a stain on his
celebrated victories. When Saladin refused to ratify the capitulation
of Acre, the king of England ordered all his prisoners, to the number
of five thousand, to be butchered; and the Saracens found themselves
obliged to retaliate upon the Christians by a like cruelty [n].
Saladin died at Damascus soon after concluding this truce with the
princes of the crusade: it is memorable that, before he expired, he
ordered his winding-sheet to be carried as a standard through every
street of the city; while a crier went before, and proclaimed with a
loud voice, THIS IS ALL THAT REMAINS TO THE MIGHTY SALADIN, THE
CONQUEROR OF THE EAST. By his last will he ordered charities to be
distributed to the poor without distinction of Jew, Christian, or
Mahometan.
[FN [n] Hoveden, p. 697. Bened. Abb. p. 673. M. Paris, p. 115.
Vinisauf, p. 346. W. Heming. p. 531.]

[MN 1192. The king's return from Palestine.]
There remained, after the truce, no business of importance to detain
Richard in Palestine; and the intelligence which he received,
concerning the intrigues of his brother John, and those of the King of
France, made him sensible that his presence was necessary in Europe.
As he dared not to pass through France, be sailed to the Adriatic; and
being shipwrecked near Aquileia, he put on the disguise of a pilgrim,
with a purpose of taking his journey secretly through Germany.
Pursued by the governor of Istria, he was forced out of the direct
road to England, and was obliged to pass by Vienna, [MN 20th Dec.]
where his expenses and liberalities betrayed the monarch in the habit
of the pilgrim; and he was arrested by orders of Leopold, Duke of
Austria. This prince had served under Richard at the siege of Acre;
but being disgusted by some insult of that haughty monarch, he was so
ungenerous as to seize the present opportunity of gratifying at once
his avarice and revenge; and he threw the king into prison. [MN
1193.] The emperor, Henry VI., who also considered Richard as an
enemy, on account of the alliance contracted by him with Tancred, King
of Sicily, despatched messengers to the Duke of Austria, required the
royal captive to be delivered to him, and stipulated a large sum of
money as a reward for this service. [MN Captivity in Germany.] Thus,
the King of England, who had filled the whole world with his renown,
found himself, during the most critical state of his affairs, confined
in a dungeon, and loaded with irons,