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CHARLES J. ROSEBAULT.
Saladin. Prince of Chivalry
page 196
could not brook even this small success of his rival.
An implacable soul, nourishing bitterness as a serpent
does its venom. One can see him going back to his
quarters consumed with anger that heed should have
been given to his enemy, and when sleep had fallen
upon his fellows he went to the tent of the king and
demanded audience.
Guy must have been quite as weak and incompetent as his worst critics had declared him, for Gerard seemed to have little difficulty in winning him over. When the nobles rose the next morning they were confronted with orders from the King reversing the decision of the night before. Remonstrance was of no avail. The army was shortly on its ill-fated march. Their only hope was that the Holy Cross, the veritable cross on which Christ had been crucified, which had been brought by the Patriarch from Jerusalem, and which was now carried under special guard, would work the miracle needed to save them.
Saladin was sacking Tiberias, and the wife of Raymond was doing her best to hold out in the fortress, when word came of the approach of the Franks. Leaving a small force to hold back her supporters, he advanced to meet them. Some three miles from the town his army hemmed them in. Caught in the valley below the Horn of Hattin, where not a single spring or stream existed, and the sun poured down unshaded in the hottest season of the year, the King was forced to make camp.
Saladin felt himself particularly fortunate, for this
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