[63] Abbot Guibert speaks thus of William, viscount de Melun: Cum Jerosolymitanum esset agressurus, iter direptis contiguorum sibi peuperum substantiolis, profanum viaticum præparavit.—Lib. iv. c. 7.
[64] Le Père Maimbourg.
[65] Nothing is more common than to attribute the combinations of a profound policy to remote ages. If certain persons are to be believed, the men of the eleventh century were sages, and we are barbarians. I feel it just to report the opinion of Montesquieu on this subject: “To transport all the ideas of the age in which we live into remote periods is the most abundant source of error. To those people who wish to render all ancient ages modern, I will repeat what the priests of Egypt said to Solon, ‘Oh Athenians, you are but children.’”—Esprit des Lois, liv. xxx. c. 18.
[66] Eo tempore cum inter regni primates super hâc expeditione res fieret, et colloquium ab eis cum Hugone Magno, sub Philippi regis præsentiâ, Parisiis haberetur, mense Februario, tertio idus ejusdem, luna, eclipsim patiens, ante noctis medium, sanguineo paulatim cœpit colore velari, donec in cruentissimum tota horribiliter est conversa ruborem; et ubi aurora crepusculo naturæ rediit, circa ipsum lunarem circulum insolitus splendor emicuit. Quidam autem æstivi diei vespertinâ irruente horâ, tanta aquilonis plagæ efflagratio apparuit, ut plurimi è domibus suis sese proriperent, quærentes quinam hostes provincias suas adeò grave ambustione vastarent.—Guibert, Abb. lib. i. ch. 17.
[67] Raoul de Caen has written, half in prose and half in verse, the “Gestes de Tancrède.” ’See “Thesaurus Novus Anecdotorum” of D. Martenne, vol. i., or the “Recueil de Muratori,” tom. iii.)
[68] Consult the history of Raymond d’Agiles, chaplain of the count de Thoulouse, for the description of this march of the Crusaders of the south across a country till that time unknown.
[69] An Armenian historian says of the preparations for this crusade, “The gates of the Latins were opened, and the inhabitants of the West saw issuing from their countries armies and soldiers numerous as locusts or the sands of the sea.”
[70] Nothing can be more diffuse than historians upon the march of the different princes of the crusade; each body of the Christian army has its particular historian, which is very injurious to perspicuity: it is exceedingly difficult to follow so many different relations.
[71] The Crusaders who followed Raymond are designated by historians Provençalex. This comes from the ancient denomination of Provincia Romana, or Provencia Narbonensis, which comprised Languedoc, Dauphiné, and Provence.
[72] The contemporary historians who have spoken of the crusades, and who have made this enumeration, had doubtless in their minds the numbering which is found in Scripture, which makes the number of the soldiers of Israel amount to six hundred and thirty-three thousand five hundred and fifty. I believe I ought to add some passages from the historians: Si omnes qui de domibus suis egressi votum jam iter ceperant, simul illuc adessent, procul dubio sexagies centum millia bellatorum adessent.—Foulcher de Chartres. Opinionem hominum vincebat numerus, quamvis æstimarentur sexagies centum millia itinerantium.—Malmesbury, book iv.