Among all the Christian warriors, the French distinguished themselves greatly, and directed their efforts principally against the Cursed Tower, which was erected at the eastern side of the city. A great part of the walls began to fall, and must soon offer a passage to the besieging army. War, famine, and disease had weakened the garrison; the city had not soldiers enough left to defend the ramparts and move about the machines employed against those of the Christians. The place not only stood in need of provisions, but of warlike munitions and Greek fire. The warriors who had gone through so much, began to feel discouragement, and the people loudly murmured against Saladin and the emirs. In this extremity, the commander of the garrison came and proposed a capitulation to Philip Augustus, who swore by the God of the Christians that he would not spare a single inhabitant of Ptolemaïs, if the Mussulmans did not restore all the cities that had fallen into their power since the battle of Tiberias.
The chief of the emirs, irritated by the refusal of Philip, retired, saying that he and his companions would rather bury themselves beneath the ruins of the city, than listen to such terms, and that they would defend Ptolemaïs as a lion defends his blood-stained lair. On his return into the place, the commander of the Saracens communicated his courage, or rather his despair, to every heart. When the Christians resumed their assaults, they were repulsed with a vigour that astonished them. “The tumultuous waves of the Franks,” says an Arabian author, “rolled towards the place with the rapidity of a torrent; they mounted the half-ruined walls as wild goats ascend the steepest rocks, whilst the Saracens precipitated themselves upon the besiegers like stones detached from the summits of mountains.”
In one general assault, a Florentine knight of the family of Bonaguisi, followed by some of his men, fought his way into one of the towers of the infidels, and got possession of the Mussulman banner that floated from it. Overpowered by numbers, and forced to retreat, he returned to the camp, bearing the flag he had carried off from the Saracens. In the same assault, Alberic Clement, the first marshal of France of whom history makes mention, scaled the ramparts, and, sword in hand, penetrated into the city, where he found a glorious death. Stephen, count of Blois, and several knights were burnt by the Greek fire, the boiling oil, the melted lead, and heated sand which the besieged poured down upon all who approached the walls.
The obstinate ardour of the Mussulmans was sustained during several days; but as they received no succour, many emirs, at length despairing of the safety of Ptolemaïs, threw themselves, by night, into a bark, to seek an asylum in the camp of Saladin, preferring to encounter the anger of the sultan, to perishing by the sword of the Christians. This desertion, and the contemplation of their ruined towers, filled the Mussulmans with terror. Whilst pigeons and divers constantly announced to Saladin the horrible distresses of the besieged, the latter came to the resolution of leaving the city by night, and braving every peril to join the Saracen army. But their project being discovered by the Christians, they blocked up and guarded every passage by which the enemy could possibly escape. The emirs, the soldiers, and the inhabitants then became convinced that they had no hope but in the mercy of Philip Augustus, and promised, if he would grant them liberty and life, to cause to be given up to the Christians sixteen hundred prisoners, and the wood of the true cross. By the capitulation they engaged to pay two hundred thousand pieces of gold to the leaders of the Christian army, and the garrison, with the entire population of Ptolemaïs, were to remain in the power of the conquerors till the execution of the treaty.
A Mussulman soldier was sent from the city to announce to Saladin that the garrison was forced to capitulate. The sultan, who was preparing to make a last effort to save the place, learnt the news with deep regret. He assembled his council, to know if they approved of the capitulation; but scarcely were the principal emirs met in his tent, when they beheld the standards of the crusaders floating over the walls and towers of Ptolemaïs.
Such was the conclusion of this famous siege, which lasted nearly three years, and in which the crusaders shed more blood and exhibited more bravery than ought to have sufficed for the subjugation of the whole of Asia. More than a hundred skirmishes and nine great battles were fought before the walls of the city; several flourishing armies came to recruit armies nearly annihilated, and were in their turn replaced by fresh armies. The bravest nobility of Europe perished in this siege, swept away by the sword or disease. Among the illustrious victims of this war, history points out Philip, count of Flanders, Guy de Chatillon, Bernard de St. Vallery, Vautrier de Mory, Raoul de Fougères, Eudes de Gonesse, Renaud de Maguy, Geoffroi d’Aumale, viscount de Châtellerault, Josselin de Montmorency, and Raoul de Marle; the archbishops of Besançon and Canterbury; with many other ecclesiastics and knights whose piety and exploits were the admiration of Europe.[336]
In this war both parties were animated by religion; each side boasted of its miracles, its saints, and its prophets. Bishops and imauns equally promised the soldiers remission of their sins and the crown of martyrdom. Whilst the king of Jerusalem caused the book of the Evangelists to be borne before him, Saladin would often pause on the field of battle to offer up a prayer or read a chapter from the Koran.[337] The Franks and the Saracens mutually accused each other of ignorance of the true God and of outraging him by their ceremonies. The Christians rushed upon their enemies crying, “It is the will of God! It is the will of God!” and the Saracens answered by their war-cry, “Islam! Islam!”
Fanaticism frequently augmented the fury of slaughter. The Mussulmans from the height of their towers insulted the religious ceremonies of the Christians.[338] They raised crosses on their ramparts, beat them with rods, covered them with dust, mud, and filth, and broke them into a thousand pieces before the eyes of the besiegers. At this spectacle the Christians swore to avenge their outraged worship, and menaced the Saracens with the destruction of every Mahomedan pulpit. In the heat of this religious animosity, the Mussulmans often massacred disarmed captives; and in more than one battle they burnt their[339] Christian prisoners in the very field of conflict. The crusaders but too closely imitated the barbarity of their enemies; funeral piles, lighted up by fanatical rage, were often extinguished in rivers of blood.
The Mussulman and Christian warriors provoked each other during single combats, and were as lavish of abuse as the heroes of Homer. Heroines often appeared in the mêlée, and disputed the prize of strength and courage with the bravest of the Saracens.[340] Children came from the city to fight with the children of the Christians in the presence of the two armies.
But sometimes the furies of war gave place to the amenities of peace, and Franks and Saracens would for a moment forget the hatred that had led them to take up arms. During the course of the siege several tournaments were held in the plain of Ptolemaïs, to which the Mussulmans were invited. The champions of the two parties harangued each other before entering the lists; the conqueror was borne in triumph, and the conquered ransomed like a prisoner of war. In these warlike festivities, which brought the two nations together, the Franks often danced to the sound of Arabian instruments, and their minstrels afterwards played or sang to the dancing of the Saracens.