[166] Decline and Fall, vol. ii. p. 385.
[167] The reader who wishes to examine the evidence for the miraculous nature of the interruption sustained by the agents of Julian will find an ample discussion in the pages of Basnage, Lardner, Warburton, Gibbon, and of the Author of the History of the Jews.
[168] History of the Jews, vol. iii.
[169] "When the first light brought news of a morning, they on afresh; because they had intercepted a letter tied to the leg of a dove, wherein the Persian emperor promised present succours to the besieged. The Turks cased the outside of their walls with bags of chaff, straw, and such like pliable matter, which conquered the engines of the Christians by yielding unto them. As for one sturdy engine, whose force would not be tamed, they brought two old witches on the walls to enchant it; but the spirit thereof was too strong for their spells, so that both of them were miserably slain in the place.
"We must not think that the world was at a loss for war-tools before the brood of guns was hatched: it had the battering-ramme, first found out by Epeus at the taking of Troy; the balista to discharge great stones, invented by the Phenicians; the catapulta, being a sling of mighty strength, whereof the Syrians were authors; and perchance King Uzziah first made it, for we find him very dexterous and happy in devising such things. And although these bear-whelps were but rude and unshaped at the first, yet art did lick them afterward, and they got more teeth and sharper nails by degrees; so that every age set them forth in a new edition, corrected and amended. But these and many more voluminous engines are now virtually epitomized in the cannon. And though some say that the finding of guns hath been the losing of many men's lives, yet it will appear that battles now are fought with more expedition, and Victory standeth not so long a neuter, before she express herself on one side or other."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 41.
[170] Fuller remarks, that "this second massacre was no slip of an extemporary passion, but a studied and premeditated act. Besides, the execution was merciless upon sucking children whose not speaking spake for them; and on women whose weakness is a shield to defend them against a valiant man. To conclude, severity, hot in the fourth degree, is little better than poison, and becometh cruelty itself; and this act seemeth to be of the same nature."—Fuller's Holy Warre, p. 41.
[171] On this interesting subject we refer to the "Itinéraire" of Chateaubriand, and his "Génie du Christianisme;" the History of England by Sir James Mackintosh, volume first; and to Mills's History of the Crusades, volume first, chapter sixth. We may add Dr. Robertson's "Historical Disquisition concerning the Knowledge which the Ancients had of India."
[172] Mill's History of the Crusades, vol. ii. p. 48.
[173] Mills's History of the Crusades, vol. ii. p. 129. Michaud, Histoire des Croisades, tom. iii. p. 187.
[174] A curé at Paris, instead of reading the bull from the pulpit in the usual form, said to his parishioners, "You know, my friends, that I am ordered to fulminate an excommunication against Frederick. I know not the motive. All that I know is, that there has been a quarrel between that prince and the pope. God alone knows who is right. I excommunicate him who has injured the other, and I absolve the sufferer." The emperor sent a present to the preacher, but the pope and the king blamed this sally: le mauvais plaisant—the unhappy wit—was obliged to expiate his fault by a canonical penance.—Mills's History, vol. ii. p. 253.