100 ANNALS OF ROGEB BE HOVEBEN. A.D. 1183. there the Venetians captured it at sea; on which, together with the ship, it was taken to Tyre. They also reported that a certain old man, a Greek by birth, from Astralix, had informed them that the prophecy was about to be fulfilled which was written on the Golden Gate, which had not been opened for two hundred years past; which was this, ""When the Yellow-haired King of the "West shall come, then shall I open of my own accord, and then shall the Latins reign, and hold rule in the city of Constantinople." They also stated that the emperor had promised Saladin a hundred galleys, and that Saladin had promised him the whole of the land of promise, if he should impede the passage of the Franks ; and that, in consequence of this, the emperor had forbidden any one throughout all his territories to assume the cross ; and if bychance any one in his territories did assume the cross, he was immediately arrested and thrown into prison. There was also a prophecy and astrological prediction among the Greeks and Turks, that within the next three years one third of the Turks should perish by the sword, another third should fly beyond the trees of the desert,90 and the remaining third be baptized. In the same year, a certain monk, of the Cistercian order, a religious man and one who feared God, beheld a vision of this nature relative to Henry, king of England. There appeared to him in his sleep a man of 'wonderful magnitude and noble features, and clothed in white garments, who said to him, "Observe and read these things about the king: Ί have set my seal upon him; the womb of his wife shall swell against him, and in torments he shall suffer torments, and among the veiled women he shall be as one wearing the veil.' " In the same year, Frederic, emperor of the Romans, having assumed the cross at the hands of Henry, the cardinal-bishop of Albano, as befitted a prudent and circumspect man, made all necessary provisions for himself and his journey; for, in the first place, he reconciled himself to God and the Holy Church, and then wrote to Saladin to the following effect :— The Letter of Frederic, emperor of the Romans, to Saladin, ruler of the Saracens. " Frederic, by the grace of God, emperor of the Romans, ever august, and the mighty triumpher over the enemies of the *· " Arborem siccam ; " perhaps in allusion to the oases of Baalbec or Palmyra, on the north-eastern side of Syria.