in Urban's benediction, having passed through Tuscany and Campania, came by Apulia to Calabria, and would have embarked immediately had not the seamen, on being consulted, forbade them, on account of the violence of the southerly winds. In consequence, the earls of Normandy and Blois passed the winter there; sojourning each among their friends, as convenient. The earl of Flanders, alone, ventured to sea, experiencing a prosperous issue to a rash attempt: wherefore part of this assembled multitude returned home through want; and part of them died from the unwholesomeness of the climate. The earls who remained however, when by the vernal sun's return they saw the sea sufficiently calm for the expedition, committed themselves to the ocean, and, by Christ's assistance, landed safely at two ports. Thence, through Thessaly, the metropolis of which is Thessalonica, and Thracia, they came to Constantinople. Many of the lower order perished on the march through disease and want; many lost their lives at the Devil's Ford, as it is called from its rapidity; and more indeed would have perished, had not the advanced cavalry been stationed in the river, to break the violence of the current; by which means the lives of some were saved, and the rest passed over on horseback. The whole multitude then, to solace themselves for their past labours, indulged in rest for fifteen days, pitching their camp in the suburbs of the city; of which, as the opportunity has presented itself, I shall briefly speak.
Constantinople was first called Byzantium: which name is still preserved by the imperial money called Bezants. St. Aldhelm, in his book On Virginity,[1] relates that it changed its appellation by divine suggestion: his words are as follow. As Constantine was sleeping in this city, he imagined that there stood before him an old woman, whose forehead was furrowed with age; but, that presently, clad in an imperial robe, she became transformed into a beautiful girl, and so fascinated his eyes, by the elegance of her youthful charms, that he could not refrain from kissing her: that Helena, his mother, being present, then said, "She shall be yours for
- ↑ Aldhelmi Opera, page 28.
sions, which, in every country and under every form of superstition, act always in the same way.
