bassadors, in their master's name,
renounced him as a vassal to the crown of France, and declared all
his fiefs to be forfeited to his liege lord. The emperor, that he
might render him more impatient for the recovery of his liberty, and
make him submit to the payment of a larger ransom, treated him with
the greatest severity, and reduced him to a condition worse than that
of the meanest malefactor. He was even produced before the diet of
the empire at Worms, and accused by Henry of many crimes and
misdemeanours; of making an alliance with Tancred, the usurper of
Sicily; of turning the arms of the crusade against a Christian prince,
and subduing Cyprus; of affronting the Duke of Austria before Acre; of
obstructing the progress of the Christian arms by his quarrels with
the King of France; of assassinating Conrade, Marquis of Montferrat;
and of concluding a truce with Saladin, and leaving Jerusalem in the
hands of the Saracen emperor [w]. Richard, whose spirit was not
broken by his misfortunes, and whose genius was rather roused by these
frivolous or scandalous imputations; after premising, that his dignity
exempted him from answering before any jurisdiction, except that of
Heaven; yet condescended, for the sake of his reputation, to justify
his conduct before that great assembly. He observed, that he had no
hand in Tancred's elevation, and only concluded a treaty with a prince
whom he found in possession of the throne; that the king, or rather
tyrant of Cyprus, had provoked his indignation by the most ungenerous
and unjust proceedings; and though he chastised this aggressor, he had
not retarded a moment the progress of his chief enterprise: that if he
had at any time been wanting in civility to the Duke of Austria, he
had already been sufficiently punished for that sally of passion; and
it better became men, embarked together in so holy a cause, to forgive
each other's infirmities, than to pursue a slight offence with such
unrelenting vengeance: that it had sufficiently appeared by the event,
whether the King of France or he were most zealous for the conquest of
the Holy Land, and were most likely to sacrifice private passions and
animosities to that great object: that if the whole tenour of his life
had not shown him incapable of a base assassination, and justified him
from that imputation in the eyes of his very enemies, it was in vain
for him, at present, to make his apology, or plead the many
irrefragable argumen