At Venice we embarked, and sailed to Messina, where most of the pilgrims for the Holy Land assemble, as it is the most convenient port. We did not go overland, as some pilgrims do, through the dominions of the Byzantine Cæsar;[#] but we sailed thence to Crete. I was rather sorry to miss Byzantium,[#] both on account of the beautiful stuffs which are sold there, and the holy relics: but since I have seen a spine of the crown of thorns, which the Lady de Montbeillard has--she gave seven hundred crowns for it to Monseigneur de Rheims[#]--I did not care so much about the relics as I might otherwise have done. Perhaps I shall meet with the same kind of stuffs in Palestine; and certainly there will be relics enough.
[#] The Eastern Emperor; his dominions in Europe extended over Greece and Turkey.
From Crete we sailed to Rhodes, and thence to Cyprus. They all say that I am an excellent sailor, for I feel no illness nor inconvenience at all; but poor Bertrade has been dreadfully ill, and Marguerite and Perette say they both feel very uncomfortable on the water. At Cyprus is an abbey of monks, on the Hill of the Holy Cross; and here Amaury and his men were housed for the night, and I and my women at a convent of nuns not far off. At the Abbey they have a cross, which they say is the very cross on which our Lord suffered, but some say it is only the cross of Ditmas, the good thief. I was rather puzzled to know whether, there being a doubt whether it really is the holy cross, it ought to be worshipped. If it be only a piece of common wood, I suppose it would be idolatry. So I thought it more right and seemly to profess to have a bad headache, and decline to mount the hill. I asked Amaury what he had done.
"But how if it were not the true cross?" I asked.
"My sister, wouldst thou have a knight thus discourteous? The monks believe it true. It would have hurt their feelings to show any doubt."
"Ha, bah!" he answered. "The angels will see it put to the right account--no doubt of that. Dear me!--if one is to be for ever considering little scruples like that, why, there would be no end to them--one would never do any thing."
Then I asked Marguerite if she went up to worship the holy cross.