The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World: from Marathon to WaterlooCreasy, Edward Shepherd, Sir
History
The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World: from Marathon to Waterloo
Creasy, Edward Shepherd, Sir
Battles
They tell us how there was war between the count of the Frankish
frontier and the Moslems, and how the count gathered together all his
people, and fought for a time with doubtful success. "But," say the
Arabian chroniclers, "Abderrahman drove them back; and the men of
Abderrahman were puffed up in spirit by their repeated successes, and
they were full of trust in the valour and the practice in war of their
Emir. So the Moslems smote their enemies, and passed the river Garonne,
and laid waste the country, and took captives without number. And that
army went through all places like a desolating storm. Prosperity made
those warriors insatiable. At the passage of the river, Abderrahman
overthrew the count, and the count retired into his stronghold, but the
Moslems fought against it, and entered it by force, and slew the count;
for everything gave way to their scimetars, which were the robbers of
lives. All the nations of the Franks trembled at that terrible army, and
they betook them to their king Caldus, and told him of the havoc made
by the Moslem horsemen, and how they rode at their will through all the
land of Narbonne Toulouse, and Bordeaux, and they told the king of the
death of their count. Then the king bade them be of good cheer, and
offered to aid them. And in the 114th year [Of the Hegira.] he mounted
his home, and he took with him a host that could not be numbered, and
went against the Moslems. And he came upon them at the great city of
Tours. And Abderrahman and other prudent cavaliers saw the disorder of
the Moslem troops, who were loaded with spoil; but they did not venture
to displease the soldiers by ordering them to abandon everything except
their arms and war-horses. And Abderrahman trusted in the valour of his
soldiers, and in the good fortune which had ever attended him. But
(the Arab writer remarks) such defect of discipline always is fatal to
armies. So Abderrahman and his host attacked Tours to gain still more
spoil, and they fought against it so fiercely that they stormed the city
almost before the eyes of the army that came to save it; and the fury
and the cruelty of the Moslems towards the inhabitants of the city were
like the fury and cruelty of raging tigers. It was manifest," adds the
Arab, "that God's chastisement was sure to follow such excesses; and
fortune thereupon turned her back upon the Moslems."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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