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of that house hesitate to expose their lives for theirbrothers in Jesus Christ; but with infantry andcavalry, kept for that special purpose, and paid bytheir own money, defend the faithful from Paynimsfearlessly, both in going and returning. It is theseHospitallers that are the instruments by which theOmnipotent preserves His Church in the East fromthe ordures of the infidels.’’ Thus says the Popeon the tenth of March, and thus on the twelfth : l“ The more these excellent men, the Knights Hos-pitallers of Jerusalem, are assailed by malicioustongues for their religion and probity, the more arewe desirous of protecting them, and showing thatthe Roman Church is intimately persuaded of thepurity of their devotion. Therefore it is that welay our injunctions on all parish priests, and otherclergy over the whole globe, to allow no one topresume to speak against the Hospitallers, but torecur to every means in their defence, even excom-munication.’’ And so this continues, and manyother Papal decrees, in the same tenor.

Fulk became King of Jerusalem. His firstexercise of authority was an unpleasant one; forAlice, his wife’s sister, having been left widow, con-ducted herself so scandalously, that it was necessary

1 Appendix, Num. xii., xiii.

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