While they were being defeated in this manner, and were fleeing day
and night from the face of the Franks, the prince who ruled Nicaea,
[135] frightened out of his mind, after the siege had ended, happened
to meet a group of ten thousand Arabs, who said to him, "O least of
men, why are you fleeing in miserable fright?" He replied, "I
thought that I had destroyed and killed every last Frank, and I
thought that I would deliver them to eternal captivity; I assumed
that I would conquer them as they moved forward in small groups, and
I would bind them and lead them away to distant lands. But a large
army appeared, and the fields and mountains were covered with great
numbers of them, and they seemed to occupy every inch of our entire
land." The capture which he mentioned referred to the army of Peter
the Hermit, and the multitude that followed to those who lately had
subjugated Nicaea. "There, when we had seen an army of so many
people, with divisions growing like wheat, against whom we judged
correctly that we stood no chance of defending ourselves (for there
was no safe place), we thought it best to escape imminent death by
fleeing swiftly. Although we are now at some distance, nevertheless
we are shaken by the terrible memory of those men whom we saw, and
the momentary encounter has left us frightened of their ferocity. If
you have any faith in my report of what happened, you will retreat
from this place because, if their forces find you here, you will
undoubtedly pay for your folly many times over." They decided that
what they heard was credible, quickly reversed direction,[136] and
scattered all over Romania.

Meanwhile our men were intent on pursuing the fleeing Turks, who,
when they passed through cities and forts, boastfully proclaimed that
they had conquered the Franks, thus deluding the inhabitants of the
lands through which they traveled with lying words. "We have