but the feelings so aroused were as nought to the enthusiasm which
greeted the address of the friar.

Meagre and pale, with a worn, anxious face as one who had suffered much,
the friar, holding aloft two pieces of wood from the Mount of Olives tied
together in the form of a cross, harangued the crowd. His words poured
forth in a fiery stream, kindling the hearts, and stirring at once the
devotion and the anger of his listeners.

He told of the holy places, he spoke of the scenes of Holy Writ, which
had there been enacted; and then he depicted the men who had died for
them. He told of the knights and men-at-arms, each of whom proved himself
again and again a match for a score of infidels. He spoke of the holy
women, who, fearlessly and bravely, as the knights themselves, had borne
their share in the horrors of the siege and in the terrible times which
had preceded it.

He told them that this misfortune had befallen Christianity because of
the lukewarmness which had come upon them.

"What profited it," he asked, "if the few knights who remained to defend
the holy sepulchre were heroes? A few heroes cannot withstand an army. If
Christendom after making a mighty effort to capture the holy sepulchre
had not fallen away, the conquest which had been made with so vast an
expenditure of blood would not have been lost. This is a work in which no
mere passing fervour will avail; bravery at first, endurance afterwards,
are needed. Many men must determine not only to assist to wrest the holy
sepulchre from the hands of the infidels, but to give their lives, so
long as they might last, to retaining it. It is scarce to be expected
that men with wives and families will take a view like this, indeed it is