WHEN Henry, King of England, died of grief and weariness at the palace of the Plantagenets, on the banks of the Loire, Richard Coeur de Lion had reached the age of thirty-two, and won high renown among the warriors of his generation. His appearance was such as to give the idea of a man frank in friendship and formidable in war. His form was bulky and strong; his limbs long, but finely proportioned; and he had a fair face, set off with bright blue eyes and auburn hair, which he wore in curls. Array such a personage in a tunic of rose-colored satin, girded at the waist, with a mantle of striped silver tissue brocaded with half moons; hang at his belt a sword of Damascus steel, with a golden hilt, in a silver-scaled sheath; place on his head a scarlet bonnet, brocaded with gold; mount him on a Spanish steed, magnificently harnessed; and you will have some idea of Coeur de Lion, as he appeared to those contemporaries in whose company he went to do battle with the infidel.
Richard was a native of England, having first seen the light at Beaumont, near Oxford. During his father's life he had been the most refractory of sons, and taken a prominent part in those parricidal wars, which brought down our first Plantagenet King with sorrow to the grave. However, when the corpse of Henry was on its way from Chinon to its resting-place, Richard, touched with remorse, met the procession, and with signs of contrition accompanied the funeral to the abbey of Foutrevault, and made some slight atonement for breaches of filial duty by praying at the side of his father's corpse.
A few months after Henry had departed this life, Richard was welcomed in England, and invested with the symbols of sovereignty at Westminster. The coronation was rendered memorable by a fearful massacre of the Jews, which began in London and extended all over England.* Richard issued a proclamation taking the Jews under his protection; but he was in no frame of mind to exert himself much in their behalf. Ever since the conference of Gisors, he had been occupied with visions of battles in Palestine; and no sooner was the Confessor's crown placed on his head, than he bent his whole thoughts towards the East. Not content with the money exacted by his father as "the Saladin tenth," he turned his presence-chamber into a mart, and disposed of towns, castles, and demesne-lands to the highest bidder. Some of his ministers remonstrated, but in vain. " If I could find a proper purchaser," he said, " I would sell London itself." Having disposed of the earldom of Northumberland to Hugh Pudsey, Bishop of Durham, he jocosely boasted that " he had made a young earl out of an old bishop."
While occupied with the task of raising money for the crusade, Richard was reminded by a messenger from Philip that their departure was fixed for Easter, 1190. The King of England engaged upon oath to be ready at the time named; and, having nominated the Bishop of Durham as regent, repaired to Normandy, and held a great council at Rouen. The departure of the two Kings was then postponed to midsummer, when their magnificent armies mustered on the plains of Vezelay, and moved in company to Lyons. There they parted -- Philip to betake himself to Genoa, where he hoped to hire transports; Richard to march down the Rhone to Marseilles, where he expected to meet the English fleet.
Between the time of his meeting with William of Tyre at Gisors and his death in the palace of Chinon, Henry had built ships for his voyage to the East. Richard was thus enabled, besides other vessels of war, to launch fifty galleys of three banks of oars, and he moreover selected transports from the shipping in all his ports. The English King found himself, unlike other sovereigns, quite independent of Venice or Genoa, and had, in fact, at his command the most formidable fleet that Europe had ever seen.
It was from Dartmouth that the English ships sailed, with a magnificent display of banners and painted shields. Their voyage, however, was not fortunate. While crossing the Bay of Biscay, the ships were scattered in all directions; and many of them suffered so fearfully from the tempest and the waves, that their ultimate safety was ascribed to the interference of St. Edmund and Thomas a Becket.
Richard, on reaching Marseilles, learned with disappointment that the English fleet had not arrived. After waiting some days, his patience gave way; and having hired galleys to convey him to Genoa, he went on board, leaving the bulk of his army to embark for Sicily. Having sailed into the river Arno, and visited Pisa, he proceeded to the mouth of the Tiber, and was there met by a Cardinal, who welcomed him to the papal territories. The interview between Coeur de Lion and the Cardinal was not altogether satisfactory. The Cardinal, unfortunately, asked payment of some dues; and the King, in a rage, abused him, without regard to his spiritual character. Declining to visit Rome, Richard repaired to Naples, and rode up a lovely pass of the Appenines to Salerno.
When Coeur de Lion entered Calabria, and was passing through a village, unattended save by a single knight, he was informed that one of the inhabitants possessed a very fine hawk. The King, wanting some exciting sport, and understanding that the owner was merely a peasant, who had no right to keep such a bird, entered the man's tenement and seized it. The Calabrian rustic, not relishing the loss of his hawk, ran after the King, with the cry of " Stop thief!" The neighbors came to the spot with stones and sticks, and one of them with a sword made a thrust at Richard, who still kept the bird on his wrist. Enraged, Coeur de Lion struck the peasant with the back of his sword; and the blade breaking, he was in a helpless predicament, and forced to fly for his life to a priory. Reaching the coast, he pitched his tent near the cavern of Scylla; and next day, the fleet having appeared, with sounds of trumpets and clang of horns, he entered the port of Messina, where the French King had already arrived.
Philip Augustus now proposed to proceed to the East; but, the winds proving contrary, the crusaders determined upon wintering of Sicily. William the Good, the last of the Norman rulers in Sicily, had recently died, under the impression that his aunt, the Princess Constance, would succeed, and that Queen Joan, his widow, who was Richard's sister, would enjoy a magnificent dower. But so strong was the prejudice against the government of women, that Tan-cred, an illegitimate scion of the royal house of Sicily, had not only seized the throne of Constance, but withheld Joan's dower, and placed the royal widow in durance. Richard, indignant at his sister being so treated, demanded that she should be restored to liberty, and that she should be paid her dower. Tancrcd, complying with one demand, sent Joan to Messina; but hesitated about the dower. Richard, not to be trifled with, crossed the straits, placed his sister in the Castle of Baynard, and returning to Messina, expelled the monks from a monastery, and converted it into a store-house. Next day, when his soldiers were strolling through the town, they were set upon by the inhabitants, who killed them without mercy, and closed the gates of the town. The crusaders, enraged at this outrage, were about to scale the walls; but Richard, riding among them, compelled them to fall back; and going to the French camp, he there had an interview with the magistrates, and obtained promises of redress.
But, ere this, mischief had appeared in another form. The English crusaders had begun to quarrel with those from France; and Philip, with the chief men of Messina, repaired to the English King's tent to complain and remonstrate. Richard was promising redress, when the conference was interrupted in a way which made his blood boil. In fact, while the Kings were in council, a band of Sicilians, gathering on the hills over the English camp, threatened an assault, and wounded a knight of Normandy, whom chance threw in their way. The sight kindled Richard's ire, and, rushing out, with vows of vengeance, he led his soldiers up the hillside, repulsed the Sicilians, chased them to their gates, and taking the city by storm, planted the flag of England on the highest tower. The French, however, lent no assistance; and Philip, who seemed rather inclined to take part with the Sicilians, expressed such indignation, that Richard was under the necessity of lowering his standard and committing the city to the Templars and Knights of St. John.
Tancred now began to comprehend the man with whom he had to deal. Warned by the past, the Sicilian King came to terms, paid a large part of Joan's demand, and plighted the hand of his infant daughter to Richard's nephew, Arthur, Duke of Brittany. But the winter, though enlivened by a magnificent banquet, which Richard gave at Christmas, wore slowly away; and disputes soon broke out between the Kings.
When a boy, Richard had been contracted in marriage to Alice, Philip's sister, and the Princess with her dowry, had been placed in Henry's custody. Engaged in war, Richard paid little attention to his betrothed; and it was not till incited by his mother, that he demanded her hand. Henry, however, exhibited no inclination to grant his son's request; and Richard, while taking part in a tournament at Pampe-luna, became enamored of Berengaria, daughter of the King of Navarre. On ascending the English throne, he deputed his mother to demand Berengaria in marriage; and the mission having been crowned with success, Berengaria arrived at Messina, and was placed under the protection of Queen Joan. Philip, on seeing this, charged Richard, with breach of a matrimonial treaty; and Richard, putting aside all delicacy, informed Philip, that Alice had wrecked her maiden reputation by a scandalous intrigue. High words, of course, passed between the comrades-inarms; but at length, when spring arrived, Philip, finding that the case would not bear discussion, corn-pounded the dispute for a sum of money, and leaving the English King to celebrate his marriage, set sail for Acre.
After the departure, of Philip, Richard became too enthusiastic to delay his enterprise for his wedding; and embarking in one galley, while Berengaria, under the auspices of Queen Joan, embarked in another, he sailed for the Holy Land. The voyage was interrupted by a tempest which scattered the fleet, and Richard reached Rhodes without his bride, whose galley had taken refuge at Cyprus. Richard, learning that two of his ships had been maltreated at Cyprus, sailed thither with his fleet; and no sooner did he recognize the galley in which Berengaria and Queen Joan were, than he concluded they had been injured, and vowed vengeance on the islanders.
Cyprus was inhabited by Greeks, and governed by a prince of imperial lineage, who styled himself "Isaac, Emperor of Cyprus." With an idea of resisting the crusaders, this potentate ranged his troops along the shore, and placed some galleys at the mouth of the harbor. But his bravado had not the intended effect. Hardly, indeed, had Richard become aware that he was defied, when he siezed his ponderous battle-axe, leaped into a boat, and chasing the Emperor to Nicosia, took possession of Limisso. Next morning, however, Isaac sent to sue for peace; and Richard expressing his readiness to negotiate, met the Emperor outside the city. A reconciliation then took place; and Isaac engaged to pay Richard a large sum in gold, to follow the English to Palestine with a well-appointed force, and to give his youthful daughter as a hostage for his good faith.
Matters had scarcely been thus arranged, when Isaac escaped, and again attempted resistance. But Richard was not to be baffled. After cutting off the wily Greek's flight by sea, the English King marched upon the capital, and took Isaac's daughter prisoner. This last circumstance was too much for the Emperor of Cyprus. He left his stronghold, threw himself at the King's feet, and offered his own life for his child's freedom. Richard, while detaining the Princess, ordered her father to be put in chains. The crestfallen Cypriot entreated that he might not be disgraced by bonds of iron, and Richard, laughing, ordered chains of silver to be forged for the imperial captive.
No pity appears to have been felt for Isaac, when thus deprived of his crown and liberty. Indeed, Geoffrey de Vinsauf, an Anglo-Norman monk, who accompanied the crusaders, and wrote, in their camp, a history of the expedition, treats the Emperor as the worst of human beings. " He was the most wicked of men," says Vinsauf, " surpassing Judas in treachery, and wantonly persecuting all who professed the Christian religion. He was said to be a friend of Saladin, and it was reported that they had drunk each other's blood, as a sign and testimony of mutual treaty, as if, by the mingling of blood outwardly, they might become kinsmen in reality."
Having reduced Cyprus, Richard resolved on being crowned king of the island, and remaining to solemnize his marriage. A grand feast was accordingly proclaimed; and when Berengaria had, in the month of May, become Queen of England, the English crusaders embarked in their vessels, hoisted their sails, and steered for Acre.
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From John G. Edgar
The Crusades and the Crusaders, 1860
