[67] The pope was satisfied with liberating the Crusaders from the usurious debts which they owed to the Jews. At that period all interest upon money lent was considered usury.
[68] Jacques of Vitri, when speaking of the suspicions and murmurs that arose against Foulques of Neuilly, expresses himself thus:—Et crescente pecuniâ, timor et reverentia decrescebant.
[69] The Abbé Lebeuf, in his History of the Diocese of Paris, vol. vi. p. 20, gives us a description of the tomb of Foulques of Neuilly, which was still standing in the last century. “The tomb of Foulques, the famous curé of this place about the year 1200, is in the nave, before the entrance to the choir, built of stone a foot and a half high. It is the work of the age in which this pious personage died. Foulques is represented in relief upon the monument, clothed as a priest, his head bare, having the tonsure on the top, and the hair so short that the whole of his ears is visible. A book is laid upon his breast, which he does not hold, as his hands are crossed above, the right placed upon the left. His chasuble and his manipule represent the vestments of his times. He has under him a kind of footstool, cut in the stone, and two angels in relief incense his head, which is placed towards the west; for, after the ancient manner, his feet are pointed to the east, or the altar. It is not true, as has been said, that this tomb is incensed, nor has it any arms. He is called in the country Sir Foulques, and sometimes Saint Sire Foulques. There is a tradition that the canons of St. Maur formerly endeavoured to carry it away; but the immobility of the car with which this story is adorned, tells us what degree of faith may be attached to it.” M. l’Abbé Chastelain names his death, in his Universal Martyrology, as having taken place on the 2nd of March, 1201, and qualifies him as venerable.
[70] Villehardouin says, when speaking of the arrival of the Crusaders at Venice, “No nobler people were ever seen, nor better appointed, nor more disposed to do something good for the honour of God and the service of Christendom.”
[71] Upon the sojourn of the Crusaders at Venice, Gesta Innocentii, Villehardouin and Ducange, Sanuti, Hérold, D’Outreman, Fleury, Histoire Ecclésiastique, vol. xviii., l’Abbé Langier, &c. &c., may be consulted.
[72] Then might be seen so many beautiful and rich vessels of gold and silver heaped up here and there, and carried to the hotel of the duke as part of their payment.—Villehardouin.
[73] The Venetians might have said, and no doubt did say on this occasion, that the king of Hungary had taken the cross many years before, and had done nothing yet towards the fulfilment of his vow. Andrew did not set out for Palestine till many years after the taking of Constantinople.
[74] The monk Gunther does not at all spare the Venetians, and reproaches them bitterly with having diverted the Crusaders from their holy enterprise. The pious resolution of the leaders of the crusade, says he, was subverted by the perfidy and wicked artifices of these masters of the Adriatic,—fraude et nequitiâ Venetorum.
[75] With the true spirit of an antiquary, M. Michaud delights in throwing a character of the “olden time” into the language of Villehardouin, which is in a degree effective in the French, but is with much difficulty conveyed into English.—Trans.
[76] Irene, the daughter of Isaac, had been affianced to William, son of Tancred, king of Sicily; being taken into Germany, with the rest of the family of Tancred, she had married Philip of Swabia.