[306] This word ores, which was employed to animate the courage of combatants, and which is still in use among the people in several provinces of France, may it not be the same as the word houra, which the Russians employ? May it not have been introduced by the Franks and the other barbarians who conquered the Gauls?
[307] This is the same person who, later, made himself so formidable to the Christians when he had united Egypt and Syria under his power; he had preserved the name of Bondocdar from that of his ancient master, so called because he was the bondocdar, or general of the arbalatiers, in the reign of Malek-Saleh.
[308] Je vous promets que oncques plus bel homme armé ne vis.
[309] Leur disant paroles en signe de mocquerie.—Joinville.
[310] .... et tous furent moult oppressés d’angoisse, de compassion et de pitié de le voir ainsi plorer.—Joinville. [I hope my readers will excuse my repetitions of this kind; I make them from a sense of inability to convey the touching and characteristic simplicity of the original, and from a wish that others should partake with me the feeling they create.]—Trans.
[311] This disease was the scurvy; “it was such,” says Joinville, “that the flesh of our legs dried away to the bone, and our skins became of a black or earth colour, like an old saddle which has been a long time laid aside: and besides this, we who were afflicted by this disease were soon subjected to another persecution, in a complaint of the mouth, which arose from our having eaten of those fish; it putrified the flesh of the gums, so that it rendered the breath horribly stinking.” Joinville here speaks of the burbotte, a fish of the Nile, which is a voracious fish, and feeds upon dead bodies. The seneschal adds, in another passage of his memoirs, “that the malady having seized upon the army, it became necessary for the barbers to cut out the swollen flesh of the gums of all who were afflicted with this disease, so that they could not eat. Great pity was it to hear all from whom this dead flesh had been cut, going about in the army, crying and moaning. They appeared to me like poor women who are in labour with their children when they come upon earth: nobody can tell how pitiable that sight was.”
[312] ... ne oncques plus ne chanta. [The readers of Michaud have reason to congratulate themselves, when he is availing himself of such authorities as Villehardouin and Joinville; he seems to have a sympathy with them that procures us some very delightful traits.]—Trans.
[313] Bernard Thesaurius, the author of the Continuation of the History of William of Tyre, has fixed the precise epoch of each fact. We shall most likely have occasion to draw the reader’s attention to the Annales Ecclésiastiques of this writer in a future volume.
[314] This generous trait of St. Louis, who refused to quit his army, is attested by both French and Oriental historians. Joinville expresses himself thus:—“Seeing the king had the same disease as the army, and great weakness, as others had, we thought he would be much safer on board one of the great galleys; but he said ‘he would rather die than leave his people.’” Geoffrey of Beaulieu, equally an eyewitness, attests this fact. To the evidence of these two historians we may add that of the Arabian historian Aboul Mahassem. “The king of France,” says he, “might have escaped from the Egyptians, either on horseback, or in a boat; but this generous prince would never consent to abandon his troops.”
[The conduct of Louis might be imprudent, but it was noble and heroic. The admirers of the modern French idol, Buonaparte, would be very much at a loss to find such a trait in his history; it was always sauve qui peut with him, when he met with reverses.]—Trans.