tions of Saladin with our King. Richard's terms were,
Restore the True Cross, empty us Acre of men-at-arms, leave two thousand
hostages. This was accepted at last. The Kings rode into Acre on the
twelfth of July with their hosts, and the hollow-eyed courtesans watched
them furtively from upper windows. They knew their harvest was to reap.

Harvest with them was seed-time with others. It was seed-time with the
Archduke. King Richard set up his household in the Castle (with a good
lodging for Jehane in the Street of the Camel); King Philip, miserably
ill, went to the house of the Templars; with him, sedulously his friend,
the Marquess of Montferrat. But Luitpold of Austria proposed himself for
the Castle, and Richard endured him as well as he could. But then
Luitpold went further. He set up his banner on the tower, side by side
with Richard's Dragon, meaning no offence at all. Now King Richard's way
was a short way. He had found the Archduke a burdensome ass, but no
more. The world was full of such; one must take them as part of the
general economy of Providence. But he knew his own worth perfectly well,
and his own standing in the host; so when they told him where the
Austrian's flag flew, he said, 'Take it down.' They took it down.
Luitpold grew red, made a long speech in German at which Richard
frowned, and another (shorter) in Latin, at which he laughed. Luitpold
put up his flag again; again Richard said, 'Take it down.' Luitpold was
so angry that he made no speeches at all; he ran up his flag a third
time. When King Richard was told, he laughed, and on this occasion said,
'Throw it away.' Gaston of Bearn, more vivacious than discreet, did so
with ignominious detail. That day there was a council of the great
estates, at which King Philip presided in a furred gown; for though the
weather was suffocating his fever kept him chill to the bones. To the
Marquess, pale with his old grudge, was now added the Archduke, flaming
with his new one. The mottled Duke of Burgundy blinked approval of all
grudges, and young Saint-Pol poured fire into the fire. Richard was not
present, nor any of his faction; they, because they had not been
advertised, he, because he was in the Street of the Camel at the knees
of Jehane the Fair.

The Archduke began on the instant. 'By God, my lords,' he said, 'is
there in the world a beast more flagrant than the King of England not
killed already?' The Marquess showed the white rims of his eyes--'
Inj