THE ΚΜΟΠΤβ TEMrLAfiS. Redemption.* The infidels had indeed been driven out of Jerusalem, but not out of Palestine. The lofty mountains bordering the sea-eoast were infested by bold and warlike bands of fugitive Mussulmon, who maintained themselves in various impregnable castles and strongholds, from whence they issued forth upon the high-roads, cut off the communication between Jerusalem and the sea-ports, arid revenged themselves for the loss of their habitations and property by the indiscriminate pillage of all travellers. •The Bedouin horsemen, moreover, making rapid incursions from beyond the Jordan, frequently kept up a desultory and irregular warfare in the plains ; and the pilgrims, consequently, whether they approached the Holy City by land or by sea, were alike exposed to almost daily hostility, to plunder, and to death. To alleviate the dangers and distresses to which these pious enthusiasts were exposed, to gnard the honour of the saintly virgins and matrons,f and to protect the gray hairs of the venerable palmer, nine noble knights formed a holy brotherhood in arms, and entered into a solemn compact to aid one another in clearing the highways of infidels, and of robbers, and in protecting the pilgrims through the passes and defiles of the mountains to the Holy City. J Warmed with the religious and Military fervour 7)Fthe day, and animated by the sacredness of the cause to which they had devoted their swords, they called themselves the Poor Fellow-soldiers of Jesus Christ. They renounced the world and its pleasures, and in the holy church of the Resurrection, in the presence of the patriarch of Jerusalem, they • Omnibus mundi partibus dhìtes et paaperes, juvenes et virâmes, «nei cum junioribus, loca sancta vieitaturi HieroBoIymam pergerent—Jac. de Vitriaco. Uhi. /iierosol. cap. Ixv. + '* Tu kiss the holy monuments," says William of Tyre, " came sacred and chaste widows, forgetful of feminine fear, and the multiplicity oi dangers that beset their path." —Lib. xviii. cap. 5.