their own personal glory. The consequence
was, that while the Saracens would naturally all rejoice at an
advantage gained over the enemy by any portion of their army, yet in
the camp of the Crusaders, if one body of knights performed a great
deed of strength or bravery which was likely to attract attention in
Europe, the rest were apt to be disappointed and vexed instead of
being pleased. They were envious of the fame which the successful
party had acquired. In a word, when an advantage was gained by any
particular body of troops, the rest did not think of the benefit to
the common cause which had thereby been secured, but only of the
danger that the fame acquired by those who gained it might eclipse or
outshine their own renown.

The various orders of knights and the commanders of the different
bodies of troops vied with each other, not only in respect to the
acquisition of glory, but also in the elegance of their arms, the
splendor of their tents and banners, the beauty and gorgeous
caparisons of the horses, and the pomp and parade with which they
conducted all their movements and operations. The camp was full of
quarrels, too, among the great leaders in respect to the command of
the places in the Holy Land which had been conquered in previous
campaigns. These places, as fast as they had been taken, had been made
principalities and kingdoms, to give titles of rank to the crusaders
who had taken them; and, though the places themselves had in many
instances been lost again, and given up to the Saracens, the titles
remained to be quarreled about among the Crusaders. There was
particularly a great quarrel at this time about the title of King of
Jerusalem. It was a mere empty title, for Jerusalem was in the hands
of the Saracens, but there were twenty very powerful and influential
claimants to it, each of whom manoeuvred and intrigued incessantly
with all the other knights and commanders in the army to gain
partisans to his side. Thus the camp of the Crusaders, from one cause
and another, had become one universal scene of rivalry, jealousy, and
discord.

There was a small approach toward a greater degree of unity of feeling
just before the time of Richard's arrival, produced by the common
danger to which they began to see they were exposed. They had been now
two years besieging Acre, and had accomplished nothing. All the
furious attempts that they had made to storm the place had been
unsuccessful. The walls were too thi