ll flourishing line of princes. His father had left
the Catholic church, and joined the Protestants, but he himself returned
to Catholicism, and won fame by his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, described
in both Polish and Latin in the work _Peregrinatio Hierosolymitana_.
Besides, he offered 5000 ducats for the purchase of extant copies of the
Protestant "Radziwill Bible," published by his father, intending to have
them destroyed. On his return journey from the Holy Land he was attacked
at Pescara by robbers, and at Ancona on a Palm Sunday, according to his
own account, he found himself destitute of means. He applied to the
papal governor, but his story met with incredulity. Then he appealed to
a Jewish merchant, offering him, as a pawn, a gold box made of a piece
of the holy cross obtained in Palestine, encircled with diamonds, and
bearing on its top the _Agnus dei_. The Jew advanced one hundred crowns,
which sufficed exactly to pay his lodging and attendants. Needy as
before, he again turned to the Jew, who gave him another hundred crowns,
this time without exacting a pledge, a glance at his papal passport
having convinced him of the prince's identity.[73]

This is Radziwill's account in his itinerary. As far as it goes, it
bears striking similarity to the narrative of Rabbi Pinchas of Anspach,
and leads to the certain conclusion that the legend rests upon an
historical substratum. A critic has justly remarked that the most vivid
fancy could not, one hundred and thirty-one years after their
occurrence, invent, in Anspach, the tale of a Polish magnate's
adventures in Italy. Again, it is highly improbable that Saul Wahl's
great-grandson read Prince Radziwill's Latin book, detailing his
experiences to his contemporaries.

There are other witnesses to plead for the essential truth of our
legend. The rabbis mentioned before have given accounts of Saul's
position, of his power, and the splendor of his life. Negative signs, it
is true, exist, arguing against the historical value of the legend.
Polish history has not a word to say about the ephemeral king. In fact,
there was no day fixed for the session of the electoral diet. Moreover,
critics might adduce against the probability of its correctness the
humble station of the Jews, and the low esteem in which the Radziwills
were then held by the Polish nobility. But it is questionable whether
these arguments are sufficiently convincing to strip the Saul Wahl
legend of all semblance of