insult: individuals were obliged to depend for safety
on their own force, or their private alliances: and valour was the
only excellence which was held in esteem, or gave one man the
pre-eminence above another. When all the particular superstitions,
therefore, were here united in one great object, the ardour for
military enterprises took the same direction; and Europe, impelled by
its two ruling passions, was loosened, as it were, from its
foundations, and seemed to precipitate itself in one united body upon
the East.
[FN [n] Order. Vital. p. 720.]

All orders of men, deeming the crusades the only road to Heaven,
enlisted themselves under these sacred banners, and were impatient to
open the way with their sword to the holy city. Nobles, artisans,
peasants, even priests [o], enrolled their names; and to decline this
meritorious service, was branded with the reproach of impiety, or what
perhaps was esteemed still more disgraceful, of cowardice and
pusillanimity [p]. The infirm and aged contributed to the expedition
by presents and money; and many of them, not satisfied with the merit
of this atonement, attended it in person, and were determined, if
possible, to breathe their last in sight of that city where their
Saviour had died for them. Women themselves, concealing their sex
under the disguise of armour, attended the camp; and commonly forgot
still more the duty of their sex, by prostituting themselves, without
reserve, to the army [q]. The greatest criminals were forward in a
service which they regarded as a propitiation for all crimes; and the
most enormous disorders were, during the course of those expeditions,
committed by men inured to wickedness, encouraged by example, and
impelled by necessity. The multitude of the adventurers soon became
so great, that their more sagacious leaders, Hugh, Count of
Vermandois, brother to the French king, Raymond, Count of Toulouse,
Godfrey of Bouillon, Prince of Brabant, and Stephen, Count of Blois,
became apprehensive lest the greatness itself of the armament should
disappoint its purpose; and they permitted an undisciplined multitude,
computed at three hundred thousand men, to go before them, under the
command of Peter the Hermit, and Walter the Moneyless [s]. These men
took the road towards Constantinople through Hungary and Bulgaria; and
trusting that Heaven, by supernatural assistance, would supply all
their necessities, they made no provision for subsistence on th