vast multitude, carried away by enthusiasm, swore to win the holy
sepulchre or to die.

"Mighty was the throng that gathered for the First Crusade. Monks threw
aside their gowns and took to the sword and cuirass; even women and
children joined in the throng. What, my son, could be expected from a
great army so formed? Without leaders, without discipline, without
tactics, without means of getting food, they soon became a scourge of the
country through which they passed.

"Passing through Hungary, where they greatly ravaged the fields, they
came to Bulgaria. Here the people, struck with astonishment and dismay at
this great horde of hungry people who arrived among them like locusts,
fell upon them with the sword, and great numbers fell. The first band
that passed into that country perished miserably, and of all that huge
assembly, it may be said that, numbering, at the start, not less than
250,000 persons, only about 100,000 crossed into Asia Minor. The fate of
these was no better than that of those who had perished in Hungary and
Bulgaria. After grievous suffering and loss they at last reached Nicaea.
There they fell into an ambuscade; and out of the whole of the
undisciplined masses who had followed Peter the Hermit, it is doubtful
whether 10,000 ever returned home.

"This first attempt to rescue the holy sepulchre was followed by others
equally wild, misguided, and unfortunate. Some of them indeed began their
evil deeds as soon as they had left their home. The last of these bodies
fell upon the Jews, who are indeed enemies of the Christian faith, but
who have now, at least, nothing to do with the question of the holy
sepulchre. As soon as they entered into Germany the Crusaders put them to
death with horrible torture. Plunder and rapine indeed appeared to be the