Introduction to American history by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New York, Chicago, Longmans, Green, and co.
Published: 1916-03-25T05:00:00+00:00

was called by God to lead a crusade of young children against the infidel Turk. He sounded his call and many small boys and some girls enlisted under his banner. Some of the older people thought that the project was all right and quoted the Scriptures to the effect that "a. little child shall lead them." Others thought that the whole thing was inspired by the devil. At all events, a band of German children, estimated at from twenty thousand to forty thousand, gathered together and marched over the Alps to Italy. Nothing could hold them back. ^'Even bolts and bars," says an old writer, ''could not hold them."

These children, most of them no older than Stephen himself, marched along the shores of Italy, expecting to find a pathway to Jerusalem miraculously opened to them. They expected the sea to part for their passage, as the Red Sea had parted for the passage of the children of Israel out of Egypt. No such pathway appeared, and a large part of the little ones either feU by the wayside or died from the hardships of the march. A sorry and weary little band reached Rome and made a call upon the Pope. The Pope received them in a very kind and fatherly way. He saw the folly of the whole attempt and persuaded the children to return to their homes and to set out again upon their crusade after they became men. Such was the fate of the German boys and girls who embarked in this crusade.

The French children, about thirty thousand in number, met at Marseilles with Stephen himself as their leader. The youthful captain* rode in great pomp in a chariot, surrounded by his body-guard. The poor little ones knew

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