The Whole Being Assembled, The Company Of This Archbishop Amounted To Seven Thousand Persons, All Properly Provided For The Expedition; And We Travelled Prosperously Through Many Provinces, Arriving At Length At The City Of Constantinople.

We there did reverence to the Emperor Alexius, visited the church, of Sancta Sophia, and devoutly kissed many sacred relics.

Departing from Constantinople, we travelled through Lycia, where we fell into the hands of Arabian thieves; and after we had been robbed of infinite sums of money, and had lost many of our people, we escaped with extreme peril of our lives, and at length entered joyfully into the most anxiously wished-for city of Jerusalem. We were there received by the most reverend, aged, and holy patriarch Sophronius, with a great melody of cymbals by torch-light, and were conveyed in solemn procession, by a great company of Syrians and Latins, to the church of the Most Holy Sepulchre of our blessed Saviour. Here, how many prayers we uttered, what abundance of tears we shed, what deep sighs we breathed forth, is only known to our Lord Jesus Christ. From the most glorious sepulchre of Christ, we were conducted to visit the other sacred monuments of the holy city; and saw, with weeping eyes, a great number of holy churches and oratories, which Achius the Soldan of Egypt had lately destroyed. And, having deeply bewailed all the ruins of that most holy city, both within and without its walls, and having bestowed money for the re-edifying of some of these, we expressed the most ardent desire to go forth into the country, that we might wash ourselves in the sacred river Jordan, and that we might visit and kiss all the holy footsteps of the blessed Redeemer.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 69 of 810
Words from 18879 to 19172 of 222093