and whose chief desire was to
live in peace.

[Illustration: BIBLE OF BALDWIN'S QUEEN.]

Things remained in this unsatisfactory state till the close of the year
1145, when Edessa, the strong frontier town of the Christian kingdom, fell
into the hands of the Saracens. The latter were commanded by Zenghi, a
powerful and enterprising monarch, and, after his death, by his son
Nourheddin, as powerful and enterprising as his father. An unsuccessful
attempt was made by the Count of Edessa to regain the fortress, but
Nourheddin with a large army came to the rescue, and after defeating the
count with great slaughter, marched into Edessa and caused its
fortifications to be razed to the ground, that the town might never more
be a bulwark of defence for the kingdom of Jerusalem. The road to the
capital was now open, and consternation seized the hearts of the
Christians. Nourheddin, it was known, was only waiting for a favourable
opportunity to advance upon Jerusalem, and the armies of the cross,
weakened and divided, were not in a condition to make any available
resistance. The clergy were filled with grief and alarm, and wrote
repeated letters to the Pope and the sovereigns of Europe, urging the
expediency of a new Crusade for the relief of Jerusalem. By far the
greater number of the priests of Palestine were natives of France, and
these naturally looked first to their own country. The solicitations they
sent to Louis VII. were urgent and oft repeated, and the chivalry of
France began to talk once more of arming in defence of the birthplace of
Jesus. The kings of Europe, whose interest it had not been to take any
part in the first Crusade, began to bestir themselves in this; and a man
appeared, eloquent as Peter the Hermit, to arouse the people as that
preacher had done.

We find, however, that the enthusiasm of the second did not equal that of
the first Crusade; in fact, the mania had reached its climax in the time
of Peter the Hermit, and decreased regularly from that period. The third
Crusade was less general than the second, and the fourth than the third,
and so on, until the public enthusiasm was quite extinct, and Jerusalem
returned at last to the dominion of its old masters without a convulsion
in Christendom. Various reasons have been assigned for this; and one very
generally put forward is, that Europe was wearied with continued
struggles, and had become sick of "precipitating itself upon Asia." M.
Guizot, in his admir