the people, that,
at the sight of the first city or castle beyond the limits of their
knowledge, they were ready to ask whether that was not the Jerusalem,
the term and object of their labors. Yet the more prudent of the
crusaders, who were not sure that they should be fed from heaven with
a shower of quails or manna, provided themselves with those precious
metals, which, in every country, are the representatives of every
commodity. To defray, according to their rank, the expenses of the
road, princes alienated their provinces, nobles their lands and castles,
peasants their cattle and the instruments of husbandry. The value of
property was depreciated by the eager competition of multitudes; while
the price of arms and horses was raised to an exorbitant height by the
wants and impatience of the buyers. Those who remained at home, with
sense and money, were enriched by the epidemical disease: the sovereigns
acquired at a cheap rate the domains of their vassals; and the
ecclesiastical purchasers completed the payment by the assurance of
their prayers. The cross, which was commonly sewed on the garment, in
cloth or silk, was inscribed by some zealots on their skin: a hot iron,
or indelible liquor, was applied to perpetuate the mark; and a crafty
monk, who showed the miraculous impression on his breast was repaid with
the popular veneration and the richest benefices of Palestine.

The fifteenth of August had been fixed in the council of Clermont
for the departure of the pilgrims; but the day was anticipated by the
thoughtless and needy crowd of plebeians, and I shall briefly despatch
the calamities which they inflicted and suffered, before I enter on
the more serious and successful enterprise of the chiefs. Early in the
spring, from the confines of France and Lorraine, above sixty thousand
of the populace of both sexes flocked round the first missionary of the
crusade, and pressed him with clamorous importunity to lead them to the
holy sepulchre. The hermit, assuming the character, without the talents
or authority, of a general, impelled or obeyed the forward impulse of
his votaries along the banks of the Rhine and Danube. Their wants and
numbers soon compelled them to separate, and his lieutenant, Walter
the Penniless, a valiant though needy soldier, conducted a van guard of
pilgrims, whose condition may be determined from the proportion of eight
horsemen to fifteen thousand foot. The example and footsteps of Peter
were clo