P. 87. 'A crusader's cross.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 1. 'In the year 1227 there was a general "Passagium" to the Holy Land, in which Frederick the Emperor also crossed the seas' (or rather did _not_ cross the seas, says Heinrich Stero, in his annals, but having got as far as Sicily, came back again--miserably disappointing and breaking up the expedition, whereof the greater part died at the various ports--and was excommunicated for so doing); 'and Lewis, landgrave of the Thuringians, took the cross likewise in the name of Jesus Christ, and . . . did not immediately fix the badge which he had received to his garment, as the matter is, lest his wife, who loved him with the most tender affection, seeing this, should be anxious and disturbed, . . . but she found it while turning over his purse, and fainted, struck down with a wonderful consternation.' P. 90. 'I must be gone.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 2. A chapter in which Dietrich rises into a truly noble and pathetic strain. 'Coming to Schmalcald,' he says, 'Lewis found his dearest friends, whom he had ordered to meet him there, not wishing to depart without taking leave of them.' Then follows Dietrich's only poetic attempt, which Basnage calls a 'carmen ineptum, foolish ballad,' and most unfairly, as all readers should say, if I had any hope of doing justice in a translation to this genial fragment of an old dramatic ballad, and its simple objectivity, as of a writer so impressed (like all true Teutonic poets in those earnest days) with the pathos and greatness of his subject that he never tries to 'improve' it by reflections and preaching at his readers, but thinks it enough just to tell his story, sure that it will speak for itself to all hearts:-- Quibus valefaciens cum moerore Commisit suis fratribus natos cum uxore: Matremque deosculatos filiali more, Vix eam alloquitur cordis prae dolore, Illis mota viscera, corda tremuerunt, Dum alter in alterius colla irruerunt, Expetentes oscula, quae vix receperunt Propter multitudines, quae eos compresserunt. Mater tenens filiuin, uxorque maritum, In diversa pertrahunt, et tenent invitum, Fratres cum militibus velut compeditum Stringunt, nec discedere sinunt expeditum. Erat in exercitu maximus tumultus, Cum carorum cernerent alternari vultus. Flebant omnes pariter, senex et adultus, Turbae cum militibus, cultus et incultus. Eja! Quis non plangeret, cum videret flentes Tot honestos nobiles, tam diversas gentes, Cum Thuringis Saxones illuc venientes, Ut viderent socios suos abscedentes. Amico luctamine cuncti certavere, Quis eum diutius posset retinere; uidam collo brachiis, quidam inhaesere Vestibus, nec poterat cuiguam respondere, Tandem se de manibus eximens suorum Magnatorum socius et peregrinorum, Admixtus tandem, caetui cruce signatorum Non visurus amplius terram. Thuringorum!