Which Humphry did.
The barons, acting on the advice of Raymond, were not slow in coming to tender their allegiance, with the exception of Sir Baldwin of Ramleh, who only sent his little son, praying Guy to receive his homage, which the king refused to do. Thereupon Baldwin came himself, and went through the necessary forms, saying, “Sir Guy, I do you homage, but as a man who would rather not hold lands under you.”
It was for his son’s sake, for the knight would not remain any longer in the country, and went away, “to the great joy of the Saracens.”
Raymond, meantime, was gone to Tiberias, where he waited to see what would happen. The first thing that happened was a succession of signs from heaven, manifestly importing disaster. As they happened on Mohammedan soil as well as Christian, it is presumed that the followers of Islam interpreted them in a contrary spirit. There were tempests and impetuous winds, hail as big as hens’ eggs, earthquakes, great waves, and rades de mer, while fire ran across the heavens, “and you would have sworn that all the elements were wrathful, detesting the excesses and vices of man.” It will be observed that even in portents there is a decadence in the Christian kingdom. Time was when knights in armour assailed cities in the heavens, and when great comets blazed in the east like swords hanging over a doomed country. We fall back now on hail and storm.
Raymond called in Saladin on learning that it was the king’s intention to besiege Tiberias. Saladin was glad of an excuse, and sent his son in command of a small army—Bernard says of seven thousand.[[70]]
[70]. Others say five hundred, which is more probable.
The Grand Master of the Templars went out to meet them. He had in all one hundred and forty knights with whom to confront this host. The knights fought, as they always did, gallantly and bravely; so bravely that they perished almost to a man, only the Master himself and a very few escaping. One knight, Jacques de Maillé, a Templar, performed such prodigies of valour that after he had fallen, the Turks cut up his garments and divided them, in memory of so valiant a man. It was in May that this disaster happened, the result of internal dissension. “And in this month,” says a chronicler, “when it is most fitting that roses should be gathered, the people of Nazareth went out to gather together the dead bodies of their valiant knights, and to give them burial.”
The Master of the Templars had got hastily back to Nazareth, and sent out messengers in all directions that he had gotten a signal victory over the Turks, and that all who wanted booty must hasten to his standard. They all flocked to him, like vultures, at the mention of booty, and he led them to the field where the dead bodies of his knights lay, the flower of the two orders. It is the keenest sarcasm on the cowardice and meanness of the people that we read of.
“Pudet hæc opprobria nobis
Et dici potuisse et non potuisse refelli.”