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They obtained other persons' fortunes by the production, not of formal wills, but of counterfeit conveyances. This was how they became the heirs of Dionysius, who dwelt in Libanus, and of John the son of Basil, who was the leading man in Edessa, and had been delivered up to the Persians as a hostage against his will by Belisarius, as I have told already.
In the great cities of the East, the disadvantage of space, perhaps of position, was compensated by the zeal of the people, who seconded the garrison in the defence of their country and religion; and the fabulous promise of the Son of God, that Edessa should never be taken, filled the citizens with valiant confidence, and chilled the besiegers with doubt and dismay.
During the six months after the capture of Antioch most of the leaders seemed to have contemplated no forward step. But the orders of Raymond to march filled many with enthusiasm, and, under the lead of Raymond, Tancred, and the Duke of Normandy, the army traversed the territories of Syrian Cæsarea, Hamath, and Edessa. They were welcomed by Moslem and Christian alike.
The design of recapturing Edessa from Noureddin, the sultan of Aleppo, was given up. The siege of Damascus failed . Conrad returned home with broken health. Soon after, Damascus fell into the hands of Noureddin, who was a brave and upright leader. Through one of his lieutenants, he conquered Egypt.
One of these, Abgarus, prince of Osrhoene, or the tract east of the Euphrates about the city of Edessa, had been received into the Roman alliance by Pompey, but, with the fickleness common among Orientals, he now readily changed sides, and undertook to play a double part for the advantage of the Parthians.
Germanus, who commanded at Daras, was a general of small capacity, and found himself quite unable to make head, either against Narses in Edessa, or against Chosroes, who led his troops in person into Mesopotamia. Defeated by Chosroes in a battle near Daras, in which he received a mortal wound, Germanus withdrew to Constantia, where he died eleven days afterwards.
And he did arrive on the 16th of May, says the Armenian historian, Matthias of Edessa, at the head of six hundred thousand horsemen. The historians of the crusaders are infinitely more moderate as to the number of their foes; they assign to Kilidge-Arslan only fifty or sixty thousand men, and their testimony is far more trustworthy, being that of the victors.
For a while Edessa had braved the Persian assaults; but the chosen city, the spouse of Christ, was involved in the common ruin; and his divine resemblance became the slave and trophy of the infidels.
The resistance of Edessa, and the deficiency of spoil, inclined the mind of Cabades to peace: he sold his conquests for an exorbitant price; and the same line, though marked with slaughter and devastation, still separated the two empires.
Another, but one that does not appear to have been suggested till too late, was that which Alexander had taken against Darius; the line along the foot of the Mons Masius, by Edessa, and Nisibis, to Nineveh. Here too waters and supplies would have been readily procurable, and by clinging to the skirts of the hills the Roman infantry would have set the Parthian cavalry at defiance.
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