had brought. When he saw the fields covered with innumerable tents,
in understandably human fashion he retreated, judging that no mortal
power could help those shut up in the city. A man of the utmost
probity, energetic, pre-eminent in his love of truth, thinking
himself unable to bring help to them, certain that they would die, as
all the evidence indicated, he decided to protect himself, thinking
that he would incur no shame by saving himself for a opportune moment.

Guibert concludes his defense of Stephen's questionable behavior with
a skillful use of counter-attack:

And I certainly think that his flight (if, however, it should be
called a flight, since the count was certainly ill), after which the
dishonorable act was rectified by martyrdom, was superior to the
return of those who, persevering in their pursuit of foul pleasure,
descended into the depths of criminal behavior. Who could claim that
count Stephen and Hugh the Great, who had always been honorable,
because they had seemed to retreat for this reason, were comparable
to those who had steadfastly behaved badly?

One of the functions of the panegyric he composes for martyred
Crusader is to make Guibert's own rank clear, present, and
significant:

We have heard of many who, captured by the pagans and ordered to deny
the sacraments of faith, preferred to expose their heads to the sword
than to betray the Christian faith in which they had been instructed.
Among them I shall select one, knight and an aristocrat, but more
illustrious for his character than all others of his family or social
class I have ever known. From the time he was a child I knew him,