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M.Besant E.Walter
Jerusalem, the city of Herod and Saladin

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M.Besant E.Walter
Jerusalem, the city of Herod and Saladin
page 392



if terms were not granted them they would sell their lives as dearly as might be, utterly destroy the city, and the Cubbet es Sakhrah with it, and murder every Mohammedan who remained in their power. * As tbere were some thousands of Muslim prisoners in the city, this last threat induced the Sultan to reconsider his determination, and a council of war was called, at which it was resolved that the peaceable capitulation of the town should be received upon certain conditions. These were, that the Christians should pay ten dinars for every man, five for a woman, and two for a child, and that those who could not pay were to surrender as prisoners. There were said to be more than sixty thousand fighting men in the town, besides women and children and other non-combatants ; the sum of money demanded was therefore immoderately large. Balian disbursed thirty thousand dinars on behalf of the poor, and the Grand Masters of the Hospitallers and Templars, as well as the Patriarch, came forward nobly to the relief of their poorer brethren both with money and security. The Mohammedans entered the city on the 1st of November, just before noon-day prayer, and at once took precautions for ensuring the due performance of the stipulation, by locking the gates of the city and allowing no one to leave without payment of the required sum, and, moreover, appointing officers to collect the polltax from the inhabitants. The Mohammedan historians themselves allow' that great corruption prevailed amongst these officers, and that for a small consideration they connived • at the escape of many Christians by the breaches which had been made during the siege, or even let them down themselves in buckets from the walls. Some of the more distinguished, especially of the women, experienced the Sultans clemency ; amongst these was a princess of great wealth, who had resided in Jerusalem as a nun, and who was allowed to leave with her property intact. Sybille, the queen consort of


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