esire, shall be willing
to march away, place the cross behind him, between his shoulders; for
thus he will fulfil the precept of the Lord, who said, 'He that doth not
take up his cross and follow me, is not worthy of me.'"

These words aroused a new enthusiasm. The desire to assume the cross
spread like a contagion through the crowd. Adhemar, bishop of Puy, was
the first to receive it from the pope's hands. This emblem was of red
cloth, sewed on the right shoulder of the coat, or fastened on the front
of the helmet. In haste the crowd sought materials to make it. The
passion for wearing the cross spread like wild fire through Europe.
Peter the Hermit, seconded by the pope, had given birth to the Crusades.

The first outburst of enthusiasm was, as always, the strongest. It has
been said that in the spring of 1096 six million souls took the road to
Palestine. This is, doubtless, a vast exaggeration, but great numbers
set out, and an immense multitude of ignorant and enthusiastic people
pushed tumultuously towards the Holy Land, in advance of the organized
armies of the First Crusade.

As early as the 8th of March, 1096, great mobs--they cannot fairly be
called armies--began their journey towards Palestine. They were not only
composed of armed men; women and children made up part of them; whole
families abandoned their villages; and without organization or
provisions, or a knowledge of what lay before them, the ignorant and
enthusiastic mass pushed onward with unquestioning faith.

The first body of these enthusiasts, led by a poor knight called Walter
the Penniless, was cut to pieces by the natives of Bulgaria, a few only
reaching Constantinople. A second multitude, forty thousand strong, was
headed by Peter the Hermit. It was similar in character to the
preceding. Whenever a town came in sight on their way, the children
eagerly asked if that were Jerusalem. The elders were little better
informed. Onward they went, through Hungary, through Bulgaria, through
the provinces of the Greek empire, everywhere committing excesses,
everywhere treated as enemies by the incensed people, until the line of
march was strewn with their dead bodies. Peter the Hermit sought to
check their excesses, but in vain; and when, at length, a miserable
remnant of them reached Constantinople, the Emperor Alexius hastened to
convey them across the Bosphorus, to save the suburbs of his city from
their ravages.

In Asia Minor they were assailed b