made their camp on the bloody field where Stephen, Earl of Blois, received his mortal wound. A winter of extra-ordinary inclemency aggravated their hardships. The winds tore up the tents, and the rain spoiled the provisions, and rusted the arms. Through the hovering myriads of Saracens the Christians pressed their way almost in sight of Jerusalem. Richard was animated by the most ardent expectation. But the Templars, Hospitallers and Pisans, represented the impossibility of capturing the city, with their army in its present condition, the impracticability of garrisoning it against the Turks in the neighborhood, and the certainty that the soldiers as soon as the sepulchre was recovered, would return to Europe, leaving the rest of Palestine in the hands of the Infidels. Influenced by these unanswerable arguments, the disappointed king gave orders to fall back upon Ramula, and continued to retrograde with his murmuring and discontented army to Ascalon, a city of great consequence, being the link between the Turks in Jerusalem, and the Turks in Egypt. The pains and perils of this backward march eclipsed all former sufferings, and when the dismantled walls of Ascalon at length received them, Famine stared upon them with her hollow eyes, and Faction with its sharpened fangs tore asunder the remaining cords that bonnd together the wasted body of the croises. The Duke of Burgundy deserted the standard of Richard, part of the French soldiers retired to Jaffa, others to Acre, and others to Tyre ; and while the proudest nobles and the most dignified of the clergy were employed like the mean-est vassals, in repairing the ruined fortifications, Leopold wrapped in haughty selfishness surveyed the works with contemptuous sneers, and remarked, "The father of Aus-tria was neither a" carpenter nor a mason." The Turkish Soldan aware of the distress of his enemies, considered the war as nearly at an end, and dismissed a portion of his troops. He even extended the courtesies of civilized life to the valiant Richard, furnished his table with Damascene pears, peaches, and other delicacies, and with a liberal hand supplied the snow of Lebanon to cool his wines. 250 HEROINES OP THE CRUSADES.