All who were fortunate enough to run between the shots were fortunate enough to escape. At the end of an hour the fugitives had disappeared like dust swept by the wind, leaving the plain covered with dead, abandoning their camp, their standards, four hundred camels, and an immense amount of booty.
The fugitives thought themselves safe, and those who succeeded in reaching the mountains of Nablos did indeed find shelter there; but those who tried to escape across the Jordan by the way they had come, found Murat and his thousand men guarding the ford of the river.
The French did not stop until they were weary of killing. Bonaparte and Kléber met upon the battlefield and embraced amid the shouts of the three squares.
According to tradition, it was then that the colossal Kléber, putting his hand on Bonaparte's shoulder, who barely reached to his chest, said those words which have so often since been disputed: "General, you are as great as the world!"
Bonaparte ought to have been content.
He had just conquered on the same spot where Guy de Lusignan had been defeated; it was there that, on the 5th of July, 1187, the French, "after having exhausted even the source of their tears," says the Arab author, "met in desperate conflict with the Mussulmans commanded by Saladin."
"At the beginning," says the same author, "they fought like lions; but at the end they were nothing more than scattered sheep." Surrounded on all sides, they were driven back to the foot of the Mount of Beatitudes, where our Saviour in teaching the people had said: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are they that weep, blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness' sake"; and where he also said: "When ye pray say, 'Our Father, who art in heaven.'"
The whole action took place in the neighborhood of this mountain, which the infidels call Mount Hittin.
Guy de Lusignan took refuge among the hills and defended the True Cross as well as he could; but he could not prevent the Mussulmans from capturing it after they had mortally wounded the Bishop of Saint-Jean-d'Acre who was carrying it.