* * * * * THE ASSAULT. BY J. H. DANA. It was the last morning of the assault. The sun had risen heavily across the eastern highlands, flinging his slant beams upon the embattled armies of the cross, and disclosing, as the mists rolled upwards from the valley, mangonel, and tower, and battering-ram, and serried troops of warriors, drawn up in array before Jerusalem,—and now as the shout “to the Holy City,” swelled out upon the air, and the priests, in sacerdotal robes, lifted up their chaunt again, the whole vast mass, as if by a simultaneous impulse, moved forward from their stations, and with lance, and shield, and banner, and shouts of triumph, and clashing of arms, marched on to the assault. All Europe was up. Prince and subject; noble and serf; layman and monk; the rich and the poor; the proud and the humble; old, young, and middle aged; stalwart men and feeble women; the knight in his armor, and the boor in his capote,—the bishop with his crozier, and the friar in his cowl; the halt, the deaf, the blind; all ranks and conditions of life swelled the gigantic host, which, gathering new accessions to its numbers in every land it traversed, had rolled on with threatening aspect over Palestine, carrying terror and desolation to the Saracens, until at length the mighty army was now arrayed before Jerusalem, burning to achieve the redemption of the sepulchre. Yes! Europe was there in arms, moved as one man, by one spirit. From hill and dale; from city and hamlet; from the castle of the noble and the cottage of the boor; from cloister, and forge, and plough, the sons of the church had gathered at her summons, fired with a lofty determination to avenge an insulted faith, and scourge back to the fastnesses from whence they came the sacrilegious followers of the crescent. There was the bluff Englishman, the fair-haired German, the tall gaunt Scot, the gay cavalier from Provence, the dark eyed son of Italy, and the wild and uncouth child of that green “Erin,” of the ocean, lying on the utmost verge of civilization, and known only by vague rumor as the habitation of man. Ay! all these were there—there, with spear, and sword, and cross-bow—there, in glittering casque, and homely jerkin—there, on proudly caparisoned steeds, or marching with soiled buskin humbly on foot. Soldiers of every garb, tongue, and nation; men who had been enemies but were now friends; warriors, who had hitherto lived only for rapine, joined in that wild shout, and with an enthusiasm they had never felt before, swept on the second time to the assault—and ever as they marched, in solid phalanx or open column, Frank, or Saxon, or Italian, they swelled out the cry, “Ho! soldiers of the cross—on to the Holy City!”