Among the precautions which Tancred took for the establishing of his authority was the imprisonment of the widow of William the Good, his immediate predecessor. She was the sister of Richard, king of England, but on the arrival of that monarch in Sicily, the usurper restored her to freedom. But her dowry was still withheld, and her brother was resolved to avenge her wrongs. In all his measures he was violent and unjust. He placed her in a fortress which he seized from the Sicilians, and drove out the religious inhabitants of a monastery in order that it might contain his stores. Those circumstances and the dissoluteness of his people were the occasion of much altercation between the natives and the strangers. Philip Augustus had favoured the Sicilians’ cause, and the English monarch, therefore, regarded him as an enemy, and planted his standard on the quarters of the French. The mediation of the barons prevented a war between Philip and Richard, and the latter showed his goodwill to his royal companion by delivering Messina to the soldiers of the military orders till Tancred should equitably settle the claims of his sister. Peace was then concluded. Richard renounced all claims on Sicily. Messina was given to the French king, and Richard encamped without the walls. Various regulations were made for intercourse between the different nations during the winter months. Merchants were not to purchase bread or corn in the army for the purpose of re-sale, and the profits on their general transactions were restricted to one denarius in ten. Gaming was permitted to the knights and clergy, to the exclusion of the rest of the army. No individual, however, was to lose more than twenty shillings in one day or night. For some time there was a frequent interchange of good offices between the French and English. Richard gave Philip several ships, and was so prodigal of his money among the soldiers that it was commonly said he was more bountiful in a month than his father had been in a year. But the disputes at Messina had rankled in the mind of Philip, and contemporary English historians have charged him with offering his assistance to Tancred for the expulsion of Richard.
THE FRENCH SAIL TO ACRE
In the month of March, 1191, Philip left Sicily and sailed to Acre. His appearance was regarded as a divine blessing; in the moment of elation the attacks were renewed; but orders were soon given for suspending them till the arrival of Richard, and it is more rational to think that the improbability of success without him was Philip’s motive, and not the specious reason that as the cause was common, the victory should be common also. Before his departure from Sicily, Richard avowed that he would lead a life of virtue, and with all humility submitted his back to the scourges of his clergy. He was detained for a short time on account of the expected arrival of his mother Eleanor with the princess Berengaria of Navarre, to whom he had been affianced, long before his treaty with Philip gave him liberty of marriage.
About a fortnight after the departure of his rival, the English monarch set sail. In the absence of numerical statements concerning the strength of his army, we can conjecture that it was formidable from the fact that his soldiers, horses, and stores filled two hundred ships of various sizes. A storm dispersed his fleet, and he heard at Rhodes that two of his vessels had been stranded on the shores of Cyprus, and that the people of the island had plundered and imprisoned such of the crews as had survived shipwreck. The vessel which carried the dowager queen of Sicily had been refused entrance into port. The English therefore landed on the shores of Cyprus; the archers as usual preceded to clear the way; their barbed arrows fell like showers of rain on the meadows, and supported by the heavily armed soldiers they drove the emperor and his Greeks into the interior of the island. The ruler of Cyprus was of the race of Comnenus, but he had changed his government into a kingdom. Isaac was taken; the king of England became lord of Cyprus; he taxed the people to the dreadful amount of the half of their movables, and then accorded to them the rights they had enjoyed under the dominion of the Byzantine emperors.
Richard reposed himself from the toil of conquest by celebrating his marriage with Berengaria. But in a few weeks he roused himself to arms. His fleet left Cyprus; a large troop ship[61] of Saladin crossed his way; the light galleys surrounded and attacked her, but the lofty sides of the Turk could not be mounted. “I will crucify all my soldiers if she should escape,” exclaimed Richard. His men, more in dread of their sovereign’s wrath than the swords of the foe, impelled the sharp beaks of their vessels against the enemy; some of the soldiers dived into the sea, and seized the rudder; and others came to close combat with the Saracens. In order to make the capture an unprofitable one, the emir commanded his troops to cut through the sides of their ship till the waters should rush in. They then leaped on the decks of the English galleys. But the sanguinary and ungenerous Richard killed or cast overboard his defenceless enemies, or, with an avarice equally detestable, saved the commanders for the sake of their ransom.
Shouts of warm and gratulatory acclamations saluted the English on their arrival at Acre. The brilliant scene before them was calculated to excite all the animating feelings of warriors. The martial youth of Europe were assembled on the plain in all the pride and pomp of chivalry. The splendid tents, the gorgeous ensigns, the glittering weapons, the armorial cognisances, displayed the varieties of individual fancy and national peculiarities. On the eminences in the distance the thick embattled squadrons of the sultan were encamped. The mameluke Tatar was armed with his bow; the people of the higher Egypt with their flails and scourges; and the Bedouins with their spears and small round shields. The brazen drum sounded the note of war; and the black banner of Saladin was raised in proud defiance of the crimson standard of the cross.
DISSENSION BETWEEN THE FRENCH AND ENGLISH KINGS
The joy with which the French regarded the English was soon changed for the bitter feelings of military envy and national hatred. The religious objects of the war appeared to be forgotten. The Genoese and Templars sided with Philip; and the Pisans and Hospitallers with Richard. The king of France prepared his soldiers and their battering engines for a vigorous and general assault on the walls of Acre; and murmured revenge when his martial competitor declined co-operation on the ground of illness. The choicest part of the French troops marched to the walls, eager to shame the English.
But high as was the valour of the assailants, their numbers were not adequate; and they were repulsed in every point. When Saladin, however, attempted to carry destruction into the army and camp of his baffled foes, he was driven back with loss. The French reappeared as assailants; but once again displayed their imprudent spirit. In sickness and in convalescence Richard was carried to his military engines on a mattress, and was so active in making and using his petrariæ, that he soon destroyed half of one of the Turkish towers. He preserved his machines from the Greek fire of the city; and he rewarded his balistarii for every stone which they removed from the walls. The ditch was filled up; the tower was completely levelled; and the English heroes, particularly the earl of Leicester and the bishop of Salisbury, prepared to enter the breach. The conflict was close and sanguinary. The Pisans came to the assistance of the English, but the fury of the Turks was irresistible and the walls were cleared of the enemy.
