Let us now pass to the name _Assassin_. This word, as I have already said, has been written in a variety of ways; but to confine myself to those possessing the best authority, I shall state, that it has been pronounced _Assassini_, _Assissini_, and _Heississini_. Joinville has written _Haussaci_. The limits which I have prescribed myself, forbid my entering here into the discussion of the various etymologies of this name, which have been proposed by different learned persons. Suffice it for me to say, that they have all been mistaken, because they had, no doubt, never met with the word in any Arabic author. The Assassins are almost always called by oriental historians, _Ismailites_, _Mulahid_ (i. e. _the Impious_), or _Batenites_, signifying _partisans of the allegorical sense_. Only one literary person, in a letter, preserved by Menage, had a glimpse of the true etymology; but he had erected it on bad foundations, as he had not the slightest suspicion of the motive which led to the Ismailites being designated by this term. One of the most illustrious, most certainly, of the victims to the fury of the Ismailites, is Saladin. It is true, this great prince escaped their attacks; but he was twice on the point of losing his life by these wretches’ daggers, for which he afterwards reaped a striking revenge. It is in perusing the account of these reiterated attempts, in some Arabic authors, contemporaries of Saladin, and ocular witnesses of what they relate, that I have been convinced that the Ismailites, or, at least, the men whom they employed to execute their horrible projects, were called, in Arabic, _Hashishin_ in the plural, and _Hashishi_ in the singular; and this name, slightly altered by the Latin writers, has been expressed as exactly as possible by several Greek historians, and by the Jew, Benjamin, of Tudela.