mpestuous, that the mariners thought it dangerous to put to sea:
but the king hurried on board, and ordered them to set sail instantly;
telling them that they never yet heard of a king that was drowned.[*]
By this vigor and celerity he delivered the citadel of Mans from its
present danger, and pursuing Helie into his own territories, he laid
siege to Majol, a small castle in those parts: {1100.} but a wound which
he received before this place, obliged him to raise the siege; and he
returned to England.

The weakness of the greatest monarchs during this age, in their
military expeditions against their nearest neighbors, appears the more
surprising, when we consider the prodigious numbers, which even petty
princes, seconding the enthusiastic rage of the people, were able
to assemble, and to conduct in dangerous enterprises to the remote
provinces of Asia. William earl of Poitiers and duke of Guienne,
inflamed with the glory and not discouraged by the misfortunes, which
had attended the former adventurers in the crusades, had put himself at
the head of an immense multitude, computed by some historians to amount
to sixty thousand horse, and a much greater number of foot,[**] and he
purposed to lead them into the Holy Land against the infidels. He wanted
money to forward the preparations requisite for this expedition, and he
offered to mortgage all his dominions to William, without entertaining
any scruple on account of that rapacious and iniquitous hand to which he
resolved to consign them.[***]

[* W. Malms, p. 124. H. Hunting, p. 378. M. Paris,
p. 33. Ypod. Neust. p. 442.]

[** W. Malms, p. 149. The whole is said, by Order.
Vitalie (p. 789) to amount to three hundred thousand men.]

[*** W. Maims, p. 127.]

The king accepted the offer; and had prepared a fleet and an army, in
order to escort the money and take possession of the rich provinces of
Guienne and Poictou; when an accident put an end to his life, and to all
his ambitious projects. He was engaged in hunting, the sole amusement,
and indeed the chief occupation of princes in those rude times, when
society was little cultivated and the arts afforded few objects worthy
of attention. Walter Tyrrel, a French gentleman, remarkable for his
address in archery, attended him in this recreation, of which the new
forest was the scene: and as William had dismounted after a chase,
Tyrrel, impatient to show his dexterity, let fly an arrow at a stag