At the very hour at which their Saviour breathed His dying words upon the Cross, the red-cross standard was first seen to float over the walls of the Holy City. From the horrors of bloodshed that followed the capture of Jerusalem we can but turn away in disgust. "Such a slaughter of pagan folk had never been seen or heard of; none know their number save God alone." This wanton cruelty can indeed only be excused when we remember that it was the firm belief of those days that "whosoever killeth an infidel doeth God service." After that scene of slaughter and violence the leaders of the Crusaders walked, bareheaded and barefooted, dressed in long white mantles marked with the red cross, to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to offer thanks for their success. Amongst them stood Peter the Hermit, the real moving spirit of the Crusade, in spite of his mistaken zeal as a leader of men. It is said that many of the Christian inhabitants of the city recognised him as the unknown pilgrim who had promised to rouse on their behalf the nations of the west, and they clung to his raiment with tears of gratitude. It is the last glimpse we have of that enthusiastic personality, and we may be content to leave him there, at the moment when his great aim had been accomplished. [Illustration: _The Storming of Jerusalem_] A week later a meeting of the chieftains was called to elect a king of Jerusalem. None were eager to obtain a {101} post of honour so difficult to maintain, and most were anxious to return to their own dominions. The crown was first offered to Robert of Normandy, who, "impelled by sloth or fear, refused it, and so aspersed his nobility with an indelible stain." So writes an English chronicler of his day, but it must be said in Robert's defence that, even as it was, he had tarried too long to make good his claim to the kingdom of England against his grasping brother Henry, and that his fair dukedom of Normandy stood in immediate peril from the same cause. Finally, by universal consent, the crown fell to the lot of Godfrey of Boulogne, in many respects the noblest Crusader of them all. But he, with characteristic modesty, refused to wear a crown of gold in the place where his Lord had worn a crown of thorns, and so he was known only by the title of the Defender of the Holy Sepulchre. Some say that Count Raymond had previously been offered the position of king, and had refused to take it, hoping possibly that he might obtain the honour without the full responsibility. However this might be, we find him, on Godfrey's acceptance, sulkily retiring to the Tower of David, which stronghold had been seized from the Saracens by his men. At first he refused to give it up, and when forced to do so, declared with childish fury that he would go home at once.