flaming barrier, and increasing the terrible thirst by which they were afflicted. In the meanwhile the archers of Saladin took possession of the commanding heights around, prepared to pour their arrows upon the devoted host of the Christians; and his cavalry, in overpowering numbers, occupied all the passes leading towards the lake.

The army of Palestine, however, after some short delay, moved forward to the battle, the Holy Cross being borne by the bishops of Acre and Lidda, and the advance guard led by the Count of Tripoli; while the main body of the enemy was commanded by Saladin in person, with his renowned nephew, Taki-eddin, at the head of the Mussulman van. A great mass of foot, it would appear, accompanied the Count of Tripoli, but this was composed of the peasantry of Palestine, who impeded rather than assisted his operations; and the knights who supported them were covered with heavy armour, which excited the astonishment of the historian, Emad-eddin, but which increased in a tremendous degree the fatigue and heat which they were destined to endure. As the Christians advanced to the charge, the Mussulman archers, from the heights, poured upon them a shower of arrows, which they themselves compare to a flight of locusts; and the Frankish infantry, thrown into confusion, attempted, without orders, to gain an elevation on which they might remain out of reach of the terrible shafts of the enemy.

As far as we can judge by the obscure accounts of that which is always, more or less, a scene of confusion, the Christian forces were attacked by the superior Mussulman force on both flanks, as well as in front; and while the Count of Tripoli, with the horse and foot under his command, was maintaining the battle in advance, the Hospitallers and Templars in the rear of the army were also carrying on a bloody and determined contest against a powerful corps of the Mahommedan troops.* The two grand masters, finding themselves overpowered, dispatched messengers to the king for aid; but Lusignan himself was under the arrows of the enemy, and his only resource was to order the Count of Tripoli to attack the main body of the sultan vigorously, and open a way to the lake of Tiberias.

The count accordingly charged down the side of a hill, accompanied by a number of the knights and nobles by whom he was surrounded; and Takieddin, to whom he was opposed at that moment, seeing the desperate fury with which he advanced, caused his battalions to open to receive the Christian prince, with the design of enveloping him in the masses of Turkish cavalry, and cutting his small corps to pieces. It is probable that had the Templars and Hospitallers been stationed in such a

Mr. Addison, in his "History of the Templars," seems to place them in the front of the battle, but the words of Coggeshall are not to be mistaken when he says, "In extrema parte exercitus."

position as to be enabled to support the Count, instead of being posted in the rear, the Mussulman line would have been broken, and the way to the lake opened. Unaided as he was, he cut his way through, though not without the loss of a large number of the knights by whom he was accompanied.

The Grand Master of the Hospital, Balian of Ibelin, and Renault of Sidon, together with several knights of the Temple and some other nobles, likewise made their escape from the battle when they found that all was lost; but the king, with Renault of Chatillon, the Bishops of Acre and Lidda, the Grand Master of the Temple, the Marquis of Montferrat, Geoffrey of Lusignan, and a large body of the military friars, as well as a crowd of foot soldiers, were left surrounded on every side by the victorious Mussulmans, while charge after charge of the Syrian and Egyptian cavalry, and flight after flight of arrows, thinned their ranks every moment, and threw them into irremediable confusion. They still protracted the struggle, however, for some time, and the Christian knights again and again bore down upon the enemy, endeavouring to hew a passage for the king. We have the authority of Saladin's own son, Afdal, for saying, that the sultan himself could not believe that such desperate efforts would prove unsuccessful, till he saw the tent of the king fall, when, descending from his horse, he cast himself upon the ground, and

with tears of joy gave thanks to God for the great victory he had gained.*

Thus ended the battle of Tiberiad, the most fatal event that had ever befallen the kingdom of Jeru

* Ibn Alatir, who apparently was present at this battle, does not seem to have been near Saladin; but the account given by Prince Afdal is extremely characteristic and picturesque. He says, "I was by the side of my father when the King of the Franks retired to the hill. The warriors who were around him charged and repulsed the Mussulmans to the bottom of the slope. I then looked at my father, and saw that his countenance was sad. Give the devil the lie,' he cried to the soldiers, tearing his beard. At those words, our army rushed upon the enemies, and drove them back to the top of the hill, while I, full of joy, exclaimed, They fly, they fly!' But the Franks returned to the charge, and came down again as far as the bottom of the hill, where they were again repulsed, and I began to cry once more, They fly, they fly!' Then my father looked at me, and said, Hold thy peace, they are not really defeated till the tent of the king falls. Scarcely had he finished speaking, however, when the tent fell.' Immediately my father dismounted, prostrated himself before God, and offered him thanks with tears of joy." The standard of the king was always before his tent, so that it was easy to distinguish the royal pavilion from the others which the unhappy remnant of the Christian army had attempted to raise upon Mount Hittin.

The calumnies which had been previously circulated regarding the Count of Tripoli, induced a number of Christian writers to believe that his escape from the field of battle was concerted with the enemy; but this is entirely and satisfactorily disproved by all the best accounts of the battle. Ibn-Alatir shows that he actually cut his way through, Taki-eddin opening his ranks to avoid the desperate charge of the count. Aboulfeda declares that the count," seeing how important it was to conquer, cast

salem since its first foundation by Godfrey of Bouillon and his companions. The number slain on the part of the Christians was immense; though it is impossible to estimate exactly the amount of

himself desperately into the fight, and charged the first line of the Mussulmans. Taki-eddin, Prince of Emad, caused his ranks to open to receive him and his followers, whom he surrounded and cut to pieces. The count, however, found means of escaping, and having reached Tripoli, died mad shortly after." Radulf of Coggeshall shows that the Count of Tripoli fought valiantly with the advanced guard, which was separated from the rest of the army, and surrounded by the enemy, and that he did not attempt to fly till he saw that the battle was lost, and that he could not rejoin the rest of the army. Bernard the Treasurer, though he does not mention that the count actually sustained the shock of the Turks, proves that he was in no degree in league with them by declaring that, although Tiberiad was but two miles distant, he did not dare to fly thither lest he should be taken; and although Boha-eddin declares that the count, to the injury of his reputation, fled from the battle at the beginning, without fighting (which is proved by eye-witnesses to be false) he shows that there was no compact between him and the Mussulmans, by asserting that a party was immediately despatched in pursuit of him. Even had this latter author sanctioned the charge against the Count of Tripoli, we should not have inclined to attach much weight to his statements, as he was not present; and notwithstanding his after intimacy with Saladin, many of his assertions in regard to this very battle are proved to be false by the eye-witnesses, respecting points on which he might have obtained better information. The strongest testimony, however, in favour of the Count of Tripoli, is that of Brother Terrick, Grand Preceptor of the Temple, who, in his circular letter, giving an account of the battle of Tiberiad to his order, says, "Scarcely could the