is vow to the letter.

Fourteen days sufficed to bring the siege to an end. The Christians
had done what they could to destroy the military engines of their
enemies; the golden ornaments of the churches had been melted down and
turned into money; but no solid advantage was gained by all their
efforts. The conviction of the Christian that death brought salvation
to the champions of the cross, the assurance of the Moslem that to
those who fell fighting for the creed of Islam the gates of paradise
were at once opened, only added to the desperation of the combatants
and to the fearfulness of the carnage. At length the besieged
discovered that the walls near the gate of St. Stephen had been
undermined, and at once they abandoned all hope of safety except from
miraculous intervention. Clergy and laity crowded into the churches,
their fears quickened by the knowledge that the Greeks within the city
were treating with the enemy.

The remembrance of Saladin's offer now came back with more persuasive
power; but to the envoys whom they sent the stern answer was returned
that he was under a vow to deal with the Christians as Godfrey and his
fellows had dealt with the Saracens. Yet, conscious or unconscious of
the inconsistency of his words with the oath which he professed to
have sworn, he promised them his mercy if they would at once surrender
the city. The besieged resolved to trust the word of the conqueror, as
they could not resist his power. The agreement was made that the
nobles and fighting men should be taken to Tyre, which still held out
under Conrad; that the Latin inhabitants should be redeemed at the
rate of ten crowns of gold for each man, five for each woman, one for
each child; and that failing this ransom, they should remain slaves.
On the sick and the helpless he waged no war; and although the Knights
of the Hospital were among the most determined of his enemies, he
would allow their brethren to remain for a year in their attendance on
the sufferers who could not be moved away.

In the exasperation of a religious warfare now extended over nearly a
century these terms were very merciful. It may be said that this mercy
was the right of a people who submitted to the invader, and that in
the days of Godfrey and Peter the Hermit the defenders had resisted to
the last. It is enough to answer that the capitulation of the Latins
was a superfluous ceremony and that Saladin knew it to be so, while,
if the same submission