[49] William of Tyre xx. 12.
[50] Gesta Dei per Francos, vol. i. pp. 994, 1062.
[51] William of Tyre makes their number 60,000. He declares his inability to give the origin of the name Assassins.
[52] Raumer, Geschichte der Hohenstauffen, ii., p. 490. Wilken, Geschichte der Kreuzzüge, iv., 489.
[53] Annales Muslemici, tom. iv., pp. 122, 123. Hafniae, 1792.
[54] An instance of Henry's intimacy with the Assassins has been given in p. 81.
[55] Sir J. Mackintosh (History of England, i. 187) seems to regard the letters as genuine.
[56] May it not be said that real historic characters should not be misrepresented? Sir W. Scott was at full liberty to make his Varneys and his Bois Gilberts as accomplished villains as he pleased; he might do as he pleased with his own; but what warrant had he from history for painting Conrad of Montferrat and the then Master of the Templars under such odious colours as he does?
[57] The author invariably writes Montserrat for Montferrat. The former is in Spain, and never was a marquisate. As it were to show that it was no error of the press, it is said, "The shield of the marquis bore, in reference to his title, a serrated and rocky mountain." We also find naphtha and bitumen confounded, the former being described as the solid, the latter as the liquid substance.
[58] "Sebil, in Arabic 'the way,' means generally the road, and the traveller is hence called Ibn-es-sebil, the son of the road; but it more particularly signifies the way of piety and good works, which leads to Paradise. Whatever meritorious work the Moslem undertakes, he does Fi sebil Allah, on the way of God, or for the love of God; and the most meritorious which he can undertake is the holy war, or the fight for his faith and his country, on God's way. But since pious women can have no immediate share in the contest, every thing which they can contribute to the nursing of the wounded, and the refreshment of the exhausted, is imputed to them as equally meritorious as if they had fought themselves. The distribution of water to the exhausted and wounded warriors is the highest female merit in the holy war on God's way."—Hammer's History of the Assassins, Wood's translation, p. 144.