From all parts of France men flocked to hear Pope Urban preach there; and when he had finished his oration, the vast multitude, carried away by enthusiasm, swore to win the holy sepulchre or to die.
"Mighty was the throng that gathered for the First Crusade.

Monks threw aside their gowns and took to the sword and cuirass; even women and children joined in the throng.

What, my son, could be expected from a great army so formed?
Without leaders, without discipline, without tactics, without means of getting food, they soon became a scourge of the country through which they passed.
"Passing through Hungary, where they greatly ravaged the fields, they came to Bulgaria.

Here the people, struck with astonishment and dismay at this great horde of hungry people who arrived among them like locusts, fell upon them with the sword, and great numbers fell.

The first band that passed into that country perished miserably, and of all that huge assembly, it may be said that, numbering, at the start, not less than 250,000 persons, only about 100,000 crossed into Asia Minor.