Christian brethren; and the terms of atonement were eagerly embraced by
offenders of every rank and denomination. None were pure; none were
exempt from the guilt and penalty of sin; and those who were the least
amenable to the justice of God and the church were the best entitled to
the temporal and eternal recompense of their pious courage. If they
fell, the spirit of the Latin clergy did not hesitate to adorn their
tomb with the crown of martyrdom;  and should they survive, they could
expect without impatience the delay and increase of their heavenly
reward. They offered their blood to the Son of God, who had laid down
his life for their salvation: they took up the cross, and entered with
confidence into the way of the Lord. His providence would watch over
their safety; perhaps his visible and miraculous power would smooth the
difficulties of their holy enterprise. The cloud and pillar of Jehovah
had marched before the Israelites into the promised land. Might not the
Christians more reasonably hope that the rivers would open for their
passage; that the walls of their strongest cities would fall at the
sound of their trumpets; and that the sun would be arrested in his mid
career, to allow them time for the destruction of the infidels?

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade. -- Part II.

Of the chiefs and soldiers who marched to the holy sepulchre, I will
dare to affirm, that allwere prompted by the spirit of enthusiasm; the
belief of merit, the hope of reward, and the assurance of divine aid.
But I am equally persuaded, that in many it was not the sole, that in
someit was not the leading, principle of action. The use and abuse of
religion are feeble to stem, they are strong and irresistible to impel,
the stream of national manners. Against the private wars of the
Barbarians, their bloody tournaments, licentious love, and judicial
duels, the popes and synods might ineffectually thunder. It is a more
easy task to provoke the metaphysical disputes of the Greeks, to drive
into the cloister the victims of anarchy or despotism, to sanctify the
patience of slaves and cowards, or to assume the merit of the humanity
and benevolence of modern Christians. War and exercise were the reigning
passions of the Franks or Latins; they were enjoined, as a penance, to
gratify those passions, to visit distant lands, and to draw their swords
against the nation of the East. Their victory, or even their attempt,
would immortalize the names of the intrepid heroes of the cross; and the
purest piety could not be insensible to the most splendid prospect of
military glory. In the petty quarrels of Europe, they shed the blood of
their friends and countrymen, for the acquisition perhaps of a castle or
a village. They could march with alacrity against the distant and
hostile nations who were devoted to their arms; their fancy already
grasped the golden sceptres of Asia; and the conquest of Apulia and
Sicily by the Normans might exalt to royalty the hopes of the most
private adventurer. Christendom, in her rudest state, must have yielded
to the climate and cultivation of the Mahometan countries; and their
natural and artificial wealth had been magnified by the tales of
pilgrims, and the gifts of an imperfect commerce. The vulgar, both the
great and small, were taught to believe every wonder, of lands flowing
with milk and honey, of mines and treasures, of gold and diamonds, of
palaces of marble and jasper, and of odoriferous groves of cinnamon and
frankincense. In this earthly paradise, each warrior depended on his
sword to carve a plenteous and honorable establishment, which he
measured only by the extent of his wishes.  Their vassals and soldiers
trusted their fortunes to God and their master: the spoils of a Turkish
emir might enrich the meanest follower of the camp; and the flavor of
the wines, the beauty of the Grecian women,  were temptations more
adapted to the nature, than to the profession, of the champions of the
cross. The love of freedom was a powerful incitement to the multitudes
who were oppressed by feudal or ecclesiastical tyranny. Under this holy
sign, the peasants and burghers, who were attached to the servitude of
the glebe, might escape from a haughty lord, and transplant themselves
and their families to a land of liberty. The monk might release himself
from the discipline of his convent: the debtor might suspend the
accumulation of usury, and the pursuit of his creditors; and outlaws and
malefactors of every cast might continue to brave the laws and elude the
punishment of their crimes.

These motives were potent and numerous: when we have singly computed
their weight on the mind of each individual, we must add the infinite
series, the multiplying powers, of example and fashion. The first
proselytes became the warmest and most effectual missionaries of the
cross: among their friends and countrymen they preached the duty, the
merit, and the recompense, of their holy vow; and the most reluctant
hearers were insensibly drawn within the whirlpool of persuasion and
authority. The martial youths were fired by the reproach or suspicion of
cowardice; the opportunity of visiting with an army the sepulchre of
Christ was embraced by the old and infirm, by women and children, who
consulted rather their zeal than their strength; and those who in the
evening had derided the folly of their companions, were the most eager,
the ensuing day, to tread in their footsteps. The ignorance, which
magnified the hopes, diminished the perils, of the enterprise. Since the
Turkish conquest, the paths of pilgrimage were obliterated; the chiefs
themselves had an imperfect notion of the length of the way and the
state of their enemies; and such was the stupidity of the people, that,
at the sight of the first city or castle beyond the limits of their
knowledge, they were ready to ask whether that was not the Jerusalem,
the term and object of their labors. Yet the more prudent of the
crusaders, who were not sure that they should be fed from heaven with a
shower of quails or manna, provided themselves with those precious
metals, which, in every country, are the representatives of every
commodity. To defray, according to their rank, the expenses of the road,
princes alienated their provinces, nobles their lands and castles,
peasants their cattle and the instruments of husbandry. The value of
property was depreciated by the eager competition of multitudes; while
the price of arms and horses was raised to an exorbitant height by the
wants and impatience of the buyers.  Those who remained at home, with
sense and money, were enriched by the epidemical disease: the sovereigns
acquired at a cheap rate the domains of their vassals; and the
ecclesiastical purchasers completed the payment by the assurance of
their prayers. The cross, which was commonly sewed on the garment, in
cloth or silk, was inscribed by some zealots on their skin: a hot iron,
or indelible liquor, was applied to perpetuate the mark; and a crafty
monk, who showed the miraculous impression on his breast was repaid with
the popular veneration and the richest benefices of Palestine.

The fifteenth of August had been fixed in the council of Clermont for
the departure of the pilgrims; but the day was anticipated by the
thoughtless and needy crowd of plebeians, and I shall briefly despatch
the calamities which they inflicted and suffered, before I enter on the
more serious and successful enterprise of the chiefs. Early in the
spring, from the confines of France and Lorraine, above sixty thousand
of the populace of both sexes flocked round the first missionary of the
crusade, and pressed him with clamorous importunity to lead them to the
holy sepulchre. The hermit, assuming the character, without the talents
or authority, of a general, impelled or obeyed the forward impulse of
his votaries along the banks of the Rhine and Danube. Their wants and
numbers soon compelled them to separate, and his lieutenant, Walter the
Penniless, a valiant though needy soldier, conducted a van guard of
pilgrims, whose condition may be determined from the proportion of eight
horsemen to fifteen thousand foot. The example and footsteps of Peter
were closely pursued by another fanatic, the monk Godescal, whose
sermons had swept away fifteen or twenty thousand peasants from the
villages of Germany. Their rear was again pressed by a herd of two
hundred thousand, the most stupid and savage refuse of the people, who
mingled with their devotion a brutal license of rapine, prostitution,
and drunkenness. Some counts and gentlemen, at the head of three
thousand horse, attended the motions of the multitude to partake in the
spoil; but their genuine leaders (may we credit such folly?) were a
goose and a goat, who were carried in the front, and to whom these
worthy Christians ascribed an infusion of the divine spirit.  Of these,
and of other bands of enthusiasts, the first and most easy warfare was
against the Jews, the murderers of the Son of God. In the trading cities
of the Moselle and the Rhine, their colonies were numerous and rich; and
they enjoyed, under the protection of the emperor and the bishops, the
free exercise of their religion.  At Verdun, Treves, Mentz, Spires,
Worms, many thousands of that unhappy people were pillaged and
massacred:  nor had they felt a more bloody stroke since the persecution
of Hadrian. A remnant was saved by the firmness of their bishops, who
accepted a feigned and transient conversion; but the more obstinate Jews
opposed their fanaticism to the fanaticism of the Christians,
barricadoed their houses, and precipitating themselves, their families,
and their wealth, into the rivers or the flames, disappointed the
malice, or at least the avarice, of their implacable foes.

Between the frontiers of Austria and the seat of the Byzan tine
monarchy, the crusaders were compelled to traverse as interval of six
hundred miles; the wild and desolate countries of Hungary  and Bulgaria.
The soil is fruitful, and intersected with rivers; but it was then
covered with morasses and forests, which spread to a boundless extent,
whenever man has ceased to exercise his dominion over the earth. Both
nations had imbibed the rudiments of Christianity; the Hungarians were
ruled by their native princes; the Bulgarians by a lieutenant of the
Greek emperor; but, on the slightest provocation, their ferocious nature
was rekindled, and ample provocation was afforded by the disorders of
the first pilgrims Agriculture must have been unskilful and languid
among a people, whose cities were built of reeds and timber, which were
deserted in the summer season for the tents of hunters and shepherds. A
scanty supply of provisions was rudely demanded, forcibly seized, and
greedily consumed; and on the first quarrel, the crusaders gave a loose
to indignation and revenge. But their ignorance of the country, of war,
and of discipline, exposed them to every snare. The Greek præfect of
Bulgaria commanded a regular force; * at the trumpet of the Hungarian
king, the eighth or the tenth of his martial subjects bent their bows
and mounted on horseback; their policy was insidious, and their
retaliation on these pious robbers was unrelenting and bloody.  About a
third of the naked fugitives (and the hermit Peter was of the number)
escaped to the Thracian mountains; and the emperor, who respected the
pilgrimage and succor of the Latins, conducted them by secure and easy
journeys to Constantinople, and advised them to await the arrival of
their brethren. For a while they remembered their faults and losses; but
no sooner were they revived by the hospitable entertainment, than their
venom was again inflamed; they stung their benefactor, and neither
gardens, nor palaces, nor churches, were safe from their depredations.
For his own safety, Alexius allured them to pass over to the Asiatic
side of the Bosphorus; but their blind impetuosity soon urged them to
desert the station which he had assigned, and to rush headlong against
the Turks, who occupied the road to Jerusalem. The hermit, conscious of
his shame, had withdrawn from the camp to Constantinople; and his
lieutenant, Walter the Penniless, who was worthy of a better command,
attempted without success to introduce some order and prudence among the
herd of savages. They separated in quest of prey, and themselves fell an
easy prey to the arts of the sultan. By a rumor that their foremost
companions were rioting in the spoils of his capital, Soliman * tempted
the main body to descend into the plain of Nice: they were overwhelmed
by the Turkish arrows; and a pyramid of bones  informed their companions
of the place of their defeat. Of the first crusaders, three hundred
thousand had already perished, before a single city was rescued from the
infidels, before their graver and more noble brethren had completed the
preparations of their enterprise.

"To save time and space, I shall represent, in a short table, the
particular references to the great events of the first crusade."

[See Table 1.: Events Of The First Crusade. ##]

None of the great sovereigns of Europe embarked their persons in the
first crusade. The emperor Henry the Fourth was not disposed to obey the
summons of the pope: Philip the First of France was occupied by his
pleasures; William Rufus of England by a recent conquest; the kings of
Spain were engaged in a domestic war against the Moors; and the northern
monarchs of Scotland, Denmark,  Sweden, and Poland, were yet strangers
to the passions and interests of the South. The religious ardor was more
strongly felt by the princes of the second order, who held an important
place in the feudal system. Their situation will naturally cast under
four distinct heads the review of their names and characters; but I may
escape some needless repetition, by observing at once, that courage and
the exercise of arms are the common attribute of these Christian
adventurers. I. The first rank both in war and council is justly due to
Godfrey of Bouillon; and happy would it have been for the crusaders, if
they had trusted themselves to the sole conduct of that accomplished
hero, a worthy representative of Charlemagne, from whom he was descended
in the female line. His father was of the noble race of the counts of
Boulogne: Brabant, the lower province of Lorraine,  was the inheritance
of his mother; and by the emperor's bounty he was himself invested with
that ducal title, which has been improperly transferred to his lordship
of Bouillon in the Ardennes.  In the service of Henry the Fourth, he
bore the great standard of the empire, and pierced with his lance the
breast of Rodolph, the rebel king: Godfrey was the first who ascended
the walls of Rome; and his sickness, his vow, perhaps his remorse for
bearing arms against the pope, confirmed an early resolution of visiting
the holy sepulchre, not as a pilgrim, but a deliverer. His valor was
matured by prudence and moderation; his piety, though blind, was
sincere; and, in the tumult of a camp, he practised the real and
fictitious virtues of a convent. Superior to the private factions of the
chiefs, he reserved his enmity for the enemies of Christ; and though he
gained a kingdom by the attempt, his pure and disinterested zeal was
acknowledged by his rivals. Godfrey of Bouillon  was accompanied by his
two brothers, by Eustace the elder, who had succeeded to the county of
Boulogne, and by the younger, Baldwin, a character of more ambiguous
virtue. The duke of Lorraine, was alike celebrated on either side of the
Rhine: from his birth and education, he was equally conversant with the
French and Teutonic languages: the barons of France, Germany, and
Lorraine, assembled their vassals; and the confederate force that
marched under his banner was composed of fourscore thousand foot and
about ten thousand horse. II. In the parliament that was held at Paris,
in the king's presence, about two months after the council of Clermont,
Hugh, count of Vermandois, was the most conspicuous of the princes who
assumed the cross. But the appellation of the Greatwas applied, not so
much to his merit or possessions, (though neither were contemptible,) as
to the royal birth of the brother of the king of France.  Robert, duke
of Normandy, was the eldest son of William the Conqueror; but on his
father's death he was deprived of the kingdom of England, by his own
indolence and the activity of his brother Rufus. The worth of Robert was
degraded by an excessive levity and easiness of temper: his cheerfulness
seduced him to the indulgence of pleasure; his profuse liberality
impoverished the prince and people; his indiscriminate clemency
multiplied the number of offenders; and the amiable qualities of a
private man became the essential defects of a sovereign. For the
trifling sum of ten thousand marks, he mortgaged Normandy during his
absence to the English usurper;  but his engagement and behavior in the
holy war announced in Robert a reformation of manners, and restored him
in some degree to the public esteem. Another Robert was count of
Flanders, a royal province, which, in this century, gave three queens to
the thrones of France, England, and Denmark: he was surnamed the Sword
and Lance of the Christians; but in the exploits of a soldier he
sometimes forgot the duties of a general. Stephen, count of Chartres, of
Blois, and of Troyes, was one of the richest princes of the age; and the
number of his castles has been compared to the three hundred and
sixty-five days of the year. His mind was improved by literature; and,
in the council of the chiefs, the eloquent Stephen  was chosen to
discharge the office of their president. These four were the principal
leaders of the French, the Normans, and the pilgrims of the British
isles: but the list of the barons who were possessed of three or four
towns would exceed, says a contemporary, the catalogue of the Trojan
war.  III. In the south of France, the command was assumed by Adhemar
bishop of Puy, the pope legate, and by Raymond count of St. Giles and
Thoulouse who added the prouder titles of duke of Narbonne and marquis
of Provence. The former was a respectable prelate, alike qualified for
this world and the next. The latter was a veteran warrior, who had
fought against the Saracens of Spain, and who consecrated his declining
age, not only to the deliverance, but to the perpetual service, of the
holy sepulchre. His experience and riches gave him a strong ascendant in
the Christian camp, whose distress he was often able, and sometimes
willing, to relieve. But it was easier for him to extort the praise of
the Infidels, than to preserve the love of his subjects and associates.
His eminent qualities were clouded by a temper haughty, envious, and
obstinate; and, though he resigned an ample patrimony for the cause of
God, his piety, in the public opinion, was not exempt from avarice and
ambition.  A mercantile, rather than a martial, spirit prevailed among
his provincials,  a common name, which included the natives of Auvergne
and Languedoc,  the vassals of the kingdom of Burgundy or Arles. From
the adjacent frontier of Spain he drew a band of hardy adventurers; as
he marched through Lombardy, a crowd of Italians flocked to his
standard, and his united force consisted of one hundred thousand horse
and foot. If Raymond was the first to enlist and the last to depart, the
delay may be excused by the greatness of his preparation and the promise
of an everlasting farewell. IV. The name of Bohemond, the son of Robert
Guiscard, was already famous by his double victory over the Greek
emperor; but his father's will had reduced him to the principality of
Tarentum, and the remembrance of his Eastern trophies, till he was
awakened by the rumor and passage of the French pilgrims. It is in the
person of this Norman chief that we may seek for the coolest policy and
ambition, with a small allay of religious fanaticism. His conduct may
justify a belief that he had secretly directed the design of the pope,
which he affected to second with astonishment and zeal: at the siege of
Amalphi, his example and discourse inflamed the passions of a
confederate army; he instantly tore his garment to supply crosses for
the numerous candidates, and prepared to visit Constantinople and Asia
at the head of ten thousand horse and twenty thousand foot. Several
princes of the Norman race accompanied this veteran general; and his
cousin Tancred  was the partner, rather than the servant, of the war. In
the accomplished character of Tancred we discover all the virtues of a
perfect knight,  the true spirit of chivalry, which inspired the
generous sentiments and social offices of man far better than the base
philosophy, or the baser religion, of the times.

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade. -- Part III.

Between the age of Charlemagne and that of the crusades, a revolution
had taken place among the Spaniards, the Normans, and the French, which
was gradually extended to the rest of Europe. The service of the
infantry was degraded to the plebeians; the cavalry formed the strength
of the armies, and the honorable name of miles, or soldier, was confined
to the gentlemen  who served on horseback, and were invested with the
character of knighthood. The dukes and counts, who had usurped the
rights of sovereignty, divided the provinces among their faithful
barons: the barons distributed among their vassals the fiefs or
benefices of their jurisdiction; and these military tenants, the peers
of each other and of their lord, composed the noble or equestrian order,
which disdained to conceive the peasant or burgher as of the same
species with themselves. The dignity of their birth was preserved by
pure and equal alliances; their sons alone, who could produce four
quarters or lines of ancestry without spot or reproach, might legally
pretend to the honor of knighthood; but a valiant plebeian was sometimes
enriched and ennobled by the sword, and became the father of a new race.
A single knight could impart, according to his judgment, the character
which he received; and the warlike sovereigns of Europe derived more
glory from this personal distinction than from the lustre of their
diadem. This ceremony, of which some traces may be found in Tacitus and
the woods of Germany,  was in its origin simple and profane; the
candidate, after some previous trial, was invested with the sword and
spurs; and his cheek or shoulder was touched with a slight blow, as an
emblem of the last affront which it was lawful for him to endure. But
superstition mingled in every public and private action of life: in the
holy wars, it sanctified the profession of arms; and the order of
chivalry was assimilated in its rights and privileges to the sacred
orders of priesthood. The bath and white garment of the novice were an
indecent copy of the regeneration of baptism: his sword, which he
offered on the altar, was blessed by the ministers of religion: his
solemn reception was preceded by fasts and vigils; and he was created a
knight in the name of God, of St. George, and of St. Michael the
archangel. He swore to accomplish the duties of his profession; and
education, example, and the public opinion, were the inviolable
guardians of his oath. As the champion of God and the ladies, (I blush
to unite such discordant names,) he devoted himself to speak the truth;
to maintain the right; to protect the distressed; to practise courtesy,
a virtue less familiar to the ancients; to pursue the infidels; to
despise the allurements of ease and safety; and to vindicate in every
perilous adventure the honor of his character. The abuse of the same
spirit provoked the illiterate knight to disdain the arts of industry
and peace; to esteem himself the sole judge and avenger of his own
injuries; and proudly to neglect the laws of civil society and military
discipline. Yet the benefits of this institution, to refine the temper
of Barbarians, and to infuse some principles of faith, justice, and
humanity, were strongly felt, and have been often observed. The asperity
of national prejudice was softened; and the community of religion and
arms spread a similar color and generous emulation over the face of
Christendom. Abroad in enterprise and pilgrimage, at home in martial
exercise, the warriors of every country were perpetually associated; and
impartial taste must prefer a Gothic tournament to the Olympic games of
classic antiquity.  Instead of the naked spectacles which corrupted the
manners of the Greeks, and banished from the stadium the virgins and
matrons, the pompous decoration of the lists was crowned with the
presence of chaste and high-born beauty, from whose hands the conqueror
received the prize of his dexterity and courage. The skill and strength
that were exerted in wrestling and boxing bear a distant and doubtful
relation to the merit of a soldier; but the tournaments, as they were
invented in France, and eagerly adopted both in the East and West,
presented a lively image of the business of the field. The single
combats, the general skirmish, the defence of a pass, or castle, were
rehearsed as in actual service; and the contest, both in real and mimic
war, was decided by the superior management of the horse and lance. The
lance was the proper and peculiar weapon of the knight: his horse was of
a large and heavy breed; but this charger, till he was roused by the
approaching danger, was usually led by an attendant, and he quietly rode
a pad or palfrey of a more easy pace. His helmet and sword, his greaves
and buckler, it would be superfluous to describe; but I may remark,
that, at the period of the crusades, the armor was less ponderous than
in later times; and that, instead of a massy cuirass, his breast was
defended by a hauberk or coat of mail. When their long lances were fixed
in the rest, the warriors furiously spurred their horses against the
foe; and the light cavalry of the Turks and Arabs could seldom stand
against the direct and impetuous weight of their charge. Each knight was
attended to the field by his faithful squire, a youth of equal birth and
similar hopes; he was followed by his archers and men at arms, and four,
or five, or six soldiers were computed as the furniture of a complete
lance. In the expeditions to the neighboring kingdoms or the Holy Land,
the duties of the feudal tenure no longer subsisted; the voluntary
service of the knights and their followers were either prompted by zeal
or attachment, or purchased with rewards and promises; and the numbers
of each squadron were measured by the power, the wealth, and the fame,
of each independent chieftain. They were distinguished by his banner,
his armorial coat, and his cry of war; and the most ancient families of
Europe must seek in these achievements the origin and proof of their
nobility. In this rapid portrait of chivalry I have been urged to
anticipate on the story of the crusades, at once an effect and a cause,
of this memorable institution.

Such were the troops, and such the leaders, who assumed the cross for
the deliverance of the holy sepulchre. As soon as they were relieved by
the absence of the plebeian multitude, they encouraged each other, by
interviews and messages, to accomplish their vow, and hasten their
departure. Their wives and sisters were desirous of partaking the danger
and merit of the pilgrimage: their portable treasures were conveyed in
bars of silver and gold; and the princes and barons were attended by
their equipage of hounds and hawks to amuse their leisure and to supply
their table. The difficulty of procuring subsistence for so many myriads
of men and horses engaged them to separate their forces: their choice or
situation determined the road; and it was agreed to meet in the
neighborhood of Constantinople, and from thence to begin their
operations against the Turks. From the banks of the Meuse and the
Moselle, Godfrey of Bouillon followed the direct way of Germany,
Hungary, and Bulgaria; and, as long as he exercised the sole command
every step afforded some proof of his prudence and virtue. On the
confines of Hungary he was stopped three weeks by a Christian people, to
whom the name, or at least the abuse, of the cross was justly odious.
The Hungarians still smarted with the wounds which they had received
from the first pilgrims: in their turn they had abused the right of
defence and retaliation; and they had reason to apprehend a severe
revenge from a hero of the same nation, and who was engaged in the same
cause. But, after weighing the motives and the events, the virtuous duke
was content to pity the crimes and misfortunes of his worthless
brethren; and his twelve deputies, the messengers of peace, requested in
his name a free passage and an equal market. To remove their suspicions,
Godfrey trusted himself, and afterwards his brother, to the faith of
Carloman, * king of Hungary, who treated them with a simple but
hospitable entertainment: the treaty was sanctified by their common
gospel; and a proclamation, under pain of death, restrained the
animosity and license of the Latin soldiers. From Austria to Belgrade,
they traversed the plains of Hungary, without enduring or offering an
injury; and the proximity of Carloman, who hovered on their flanks with
his numerous cavalry, was a precaution not less useful for their safety
than for his own. They reached the banks of the Save; and no sooner had
they passed the river, than the king of Hungary restored the hostages,
and saluted their departure with the fairest wishes for the success of
their enterprise. With the same conduct and discipline, Godfrey pervaded
the woods of Bulgaria and the frontiers of Thrace; and might
congratulate himself that he had almost reached the first term of his
pilgrimage, without drawing his sword against a Christian adversary.
After an easy and pleasant journey through Lombardy, from Turin to
Aquileia, Raymond and his provincials marched forty days through the
savage country of Dalmatia  and Sclavonia. The weather was a perpetual
fog; the land was mountainous and desolate; the natives were either
fugitive or hostile: loose in their religion and government, they
refused to furnish provisions or guides; murdered the stragglers; and
exercised by night and day the vigilance of the count, who derived more
security from the punishment of some captive robbers than from his
interview and treaty with the prince of Scodra.  His march between
Durazzo and Constantinople was harassed, without being stopped, by the
peasants and soldiers of the Greek emperor; and the same faint and
ambiguous hostility was prepared for the remaining chiefs, who passed
the Adriatic from the coast of Italy. Bohemond had arms and vessels, and
foresight and discipline; and his name was not forgotten in the
provinces of Epirus and Thessaly. Whatever obstacles he encountered were
surmounted by his military conduct and the valor of Tancred; and if the
Norman prince affected to spare the Greeks, he gorged his soldiers with
the full plunder of an heretical castle.  The nobles of France pressed
forwards with the vain and thoughtless ardor of which their nation has
been sometimes accused. From the Alps to Apulia the march of Hugh the
Great, of the two Roberts, and of Stephen of Chartres, through a wealthy
country, and amidst the applauding Catholics, was a devout or triumphant
progress: they kissed the feet of the Roman pontiff; and the golden
standard of St. Peter was delivered to the brother of the French
monarch.  But in this visit of piety and pleasure, they neglected to
secure the season, and the means of their embarkation: the winter was
insensibly lost: their troops were scattered and corrupted in the towns
of Italy. They separately accomplished their passage, regardless of
safety or dignity; and within nine months from the feast of the
Assumption, the day appointed by Urban, all the Latin princes had
reached Constantinople. But the count of Vermandois was produced as a
captive; his foremost vessels were scattered by a tempest; and his
person, against the law of nations, was detained by the lieutenants of
Alexius. Yet the arrival of Hugh had been announced by four-and-twenty
knights in golden armor, who commanded the emperor to revere the general
of the Latin Christians, the brother of the king of kings.  *

In some oriental tale I have read the fable of a shepherd, who was
ruined by the accomplishment of his own wishes: he had prayed for water;
the Ganges was turned into his grounds, and his flock and cottage were
swept away by the inundation. Such was the fortune, or at least the
apprehension of the Greek emperor Alexius Comnenus, whose name has
already appeared in this history, and whose conduct is so differently
represented by his daughter Anne,  and by the Latin writers.  In the
council of Placentia, his ambassadors had solicited a moderate succor,
perhaps of ten thousand soldiers, but he was astonished by the approach
of so many potent chiefs and fanatic nations. The emperor fluctuated
between hope and fear, between timidity and courage; but in the crooked
policy which he mistook for wisdom, I cannot believe, I cannot discern,
that he maliciously conspired against the life or honor of the French
heroes. The promiscuous multitudes of Peter the Hermit were savage
beasts, alike destitute of humanity and reason: nor was it possible for
Alexius to prevent or deplore their destruction. The troops of Godfrey
and his peers were less contemptible, but not less suspicious, to the
Greek emperor. Their motives mightbe pure and pious: but he was equally
alarmed by his knowledge of the ambitious Bohemond, * and his ignorance
of the Transalpine chiefs: the courage of the French was blind and
headstrong; they might be tempted by the luxury and wealth of Greece,
and elated by the view and opinion of their invincible strength: and
Jerusalem might be forgotten in the prospect of Constantinople. After a
long march and painful abstinence, the troops of Godfrey encamped in the
plains of Thrace; they heard with indignation, that their brother, the
count of Vermandois, was imprisoned by the Greeks; and their reluctant
duke was compelled to indulge them in some freedom of retaliation and
rapine. They were appeased by the submission of Alexius: he promised to
supply their camp; and as they refused, in the midst of winter, to pass
the Bosphorus, their quarters were assigned among the gardens and
palaces on the shores of that narrow sea. But an incurable jealousy
still rankled in the minds of the two nations, who despised each other
as slaves and Barbarians. Ignorance is the ground of suspicion, and
suspicion was inflamed into daily provocations: prejudice is blind,
hunger is deaf; and Alexius is accused of a design to starve or assault
the Latins in a dangerous post, on all sides encompassed with the
waters.  Godfrey sounded his trumpets, burst the net, overspread the
plain, and insulted the suburbs; but the gates of Constantinople were
strongly fortified; the ramparts were lined with archers; and, after a
doubtful conflict, both parties listened to the voice of peace and
religion. The gifts and promises of the emperor insensibly soothed the
fierce spirit of the western strangers; as a Christian warrior, he
rekindled their zeal for the prosecution of their holy enterprise, which
he engaged to second with his troops and treasures. On the return of
spring, Godfrey was persuaded to occupy a pleasant and plentiful camp in
Asia; and no sooner had he passed the Bosphorus, than the Greek vessels
were suddenly recalled to the opposite shore. The same policy was
repeated with the succeeding chiefs, who were swayed by the example, and
weakened by the departure, of their foremost companions. By his skill
and diligence, Alexius prevented the union of any two of the confederate
armies at the same moment under the walls of Constantinople; and before
the feast of the Pentecost not a Latin pilgrim was left on the coast of
Europe.

The same arms which threatened Europe might deliver Asia, and repel the
Turks from the neighboring shores of the Bosphorus and Hellespont. The
fair provinces from Nice to Antioch were the recent patrimony of the
Roman emperor; and his ancient and perpetual claim still embraced the
kingdoms of Syria and Egypt. In his enthusiasm, Alexius indulged, or
affected, the ambitious hope of leading his new allies to subvert the
thrones of the East; but the calmer dictates of reason and temper
dissuaded him from exposing his royal person to the faith of unknown and
lawless Barbarians. His prudence, or his pride, was content with
extorting from the French princes an oath of homage and fidelity, and a
solemn promise, that they would either restore, or hold, their Asiatic
conquests as the humble and loyal vassals of the Roman empire. Their
independent spirit was fired at the mention of this foreign and
voluntary servitude: they successively yielded to the dexterous
application of gifts and flattery; and the first proselytes became the
most eloquent and effectual missionaries to multiply the companions of
their shame. The pride of Hugh of Vermandois was soothed by the honors
of his captivity; and in the brother of the French king, the example of
submission was prevalent and weighty. In the mind of Godfrey of Bouillon
every human consideration was subordinate to the glory of God and the
success of the crusade. He had firmly resisted the temptations of
Bohemond and Raymond, who urged the attack and conquest of
Constantinople. Alexius esteemed his virtues, deservedly named him the
champion of the empire, and dignified his homage with the filial name
and the rights of adoption.  The hateful Bohemond was received as a true
and ancient ally; and if the emperor reminded him of former hostilities,
it was only to praise the valor that he had displayed, and the glory
that he had acquired, in the fields of Durazzo and Larissa. The son of
Guiscard was lodged and entertained, and served with Imperial pomp: one
day, as he passed through the gallery of the palace, a door was
carelessly left open to expose a pile of gold and silver, of silk and
gems, of curious and costly furniture, that was heaped, in seeming
disorder, from the floor to the roof of the chamber. "What conquests,"
exclaimed the ambitious miser, "might not be achieved by the possession
of such a treasure!" -- "It is your own," replied a Greek attendant, who
watched the motions of his soul; and Bohemond, after some hesitation,
condescended to accept this magnificent present. The Norman was
flattered by the assurance of an independent principality; and Alexius
eluded, rather than denied, his daring demand of the office of great
domestic, or general of the East. The two Roberts, the son of the
conqueror of England, and the kinsmen of three queens,  bowed in their
turn before the Byzantine throne. A private letter of Stephen of
Chartres attests his admiration of the emperor, the most excellent and
liberal of men, who taught him to believe that he was a favorite, and
promised to educate and establish his youngest son. In his southern
province, the count of St. Giles and Thoulouse faintly recognized the
supremacy of the king of France, a prince of a foreign nation and
language. At the head of a hundred thousand men, he declared that he was
the soldier and servant of Christ alone, and that the Greek might be
satisfied with an equal treaty of alliance and friendship. His obstinate
resistance enhanced the value and the price of his submission; and he
shone, says the princess Anne, among the Barbarians, as the sun amidst
the stars of heaven. His disgust of the noise and insolence of the
French, his suspicions of the designs of Bohemond, the emperor imparted
to his faithful Raymond; and that aged statesman might clearly discern,
that however false in friendship, he was sincere in his enmity.  The
spirit of chivalry was last subdued in the person of Tancred; and none
could deem themselves dishonored by the imitation of that gallant
knight. He disdained the gold and flattery of the Greek monarch;
assaulted in his presence an insolent patrician; escaped to Asia in the
habit of a private soldier; and yielded with a sigh to the authority of
Bohemond, and the interest of the Christian cause. The best and most
ostensible reason was the impossibility of passing the sea and
accomplishing their vow, without the license and the vessels of Alexius;
but they cherished a secret hope, that as soon as they trod the
continent of Asia, their swords would obliterate their shame, and
dissolve the engagement, which on his side might not be very faithfully
performed. The ceremony of their homage was grateful to a people who had
long since considered pride as the substitute of power. High on his
throne, the emperor sat mute and immovable: his majesty was adored by
the Latin princes; and they submitted to kiss either his feet or his
knees, an indignity which their own writers are ashamed to confess and
unable to deny.

Private or public interest suppressed the murmurs of the dukes and
counts; but a French baron (he is supposed to be Robert of Paris )
presumed to ascend the throne, and to place himself by the side of
Alexius. The sage reproof of Baldwin provoked him to exclaim, in his
barbarous idiom, "Who is this rustic, that keeps his seat, while so many
valiant captains are standing round him?" The emperor maintained his
silence, dissembled his indignation, and questioned his interpreter
concerning the meaning of the words, which he partly suspected from the
universal language of gesture and countenance. Before the departure of
the pilgrims, he endeavored to learn the name and condition of the
audacious baron. "I am a Frenchman," replied Robert, "of the purest and
most ancient nobility of my country. All that I know is, that there is a
church in my neighborhood,  the resort of those who are desirous of
approving their valor in single combat. Till an enemy appears, they
address their prayers to God and his saints. That church I have
frequently visited. But never have I found an antagonist who dared to
accept my defiance." Alexius dismissed the challenger with some prudent
advice for his conduct in the Turkish warfare; and history repeats with
pleasure this lively example of the manners of his age and country.

The conquest of Asia was undertaken and achieved by Alexander, with
thirty-five thousand Macedonians and Greeks;  and his best hope was in
the strength and discipline of his phalanx of infantry. The principal
force of the crusaders consisted in their cavalry; and when that force
was mustered in the plains of Bithynia, the knights and their martial
attendants on horseback amounted to one hundred thousand fighting men,
completely armed with the helmet and coat of mail. The value of these
soldiers deserved a strict and authentic account; and the flower of
European chivalry might furnish, in a first effort, this formidable body
of heavy horse. A part of the infantry might be enrolled for the service
of scouts, pioneers, and archers; but the promiscuous crowd were lost in
their own disorder; and we depend not on the eyes and knowledge, but on
the belief and fancy, of a chaplain of Count Baldwin,  in the estimate
of six hundred thousand pilgrims able to bear arms, besides the priests
and monks, the women and children of the Latin camp. The reader starts;
and before he is recovered from his surprise, I shall add, on the same
testimony, that if all who took the cross had accomplished their vow,
above six millions would have migrated from Europe to Asia. Under this
oppression of faith, I derive some relief from a more sagacious and
thinking writer,  who, after the same review of the cavalry, accuses the
credulity of the priest of Chartres, and even doubts whether the
Cisalpineregions (in the geography of a Frenchman) were sufficient to
produce and pour forth such incredible multitudes. The coolest
scepticism will remember, that of these religious volunteers great
numbers never beheld Constantinople and Nice. Of enthusiasm the
influence is irregular and transient: many were detained at home by
reason or cowardice, by poverty or weakness; and many were repulsed by
the obstacles of the way, the more insuperable as they were unforeseen,
to these ignorant fanatics. The savage countries of Hungary and Bulgaria
were whitened with their bones: their vanguard was cut in pieces by the
Turkish sultan; and the loss of the first adventure, by the sword, or
climate, or fatigue, has already been stated at three hundred thousand
men. Yet the myriads that survived, that marched, that pressed forwards
on the holy pilgrimage, were a subject of astonishment to themselves and
to the Greeks. The copious energy of her language sinks under the
efforts of the princess Anne:  the images of locusts, of leaves and
flowers, of the sands of the sea, or the stars of heaven, imperfectly
represent what she had seen and heard; and the daughter of Alexius
exclaims, that Europe was loosened from its foundations, and hurled
against Asia. The ancient hosts of Darius and Xerxes labor under the
same doubt of a vague and indefinite magnitude; but I am inclined to
believe, that a larger number has never been contained within the lines
of a single camp, than at the siege of Nice, the first operation of the
Latin princes. Their motives, their characters, and their arms, have
been already displayed. Of their troops the most numerous portion were
natives of France: the Low Countries, the banks of the Rhine, and
Apulia, sent a powerful reënforcement: some bands of adventurers were
drawn from Spain, Lombardy, and England;  and from the distant bogs and
mountains of Ireland or Scotland  issued some naked and savage fanatics,
ferocious at home but unwarlike abroad. Had not superstition condemned
the sacrilegious prudence of depriving the poorest or weakest Christian
of the merit of the pilgrimage, the useless crowd, with mouths but
without hands, might have been stationed in the Greek empire, till their
companions had opened and secured the way of the Lord. A small remnant
of the pilgrims, who passed the Bosphorus, was permitted to visit the
holy sepulchre. Their northern constitution was scorched by the rays,
and infected by the vapors, of a Syrian sun. They consumed, with
heedless prodigality, their stores of water and provision: their numbers
exhausted the inland country: the sea was remote, the Greeks were
unfriendly, and the Christians of every sect fled before the voracious
and cruel rapine of their brethren. In the dire necessity of famine,
they sometimes roasted and devoured the flesh of their infant or adult
captives. Among the Turks and Saracens, the idolaters of Europe were
rendered more odious by the name and reputation of Cannibals; the spies,
who introduced themselves into the kitchen of Bohemond, were shown
several human bodies turning on the spit: and the artful Norman
encouraged a report, which increased at the same time the abhorrence and
the terror of the infidels.

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade. -- Part IV.

I have expiated with pleasure on the first steps of the crusaders, as
they paint the manners and character of Europe: but I shall abridge the
tedious and uniform narrative of their blind achievements, which were
performed by strength and are described by ignorance. From their first
station in the neighborhood of Nicomedia, they advanced in successive
divisions; passed the contracted limit of the Greek empire; opened a
road through the hills, and commenced, by the siege of his capital,
their pious warfare against the Turkish sultan. His kingdom of Roum
extended from the Hellespont to the confines of Syria, and barred the
pilgrimage of Jerusalem, his name was Kilidge-Arslan, or Soliman,  of
the race of Seljuk, and son of the first conqueror; and in the defence
of a land which the Turks considered as their own, he deserved the
praise of his enemies, by whom alone he is known to posterity. Yielding
to the first impulse of the torrent, he deposited his family and
treasure in Nice; retired to the mountains with fifty thousand horse;
and twice descended to assault the camps or quarters of the Christian
besiegers, which formed an imperfect circle of above six miles. The
lofty and solid walls of Nice were covered by a deep ditch, and flanked
by three hundred and seventy towers; and on the verge of Christendom,
the Moslems were trained in arms, and inflamed by religion. Before this
city, the French princes occupied their stations, and prosecuted their
attacks without correspondence or subordination: emulation prompted
their valor; but their valor was sullied by cruelty, and their emulation
degenerated into envy and civil discord. In the siege of Nice, the arts
and engines of antiquity were employed by the Latins; the mine and the
battering-ram, the tortoise, and the belfrey or movable turret,
artificial fire, and the catapultand balist, the sling, and the crossbow
for the casting of stones and darts.  In the space of seven weeks much
labor and blood were expended, and some progress, especially by Count
Raymond, was made on the side of the besiegers. But the Turks could
protract their resistance and secure their escape, as long as they were
masters of the Lake  Ascanius, which stretches several miles to the
westward of the city. The means of conquest were supplied by the
prudence and industry of Alexius; a great number of boats was
transported on sledges from the sea to the lake; they were filled with
the most dexterous of his archers; the flight of the sultana was
intercepted; Nice was invested by land and water; and a Greek emissary
persuaded the inhabitants to accept his master's protection, and to save
themselves, by a timely surrender, from the rage of the savages of
Europe. In the moment of victory, or at least of hope, the crusaders,
thirsting for blood and plunder, were awed by the Imperial banner that
streamed from the citadel; * and Alexius guarded with jealous vigilance
this important conquest. The murmurs of the chiefs were stifled by honor
or interest; and after a halt of nine days, they directed their march
towards Phrygia under the guidance of a Greek general, whom they
suspected of a secret connivance with the sultan. The consort and the
principal servants of Soliman had been honorably restored without
ransom; and the emperor's generosity to the miscreantswas interpreted as
treason to the Christian cause.

Soliman was rather provoked than dismayed by the loss of his capital: he
admonished his subjects and allies of this strange invasion of the
Western Barbarians; the Turkish emirs obeyed the call of loyalty or
religion; the Turkman hordes encamped round his standard; and his whole
force is loosely stated by the Christians at two hundred, or even three
hundred and sixty thousand horse. Yet he patiently waited till they had
left behind them the sea and the Greek frontier; and hovering on the
flanks, observed their careless and confident progress in two columns
beyond the view of each other. Some miles before they could reach
Dorylæum in Phrygia, the left, and least numerous, division was
surprised, and attacked, and almost oppressed, by the Turkish cavalry.
The heat of the weather, the clouds of arrows, and the barbarous onset,
overwhelmed the crusaders; they lost their order and confidence, and the
fainting fight was sustained by the personal valor, rather than by the
military conduct, of Bohemond, Tancred, and Robert of Normandy. They
were revived by the welcome banners of Duke Godfrey, who flew to their
succor, with the count of Vermandois, and sixty thousand horse; and was
followed by Raymond of Tholouse, the bishop of Puy, and the remainder of
the sacred army. Without a moment's pause, they formed in new order, and
advanced to a second battle. They were received with equal resolution;
and, in their common disdain for the unwarlike people of Greece and
Asia, it was confessed on both sides, that the Turks and the Franks were
the only nations entitled to the appellation of soldiers.  Their
encounter was varied, and balanced by the contrast of arms and
discipline; of the direct charge, and wheeling evolutions; of the
couched lance, and the brandished javelin; of a weighty broadsword, and
a crooked sabre; of cumbrous armor, and thin flowing robes; and of the
long Tartar bow, and the arbalistor crossbow, a deadly weapon, yet
unknown to the Orientals.  As long as the horses were fresh, and the
quivers full, Soliman maintained the advantage of the day; and four
thousand Christians were pierced by the Turkish arrows. In the evening,
swiftness yielded to strength: on either side, the numbers were equal or
at least as great as any ground could hold, or any generals could
manage; but in turning the hills, the last division of Raymond and his
provincialswas led, perhaps without design on the rear of an exhausted
enemy; and the long contest was determined. Besides a nameless and
unaccounted multitude, three thousand Paganknights were slain in the
battle and pursuit; the camp of Soliman was pillaged; and in the variety
of precious spoil, the curiosity of the Latins was amused with foreign
arms and apparel, and the new aspect of dromedaries and camels. The
importance of the victory was proved by the hasty retreat of the sultan:
reserving ten thousand guards of the relics of his army, Soliman
evacuated the kingdom of Roum, and hastened to implore the aid, and
kindle the resentment, of his Eastern brethren. In a march of five
hundred miles, the crusaders traversed the Lesser Asia, through a wasted
land and deserted towns, without finding either a friend or an enemy.
The geographer  may trace the position of Dorylæum, Antioch of Pisidia,
Iconium, Archelais, and Germanicia, and may compare those classic
appellations with the modern names of Eskishehr the old city, Akshehr
the white city, Cogni, Erekli, and Marash. As the pilgrims passed over a
desert, where a draught of water is exchanged for silver, they were
tormented by intolerable thirst; and on the banks of the first rivulet,
their haste and intemperance were still more pernicious to the
disorderly throng. They climbed with toil and danger the steep and
slippery sides of Mount Taurus; many of the soldiers cast away their
arms to secure their footsteps; and had not terror preceded their van,
the long and trembling file might have been driven down the precipice by
a handful of resolute enemies. Two of their most respectable chiefs, the
duke of Lorraine and the count of Tholouse, were carried in litters:
Raymond was raised, as it is said by miracle, from a hopeless malady;
and Godfrey had been torn by a bear, as he pursued that rough and
perilous chase in the mountains of Pisidia.

To improve the general consternation, the cousin of Bohemond and the
brother of Godfrey were detached from the main army with their
respective squadrons of five, and of seven, hundred knights. They
overran in a rapid career the hills and sea-coast of Cilicia, from Cogni
to the Syrian gates: the Norman standard was first planted on the walls
of Tarsus and Malmistra; but the proud injustice of Baldwin at length
provoked the patient and generous Italian; and they turned their
consecrated swords against each other in a private and profane quarrel.
Honor was the motive, and fame the reward, of Tancred; but fortune
smiled on the more selfish enterprise of his rival.  He was called to
the assistance of a Greek or Armenian tyrant, who had been suffered
under the Turkish yoke to reign over the Christians of Edessa. Baldwin
accepted the character of his son and champion: but no sooner was he
introduced into the city, than he inflamed the people to the massacre of
his father, occupied the throne and treasure, extended his conquests
over the hills of Armenia and the plain of Mesopotamia, and founded the
first principality of the Franks or Latins, which subsisted fifty-four
years beyond the Euphrates.

Before the Franks could enter Syria, the summer, and even the autumn,
were completely wasted: the siege of Antioch, or the separation and
repose of the army during the winter season, was strongly debated in
their council: the love of arms and the holy sepulchre urged them to
advance; and reason perhaps was on the side of resolution, since every
hour of delay abates the fame and force of the invader, and multiplies
the resources of defensive war. The capital of Syria was protected by
the River Orontes; and the iron bridge, * of nine arches, derives its
name from the massy gates of the two towers which are constructed at
either end. They were opened by the sword of the duke of Normandy: his
victory gave entrance to three hundred thousand crusaders, an account
which may allow some scope for losses and desertion, but which clearly
detects much exaggeration in the review of Nice. In the description of
Antioch,  it is not easy to define a middle term between her ancient
magnificence, under the successors of Alexander and Augustus, and the
modern aspect of Turkish desolation. The Tetrapolis, or four cities, if
they retained their name and position, must have left a large vacuity in
a circumference of twelve miles; and that measure, as well as the number
of four hundred towers, are not perfectly consistent with the five
gates, so often mentioned in the history of the siege. Yet Antioch must
have still flourished as a great and populous capital. At the head of
the Turkish emirs, Baghisian, a veteran chief, commanded in the place:
his garrison was composed of six or seven thousand horse, and fifteen or
twenty thousand foot: one hundred thousand Moslems are said to have
fallen by the sword; and their numbers were probably inferior to the
Greeks, Armenians, and Syrians, who had been no more than fourteen years
the slaves of the house of Seljuk. From the remains of a solid and
stately wall, it appears to have arisen to the height of threescore feet
in the valleys; and wherever less art and labor had been applied, the
ground was supposed to be defended by the river, the morass, and the
mountains. Notwithstanding these fortifications, the city had been
repeatedly taken by the Persians, the Arabs, the Greeks, and the Turks;
so large a circuit must have yielded many pervious points of attack; and
in a siege that was formed about the middle of October, the vigor of the
execution could alone justify the boldness of the attempt. Whatever
strength and valor could perform in the field was abundantly discharged
by the champions of the cross: in the frequent occasions of sallies, of
forage, of the attack and defence of convoys, they were often
victorious; and we can only complain, that their exploits are sometimes
enlarged beyond the scale of probability and truth. The sword of Godfrey
divided a Turk from the shoulder to the haunch; and one half of the
infidel fell to the ground, while the other was transported by his horse
to the city gate. As Robert of Normandy rode against his antagonist, "I
devote thy head," he piously exclaimed, "to the dæmons of hell;" and
that head was instantly cloven to the breast by the resistless stroke of
his descending falchion. But the reality or the report of such gigantic
prowess  must have taught the Moslems to keep within their walls: and
against those walls of earth or stone, the sword and the lance were
unavailing weapons. In the slow and successive labors of a siege, the
crusaders were supine and ignorant, without skill to contrive, or money
to purchase, or industry to use, the artificial engines and implements
of assault. In the conquest of Nice, they had been powerfully assisted
by the wealth and knowledge of the Greek emperor: his absence was poorly
supplied by some Genoese and Pisan vessels, that were attracted by
religion or trade to the coast of Syria: the stores were scanty, the
return precarious, and the communication difficult and dangerous.
Indolence or weakness had prevented the Franks from investing the entire
circuit; and the perpetual freedom of two gates relieved the wants and
recruited the garrison of the city. At the end of seven months, after
the ruin of their cavalry, and an enormous loss by famine, desertion and
fatigue, the progress of the crusaders was imperceptible, and their
success remote, if the Latin Ulysses, the artful and ambitious Bohemond,
had not employed the arms of cunning and deceit. The Christians of
Antioch were numerous and discontented: Phirouz, a Syrian renegado, had
acquired the favor of the emir and the command of three towers; and the
merit of his repentance disguised to the Latins, and perhaps to himself,
the foul design of perfidy and treason. A secret correspondence, for
their mutual interest, was soon established between Phirouz and the
prince of Tarento; and Bohemond declared in the council of the chiefs,
that he could deliver the city into their hands. * But he claimed the
sovereignty of Antioch as the reward of his service; and the proposal
which had been rejected by the envy, was at length extorted from the
distress, of his equals. The nocturnal surprise was executed by the
French and Norman princes, who ascended in person the scaling-ladders
that were thrown from the walls: their new proselyte, after the murder
of his too scrupulous brother, embraced and introduced the servants of
Christ; the army rushed through the gates; and the Moslems soon found,
that although mercy was hopeless, resistance was impotent. But the
citadel still refused to surrender; and the victims themselves were
speedily encompassed and besieged by the innumerable forces of Kerboga,
prince of Mosul, who, with twenty-eight Turkish emirs, advanced to the
deliverance of Antioch. Five-and-twenty days the Christians spent on the
verge of destruction; and the proud lieutenant of the caliph and the
sultan left them only the choice of servitude or death.  In this
extremity they collected the relics of their strength, sallied from the
town, and in a single memorable day, annihilated or dispersed the host
of Turks and Arabians, which they might safely report to have consisted
of six hundred thousand men.  Their supernatural allies I shall proceed
to consider: the human causes of the victory of Antioch were the
fearless despair of the Franks; and the surprise, the discord, perhaps
the errors, of their unskilful and presumptuous adversaries. The battle
is described with as much disorder as it was fought; but we may observe
the tent of Kerboga, a movable and spacious palace, enriched with the
luxury of Asia, and capable of holding above two thousand persons; we
may distinguish his three thousand guards, who were cased, the horse as
well as the men, in complete steel.

In the eventful period of the siege and defence of Antioch, the
crusaders were alternately exalted by victory or sunk in despair; either
swelled with plenty or emaciated with hunger. A speculative reasoner
might suppose, that their faith had a strong and serious influence on
their practice; and that the soldiers of the cross, the deliverers of
the holy sepulchre, prepared themselves by a sober and virtuous life for
the daily contemplation of martyrdom. Experience blows away this
charitable illusion; and seldom does the history of profane war display
such scenes of intemperance and prostitution as were exhibited under the
walls of Antioch. The grove of Daphne no longer flourished; but the
Syrian air was still impregnated with the same vices; the Christians
were seduced by every temptation  that nature either prompts or
reprobates; the authority of the chiefs was despised; and sermons and
edicts were alike fruitless against those scandalous disorders, not less
pernicious to military discipline, than repugnant to evangelic purity.
In the first days of the siege and the possession of Antioch, the Franks
consumed with wanton and thoughtless prodigality the frugal subsistence
of weeks and months: the desolate country no longer yielded a supply;
and from that country they were at length excluded by the arms of the
besieging Turks. Disease, the faithful companion of want, was envenomed
by the rains of the winter, the summer heats, unwholesome food, and the
close imprisonment of multitudes. The pictures of famine and pestilence
are always the same, and always disgustful; and our imagination may
suggest the nature of their sufferings and their resources. The remains
of treasure or spoil were eagerly lavished in the purchase of the vilest
nourishment; and dreadful must have been the calamities of the poor,
since, after paying three marks of silver for a goat and fifteen for a
lean camel,  the count of Flanders was reduced to beg a dinner, and Duke
Godfrey to borrow a horse. Sixty thousand horse had been reviewed in the
camp: before the end of the siege they were diminished to two thousand,
and scarcely two hundred fit for service could be mustered on the day of
battle. Weakness of body and terror of mind extinguished the ardent
enthusiasm of the pilgrims; and every motive of honor and religion was
subdued by the desire of life.  Among the chiefs, three heroes may be
found without fear or reproach: Godfrey of Bouillon was supported by his
magnanimous piety; Bohemond by ambition and interest; and Tancred
declared, in the true spirit of chivalry, that as long as he was at the
head of forty knights, he would never relinquish the enterprise of
Palestine. But the count of Tholouse and Provence was suspected of a
voluntary indisposition; the duke of Normandy was recalled from the
sea-shore by the censures of the church: Hugh the Great, though he led
the vanguard of the battle, embraced an ambiguous opportunity of
returning to France and Stephen, count of Chartres, basely deserted the
standard which he bore, and the council in which he presided. The
soldiers were discouraged by the flight of William, viscount of Melun,
surnamed the Carpenter, from the weighty strokes of his axe; and the
saints were scandalized by the fall * of Peter the Hermit, who, after
arming Europe against Asia, attempted to escape from the penance of a
necessary fast. Of the multitude of recreant warriors, the names (says
an historian) are blotted from the book of life; and the opprobrious
epithet of the rope-dancers was applied to the deserters who dropped in
the night from the walls of Antioch. The emperor Alexius,  who seemed to
advance to the succor of the Latins, was dismayed by the assurance of
their hopeless condition. They expected their fate in silent despair;
oaths and punishments were tried without effect; and to rouse the
soldiers to the defence of the walls, it was found necessary to set fire
to their quarters.

For their salvation and victory, they were indebted to the same
fanaticism which had led them to the brink of ruin. In such a cause, and
in such an army, visions, prophecies, and miracles, were frequent and
familiar. In the distress of Antioch, they were repeated with unusual
energy and success: St. Ambrose had assured a pious ecclesiastic, that
two years of trial must precede the season of deliverance and grace; the
deserters were stopped by the presence and reproaches of Christ himself;
the dead had promised to arise and combat with their brethren; the
Virgin had obtained the pardon of their sins; and their confidence was
revived by a visible sign, the seasonable and splendid discovery of the
holy lance. The policy of their chiefs has on this occasion been
admired, and might surely be excused; but a pious baud is seldom
produced by the cool conspiracy of many persons; and a voluntary
impostor might depend on the support of the wise and the credulity of
the people. Of the diocese of Marseilles, there was a priest of low
cunning and loose manners, and his name was Peter Bartholemy. He
presented himself at the door of the council-chamber, to disclose an
apparition of St. Andrew, which had been thrice reiterated in his sleep
with a dreadful menace, if he presumed to suppress the commands of
Heaven. "At Antioch," said the apostle, "in the church of my brother St.
Peter, near the high altar, is concealed the steel head of the lance
that pierced the side of our Redeemer. In three days that instrument of
eternal, and now of temporal, salvation, will be manifested to his
disciples. Search, and ye shall find: bear it aloft in battle; and that
mystic weapon shall penetrate the souls of the miscreants." The pope's
legate, the bishop of Puy, affected to listen with coldness and
distrust; but the revelation was eagerly accepted by Count Raymond, whom
his faithful subject, in the name of the apostle, had chosen for the
guardian of the holy lance. The experiment was resolved; and on the
third day after a due preparation of prayer and fasting, the priest of
Marseilles introduced twelve trusty spectators, among whom were the
count and his chaplain; and the church doors were barred against the
impetuous multitude. The ground was opened in the appointed place; but
the workmen, who relieved each other, dug to the depth of twelve feet
without discovering the object of their search. In the evening, when
Count Raymond had withdrawn to his post, and the weary assistants began
to murmur, Bartholemy, in his shirt, and without his shoes, boldly
descended into the pit; the darkness of the hour and of the place
enabled him to secrete and deposit the head of a Saracen lance; and the
first sound, the first gleam, of the steel was saluted with a devout
rapture. The holy lance was drawn from its recess, wrapped in a veil of
silk and gold, and exposed to the veneration of the crusaders; their
anxious suspense burst forth in a general shout of joy and hope, and the
desponding troops were again inflamed with the enthusiasm of valor.
Whatever had been the arts, and whatever might be the sentiments of the
chiefs, they skilfully improved this fortunate revolution by every aid
that discipline and devotion could afford. The soldiers were dismissed
to their quarters with an injunction to fortify their minds and bodies
for the approaching conflict, freely to bestow their last pittance on
themselves and their horses, and to expect with the dawn of day the
signal of victory. On the festival of St. Peter and St. Paul, the gates
of Antioch were thrown open: a martial psalm, "Let the Lord arise, and
let his enemies be scattered!" was chanted by a procession of priests
and monks; the battle array was marshalled in twelve divisions, in honor
of the twelve apostles; and the holy lance, in the absence of Raymond,
was intrusted to the hands of his chaplain. The influence of his relic
or trophy, was felt by the servants, and perhaps by the enemies, of
Christ;  and its potent energy was heightened by an accident, a
stratagem, or a rumor, of a miraculous complexion. Three knights, in
white garments and resplendent arms, either issued, or seemed to issue,
from the hills: the voice of Adhemar, the pope's legate, proclaimed them
as the martyrs St. George, St. Theodore, and St. Maurice: the tumult of
battle allowed no time for doubt or scrutiny; and the welcome apparition
dazzled the eyes or the imagination of a fanatic army. * In the season
of danger and triumph, the revelation of Bartholemy of Marseilles was
unanimously asserted; but as soon as the temporary service was
accomplished, the personal dignity and liberal arms which the count of
Tholouse derived from the custody of the holy lance, provoked the envy,
and awakened the reason, of his rivals. A Norman clerk presumed to sift,
with a philosophic spirit, the truth of the legend, the circumstances of
the discovery, and the character of the prophet; and the pious Bohemond
ascribed their deliverance to the merits and intercession of Christ
alone. For a while, the Provincials defended their national palladium
with clamors and arms and new visions condemned to death and hell the
profane sceptics who presumed to scrutinize the truth and merit of the
discovery. The prevalence of incredulity compelled the author to submit
his life and veracity to the judgment of God. A pile of dry fagots, four
feet high and fourteen long, was erected in the midst of the camp; the
flames burnt fiercely to the elevation of thirty cubits; and a narrow
path of twelve inches was left for the perilous trial. The unfortunate
priest of Marseilles traversed the fire with dexterity and speed; but
the thighs and belly were scorched by the intense heat; he expired the
next day;  and the logic of believing minds will pay some regard to his
dying protestations of innocence and truth. Some efforts were made by
the Provincials to substitute a cross, a ring, or a tabernacle, in the
place of the holy lance, which soon vanished in contempt and oblivion.
Yet the revelation of Antioch is gravely asserted by succeeding
historians: and such is the progress of credulity, that miracles most
doubtful on the spot, and at the moment, will be received with implicit
faith at a convenient distance of time and space.

The prudence or fortune of the Franks had delayed their invasion till
the decline of the Turkish empire.  Under the manly government of the
three first sultans, the kingdoms of Asia were united in peace and
justice; and the innumerable armies which they led in person were equal
in courage, and superior in discipline, to the Barbarians of the West.
But at the time of the crusade, the inheritance of Malek Shaw was
disputed by his four sons; their private ambition was insensible of the
public danger; and, in the vicissitudes of their fortune, the royal
vassals were ignorant, or regardless, of the true object of their
allegiance. The twenty-eight emirs who marched with the standard or
Kerboga were his rivals or enemies: their hasty levies were drawn from
the towns and tents of Mesopotamia and Syria; and the Turkish veterans
were employed or consumed in the civil wars beyond the Tigris. The
caliph of Egypt embraced this opportunity of weakness and discord to
recover his ancient possessions; and his sultan Aphdal besieged
Jerusalem and Tyre, expelled the children of Ortok, and restored in
Palestine the civil and ecclesiastical authority of the Fatimites.  They
heard with astonishment of the vast armies of Christians that had passed
from Europe to Asia, and rejoiced in the sieges and battles which broke
the power of the Turks, the adversaries of their sect and monarchy. But
the same Christians were the enemies of the prophet; and from the
overthrow of Nice and Antioch, the motive of their enterprise, which was
gradually understood, would urge them forwards to the banks of the
Jordan, or perhaps of the Nile. An intercourse of epistles and
embassies, which rose and fell with the events of war, was maintained
between the throne of Cairo and the camp of the Latins; and their
adverse pride was the result of ignorance and enthusiasm. The ministers
of Egypt declared in a haughty, or insinuated in a milder, tone, that
their sovereign, the true and lawful commander of the faithful, had
rescued Jerusalem from the Turkish yoke; and that the pilgrims, if they
would divide their numbers, and lay aside their arms, should find a safe
and hospitable reception at the sepulchre of Jesus. In the belief of
their lost condition, the caliph Mostali despised their arms and
imprisoned their deputies: the conquest and victory of Antioch prompted
him to solicit those formidable champions with gifts of horses and silk
robes, of vases, and purses of gold and silver; and in his estimate of
their merit or power, the first place was assigned to Bohemond, and the
second to Godfrey. In either fortune, the answer of the crusaders was
firm and uniform: they disdained to inquire into the private claims or
possessions of the followers of Mahomet; whatsoever was his name or
nation, the usurper of Jerusalem was their enemy; and instead of
prescribing the mode and terms of their pilgrimage, it was only by a
timely surrender of the city and province, their sacred right, that he
could deserve their alliance, or deprecate their impending and
irresistible attack.

Yet this attack, when they were within the view and reach of their
glorious prize, was suspended above ten months after the defeat of
Kerboga. The zeal and courage of the crusaders were chilled in the
moment of victory; and instead of marching to improve the consternation,
they hastily dispersed to enjoy the luxury, of Syria. The causes of this
strange delay may be found in the want of strength and subordination. In
the painful and various service of Antioch, the cavalry was annihilated;
many thousands of every rank had been lost by famine, sickness, and
desertion: the same abuse of plenty had been productive of a third
famine; and the alternative of intemperance and distress had generated a
pestilence, which swept away above fifty thousand of the pilgrims. Few
were able to command, and none were willing to obey; the domestic feuds,
which had been stifled by common fear, were again renewed in acts, or at
least in sentiments, of hostility; the fortune of Baldwin and Bohemond
excited the envy of their companions; the bravest knights were enlisted
for the defence of their new principalities; and Count Raymond exhausted
his troops and treasures in an idle expedition into the heart of Syria.
* The winter was consumed in discord and disorder; a sense of honor and
religion was rekindled in the spring; and the private soldiers, less
susceptible of ambition and jealousy, awakened with angry clamors the
indolence of their chiefs. In the month of May, the relics of this
mighty host proceeded from Antioch to Laodicea: about forty thousand
Latins, of whom no more than fifteen hundred horse, and twenty thousand
foot, were capable of immediate service. Their easy march was continued
between Mount Libanus and the sea-shore: their wants were liberally
supplied by the coasting traders of Genoa and Pisa; and they drew large
contributions from the emirs of Tripoli, Tyre, Sidon, Acre, and Cæsarea,
who granted a free passage, and promised to follow the example of
Jerusalem. From Cæsarea they advanced into the midland country; their
clerks recognized the sacred geography of Lydda, Ramla, Emmaus, and
Bethlem, * and as soon as they descried the holy city, the crusaders
forgot their toils and claimed their reward.

Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade. -- Part V.

Jerusalem has derived some reputation from the number and importance of
her memorable sieges. It was not till after a long and obstinate contest
that Babylon and Rome could prevail against the obstinacy of the people,
the craggy ground that might supersede the necessity of fortifications,
and the walls and towers that would have fortified the most accessible
plain.  These obstacles were diminished in the age of the crusades. The
bulwarks had been completely destroyed and imperfectly restored: the
Jews, their nation, and worship, were forever banished; but nature is
less changeable than man, and the site of Jerusalem, though somewhat
softened and somewhat removed, was still strong against the assaults of
an enemy. By the experience of a recent siege, and a three years'
possession, the Saracens of Egypt had been taught to discern, and in
some degree to remedy, the defects of a place, which religion as well as
honor forbade them to resign. Aladin, or Iftikhar, the caliph's
lieutenant, was intrusted with the defence: his policy strove to
restrain the native Christians by the dread of their own ruin and that
of the holy sepulchre; to animate the Moslems by the assurance of
temporal and eternal rewards. His garrison is said to have consisted of
forty thousand Turks and Arabians; and if he could muster twenty
thousand of the inhabitants, it must be confessed that the besieged were
more numerous than the besieging army.  Had the diminished strength and
numbers of the Latins allowed them to grasp the whole circumference of
four thousand yards, (about two English miles and a half, ) to what
useful purpose should they have descended into the valley of Ben Hinnom
and torrent of Cedron,  or approach the precipices of the south and
east, from whence they had nothing either to hope or fear? Their siege
was more reasonably directed against the northern and western sides of
the city. Godfrey of Bouillon erected his standard on the first swell of
Mount Calvary: to the left, as far as St. Stephen's gate, the line of
attack was continued by Tancred and the two Roberts; and Count Raymond
established his quarters from the citadel to the foot of Mount Sion,
which was no longer included within the precincts of the city. On the
fifth day, the crusaders made a general assault, in the fanatic hope of
battering down the walls without engines, and of scaling them without
ladders. By the dint of brutal force, they burst the first barrier; but
they were driven back with shame and slaughter to the camp: the
influence of vision and prophecy was deadened by the too frequent abuse
of those pious stratagems; and time and labor were found to be the only
means of victory. The time of the siege was indeed fulfilled in forty
days, but they were forty days of calamity and anguish. A repetition of
the old complaint of famine may be imputed in some degree to the
voracious or disorderly appetite of the Franks; but the stony soil of
Jerusalem is almost destitute of water; the scanty springs and hasty
torrents were dry in the summer season; nor was the thirst of the
besiegers relieved, as in the city, by the artificial supply of cisterns
and aqueducts. The circumjacent country is equally destitute of trees
for the uses of shade or building, but some large beams were discovered
in a cave by the crusaders: a wood near Sichem, the enchanted grove of
Tasso,  was cut down: the necessary timber was transported to the camp
by the vigor and dexterity of Tancred; and the engines were framed by
some Genoese artists, who had fortunately landed in the harbor of Jaffa.
Two movable turrets were constructed at the expense, and in the
stations, of the duke of Lorraine and the count of Tholouse, and rolled
forwards with devout labor, not to the most accessible, but to the most
neglected, parts of the fortification. Raymond's Tower was reduced to
ashes by the fire of the besieged, but his colleague was more vigilant
and successful; * the enemies were driven by his archers from the
rampart; the draw-bridge was let down; and on a Friday, at three in the
afternoon, the day and hour of the passion, Godfrey of Bouillon stood
victorious on the walls of Jerusalem. His example was followed on every
side by the emulation of valor; and about four hundred and sixty years
after the conquest of Omar, the holy city was rescued from the Mahometan
yoke. In the pillage of public and private wealth, the adventurers had
agreed to respect the exclusive property of the first occupant; and the
spoils of the great mosque, seventy lamps and massy vases of gold and
silver, rewarded the diligence, and displayed the generosity, of
Tancred. A bloody sacrifice was offered by his mistaken votaries to the
God of the Christians: resistance might provoke but neither age nor sex
could mollify, their implacable rage: they indulged themselves three
days in a promiscuous massacre;  and the infection of the dead bodies
produced an epidemical disease. After seventy thousand Moslems had been
put to the sword, and the harmless Jews had been burnt in their
synagogue, they could still reserve a multitude of captives, whom
interest or lassitude persuaded them to spare. Of these savage heroes of
the cross, Tancred alone betrayed some sentiments of compassion; yet we
may praise the more selfish lenity of Raymond, who granted a
capitulation and safe-conduct to the garrison of the citadel.  The holy
sepulchre was now free; and the bloody victors prepared to accomplish
their vow. Bareheaded and barefoot, with contrite hearts, and in an
humble posture, they ascended the hill of Calvary, amidst the loud
anthems of the clergy; kissed the stone which had covered the Savior of
the world; and bedewed with tears of joy and penitence the monument of
their redemption. This union of the fiercest and most tender passions
has been variously considered by two philosophers; by the one,  as easy
and natural; by the other,  as absurd and incredible. Perhaps it is too
rigorously applied to the same persons and the same hour; the example of
the virtuous Godfrey awakened the piety of his companions; while they
cleansed their bodies, they purified their minds; nor shall I believe
that the most ardent in slaughter and rapine were the foremost in the
procession to the holy sepulchre.

Eight days after this memorable event, which Pope Urban did not live to
hear, the Latin chiefs proceeded to the election of a king, to guard and
govern their conquests in Palestine. Hugh the Great, and Stephen of
Chartres, had retired with some loss of reputation, which they strove to
regain by a second crusade and an honorable death. Baldwin was
established at Edessa, and Bohemond at Antioch; and two Roberts, the
duke of Normandy  and the count of Flanders, preferred their fair
inheritance in the West to a doubtful competition or a barren sceptre.
The jealousy and ambition of Raymond were condemned by his own
followers, and the free, the just, the unanimous voice of the army
proclaimed Godfrey of Bouillon the first and most worthy of the
champions of Christendom. His magnanimity accepted a trust as full of
danger as of glory; but in a city where his Savior had been crowned with
thorns, the devout pilgrim rejected the name and ensigns of royalty; and
the founder of the kingdom of Jerusalem contented himself with the
modest title of Defender and Baron of the Holy Sepulchre. His government
of a single year,  too short for the public happiness, was interrupted
in the first fortnight by a summons to the field, by the approach of the
vizier or sultan of Egypt, who had been too slow to prevent, but who was
impatient to avenge, the loss of Jerusalem. His total overthrow in the
battle of Ascalon sealed the establishment of the Latins in Syria, and
signalized the valor of the French princes who in this action bade a
long farewell to the holy wars. Some glory might be derived from the
prodigious inequality of numbers, though I shall not count the myriads
of horse and foot * on the side of the Fatimites; but, except three
thousand Ethiopians or Blacks, who were armed with flails or scourges of
iron, the Barbarians of the South fled on the first onset, and afforded
a pleasing comparison between the active valor of the Turks and the
sloth and effeminacy of the natives of Egypt. After suspending before
the holy sepulchre the sword and standard of the sultan, the new king
(he deserves the title) embraced his departing companions, and could
retain only with the gallant Tancred three hundred knights, and two
thousand foot-soldiers for the defence of Palestine. His sovereignty was
soon attacked by a new enemy, the only one against whom Godfrey was a
coward. Adhemar, bishop of Puy, who excelled both in council and action,
had been swept away in the last plague at Antioch: the remaining
ecclesiastics preserved only the pride and avarice of their character;
and their seditious clamors had required that the choice of a bishop
should precede that of a king. The revenue and jurisdiction of the
lawful patriarch were usurped by the Latin clergy: the exclusion of the
Greeks and Syrians was justified by the reproach of heresy or schism;
and, under the iron yoke of their deliverers, the Oriental Christians
regretted the tolerating government of the Arabian caliphs. Daimbert,
archbishop of Pisa, had long been trained in the secret policy of Rome:
he brought a fleet at his countrymen to the succor of the Holy Land, and
was installed, without a competitor, the spiritual and temporal head of
the church. * The new patriarch  immediately grasped the sceptre which
had been acquired by the toil and blood of the victorious pilgrims; and
both Godfrey and Bohemond submitted to receive at his hands the
investiture of their feudal possessions. Nor was this sufficient;
Daimbert claimed the immediate property of Jerusalem and Jaffa; instead
of a firm and generous refusal, the hero negotiated with the priest; a
quarter of either city was ceded to the church; and the modest bishop
was satisfied with an eventual reversion of the rest, on the death of
Godfrey without children, or on the future acquisition of a new seat at
Cairo or Damascus.

Without this indulgence, the conqueror would have almost been stripped
of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem and Jaffa, with
about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent country.  Within this
narrow verge, the Mahometans were still lodged in some impregnable
castles: and the husbandman, the trader, and the pilgrim, were exposed
to daily and domestic hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of
the two Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne,
the Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they
equalled, in the extent of their dominions, though not in the millions
of their subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and Israel.  After the
reduction of the maritime cities of Laodicea, Tripoli, Tyre, and
Ascalon,  which were powerfully assisted by the fleets of Venice, Genoa,
and Pisa, and even of Flanders and Norway,  the range of sea-coast from
Scanderoon to the borders of Egypt was possessed by the Christian
pilgrims. If the prince of Antioch disclaimed his supremacy, the counts
of Edessa and Tripoli owned themselves the vassals of the king of
Jerusalem: the Latins reigned beyond the Euphrates; and the four cities
of Hems, Hamah, Damascus, and Aleppo, were the only relics of the
Mahometan conquests in Syria.  The laws and language, the manners and
titles, of the French nation and Latin church, were introduced into
these transmarine colonies. According to the feudal jurisprudence, the
principal states and subordinate baronies descended in the line of male
and female succession:  but the children of the first conquerors,  a
motley and degenerate race, were dissolved by the luxury of the climate;
the arrival of new crusaders from Europe was a doubtful hope and a
casual event. The service of the feudal tenures  was performed by six
hundred and sixty-six knights, who might expect the aid of two hundred
more under the banner of the count of Tripoli; and each knight was
attended to the field by four squires or archers on horseback.  Five
thousand and seventy sergeants, most probably foot-soldiers, were
supplied by the churches and cities; and the whole legal militia of the
kingdom could not exceed eleven thousand men, a slender defence against
the surrounding myriads of Saracens and Turks.  But the firmest bulwark
of Jerusalem was founded on the knights of the Hospital of St. John,
and of the temple of Solomon;  on the strange association of a monastic
and military life, which fanaticism might suggest, but which policy must
approve. The flower of the nobility of Europe aspired to wear the cross,
and to profess the vows, of these respectable orders; their spirit and
discipline were immortal; and the speedy donation of twenty-eight
thousand farms, or manors,  enabled them to support a regular force of
cavalry and infantry for the defence of Palestine. The austerity of the
convent soon evaporated in the exercise of arms; the world was
scandalized by the pride, avarice, and corruption of these Christian
soldiers; their claims of immunity and jurisdiction disturbed the
harmony of the church and state; and the public peace was endangered by
their jealous emulation. But in their most dissolute period, the knights
of their hospital and temple maintained their fearless and fanatic
character: they neglected to live, but they were prepared to die, in the
service of Christ; and the spirit of chivalry, the parent and offspring
of the crusades, has been transplanted by this institution from the holy
sepulchre to the Isle of Malta.

The spirit of freedom, which pervades the feudal institutions, was felt
in its strongest energy by the volunteers of the cross, who elected for
their chief the most deserving of his peers. Amidst the slaves of Asia,
unconscious of the lesson or example, a model of political liberty was
introduced; and the laws of the French kingdom are derived from the
purest source of equality and justice. Of such laws, the first and
indispensable condition is the assent of those whose obedience they
require, and for whose benefit they are designed. No sooner had Godfrey
of Bouillon accepted the office of supreme magistrate, than he solicited
the public and private advice of the Latin pilgrims, who were the best
skilled in the statutes and customs of Europe. From these materials,
with the counsel and approbation of the patriarch and barons, of the
clergy and laity, Godfrey composed the Assise of Jerusalem,  a precious
monument of feudal jurisprudence. The new code, attested by the seals of
the king, the patriarch, and the viscount of Jerusalem, was deposited in
the holy sepulchre, enriched with the improvements of succeeding times,
and respectfully consulted as often as any doubtful question arose in
the tribunals of Palestine. With the kingdom and city all was lost:  the
fragments of the written law were preserved by jealous tradition  and
variable practice till the middle of the thirteenth century: the code
was restored by the pen of John d'Ibelin, count of Jaffa, one of the
principal feudatories;  and the final revision was accomplished in the
year thirteen hundred and sixty-nine, for the use of the Latin kingdom
of Cyprus.

The justice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by two
tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by Godfrey of
Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in person, presided
in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of these the four most
conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the lord of Sidon and Cæsarea,
and the counts of Jaffa and Tripoli, who, perhaps with the constable and
marshal,  were in a special manner the compeers and judges of each
other. But all the nobles, who held their lands immediately of the
crown, were entitled and bound to attend the king's court; and each
baron exercised a similar jurisdiction on the subordinate assemblies of
his own feudatories. The connection of lord and vassal was honorable and
voluntary: reverence was due to the benefactor, protection to the
dependant; but they mutually pledged their faith to each other; and the
obligation on either side might be suspended by neglect or dissolved by
injury. The cognizance of marriages and testaments was blended with
religion, and usurped by the clergy: but the civil and criminal causes
of the nobles, the inheritance and tenure of their fiefs, formed the
proper occupation of the supreme court. Each member was the judge and
guardian both of public and private rights. It was his duty to assert
with his tongue and sword the lawful claims of the lord; but if an
unjust superior presumed to violate the freedom or property of a vassal,
the confederate peers stood forth to maintain his quarrel by word and
deed. They boldly affirmed his innocence and his wrongs; demanded the
restitution of his liberty or his lands; suspended, after a fruitless
demand, their own service; rescued their brother from prison; and
employed every weapon in his defence, without offering direct violence
to the person of their lord, which was ever sacred in their eyes.  In
their pleadings, replies, and rejoinders, the advocates of the court
were subtle and copious; but the use of argument and evidence was often
superseded by judicial combat; and the Assise of Jerusalem admits in
many cases this barbarous institution, which has been slowly abolished
by the laws and manners of Europe.

The trial by battle was established in all criminal cases which affected
the life, or limb, or honor, of any person; and in all civil
transactions, of or above the value of one mark of silver. It appears
that in criminal cases the combat was the privilege of the accuser, who,
except in a charge of treason, avenged his personal injury, or the death
of those persons whom he had a right to represent; but wherever, from
the nature of the charge, testimony could be obtained, it was necessary
for him to produce witnesses of the fact. In civil cases, the combat was
not allowed as the means of establishing the claim of the demandant; but
he was obliged to produce witnesses who had, or assumed to have,
knowledge of the fact. The combat was then the privilege of the
defendant; because he charged the witness with an attempt by perjury to
take away his right. He came therefore to be in the same situation as
the appellant in criminal cases. It was not then as a mode of proof that
the combat was received, nor as making negative evidence, (according to
the supposition of Montesquieu; ) but in every case the right to offer
battle was founded on the right to pursue by arms the redress of an
injury; and the judicial combat was fought on the same principle, and
with the same spirit, as a private duel. Champions were only allowed to
women, and to men maimed or past the age of sixty. The consequence of a
defeat was death to the person accused, or to the champion or witness,
as well as to the accuser himself: but in civil cases, the demandant was
punished with infamy and the loss of his suit, while his witness and
champion suffered ignominious death. In many cases it was in the option
of the judge to award or to refuse the combat: but two are specified, in
which it was the inevitable result of the challenge; if a faithful
vassal gave the lie to his compeer, who unjustly claimed any portion of
their lord's demesnes; or if an unsuccessful suitor presumed to impeach
the judgment and veracity of the court. He might impeach them, but the
terms were severe and perilous: in the same day he successively fought
allthe members of the tribunal, even those who had been absent; a single
defeat was followed by death and infamy; and where none could hope for
victory, it is highly probable that none would adventure the trial. In
the Assise of Jerusalem, the legal subtlety of the count of Jaffa is
more laudably employed to elude, than to facilitate, the judicial
combat, which he derives from a principle of honor rather than of
superstition.

Among the causes which enfranchised the plebeians from the yoke of
feudal tyranny, the institution of cities and corporations is one of the
most powerful; and if those of Palestine are coeval with the first
crusade, they may be ranked with the most ancient of the Latin world.
Many of the pilgrims had escaped from their lords under the banner of
the cross; and it was the policy of the French princes to tempt their
stay by the assurance of the rights and privileges of freemen. It is
expressly declared in the Assise of Jerusalem, that after instituting,
for his knights and barons, the court of peers, in which he presided
himself, Godfrey of Bouillon established a second tribunal, in which his
person was represented by his viscount. The jurisdiction of this
inferior court extended over the burgesses of the kingdom; and it was
composed of a select number of the most discreet and worthy citizens,
who were sworn to judge, according to the laws of the actions and
fortunes of their equals.  In the conquest and settlement of new cities,
the example of Jerusalem was imitated by the kings and their great
vassals; and above thirty similar corporations were founded before the
loss of the Holy Land. Another class of subjects, the Syrians,  or
Oriental Christians, were oppressed by the zeal of the clergy, and
protected by the toleration of the state. Godfrey listened to their
reasonable prayer, that they might be judged by their own national laws.
A third court was instituted for their use, of limited and domestic
jurisdiction: the sworn members were Syrians, in blood, language, and
religion; but the office of the president (in Arabic, of the rais) was
sometimes exercised by the viscount of the city. At an immeasurable
distance below the nobles, the burgesses, and the strangers, the Assise
of Jerusalem condescends to mention the villainsand slaves, the peasants
of the land and the captives of war, who were almost equally considered
as the objects of property. The relief or protection of these unhappy
men was not esteemed worthy of the care of the legislator; but he
diligently provides for the recovery, though not indeed for the
punishment, of the fugitives. Like hounds, or hawks, who had strayed
from the lawful owner, they might be lost and claimed: the slave and
falcon were of the same value; but three slaves, or twelve oxen, were
accumulated to equal the price of the war-horse; and a sum of three
hundred pieces of gold was fixed, in the age of chivalry, as the
equivalent of the more noble animal.

End of Volume V.