trayed into a camp destitute of water: he fled on the first onset,
with the curses of both nations: [60] Lusignan was overthrown, with the
loss of thirty thousand men; and the wood of the true cross (a dire
misfortune!) was left in the power of the infidels. [601] The royal captive
was conducted to the tent of Saladin; and as he fainted with thirst and
terror, the generous victor presented him with a cup of sherbet, cooled
in snow, without suffering his companion, Reginald of Chatillon, to
partake of this pledge of hospitality and pardon. "The person and
dignity of a king," said the sultan, "are sacred, but this impious
robber must instantly acknowledge the prophet, whom he has blasphemed,
or meet the death which he has so often deserved." On the proud or
conscientious refusal of the Christian warrior, Saladin struck him on
the head with his cimeter, and Reginald was despatched by the guards.
[61] The trembling Lusignan was sent to Damascus, to an honorable prison
and speedy ransom; but the victory was stained by the execution of two
hundred and thirty knights of the hospital, the intrepid champions and
martyrs of their faith. The kingdom was left without a head; and of
the two grand masters of the military orders, the one was slain and the
other was a prisoner. From all the cities, both of the sea-coast and the
inland country, the garrisons had been drawn away for this fatal field:
Tyre and Tripoli alone could escape the rapid inroad of Saladin; and
three months after the battle of Tiberias, he appeared in arms before
the gates of Jerusalem. [62]

[Footnote 58: For the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, see William of Tyre,
from the ixth to the xxiid book. Jacob a Vitriaco, Hist. Hierosolem l
i., and Sanutus Secreta Fidelium Crucis, l. iii. p. vi. vii. viii. ix.]

[Footnote 59: Templarii ut apes bombabant et Hospitalarii ut venti
stridebant, et barones se exitio offerebant, et Turcopuli (the Christian
light troops) semet ipsi in ignem injiciebant, (Ispahani de Expugnatione
Kudsitica, p. 18, apud Schultens;) a specimen of Arabian eloquence,
somewhat different from the style of Xenophon!]

[Footnote 60: The Latins affirm, the Arabians insinuate, the treason of
Raymond; but had he really embraced their religion, he would have been a
saint and a hero in the eyes of the latter.]

[Footnote 601: Raymond's advice would have prevented the abandonment of a
secure camp abounding with water near Sepphoris. The rash and insolent
valor