There came to Francis many adventures.  He was full of joy; he sang even to the birds in the woods.  Many men joined him as his disciples in the way of obedience, of poverty, and of love.  Men in Italy, in Spain, in Germany and in Britain caught fire from the flame of his simple love and careless courage.  Never had Europe seen so clear a vision of the love of Jesus.  His followers were called the Lesser Brothers (Friars Minor).

All who can should read the story of Francis’ life:  as for us we are here going simply to listen to what happened to him on a strange and perilous adventure.

II

About this time people all over Europe were agog with excitement about the Crusades.  Four Crusades had come and gone.  Richard Coeur-de-Lion was dead.  But the passion for fighting against the Saracen was still in the hearts of men.

“The tomb of our Lord in Jerusalem is in the hands of the Saracen,” the cry went up over all Europe.  “Followers of Jesus Christ are slain by the scimitars of Islam.  Let us go and wrest the Holy City from the hands of the Saracen.”

There was also the danger to Europe itself.  The Mohammedans ruled in Spain as well as in North Africa, in Egypt and in the Holy Land.

So rich men sold their lands to buy horses and armour and to fit themselves and their foot soldiers for the fray.  Poor men came armed with pike and helmet and leather jerkin.  The knights wore a blood-red cross on their white tunics.  In thousands upon thousands, with John of Brienne as their Commander-in-Chief (the brother of that Walter of Brienne with whom, you remember, Francis had started for the wars as a knight), they sailed the Mediterranean to fight for the Cross in Egypt.

They attacked Egypt because the Sultan there ruled over Jerusalem and they hoped by defeating him to free Jerusalem at the same time.

As Francis saw the knights going off to the Crusades in shining armour with the trappings of their horses all a-glitter and a-jingle, and as he thought of the lands where the people worshipped—­not the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ—­but the “Sultan in the Sky,” the Allah of Mahomet, his spirit caught fire within him.

Francis had been a soldier and a knight only a few years before.  He could not but feel the stir of the Holy War in his veins,—­the tingle of the desire to be in it.  He heard the stories of the daring of the Crusaders; he heard of a great victory over the Saracens.

Francis, indeed, wanted Jesus Christ to conquer men more than he wanted anything on earth; but he knew that men are only conquered by Jesus Christ if their hearts are changed by Him.

“Even if the Saracens are put to the sword and overwhelmed, still they are not saved,” he said to himself.

As he thought these things he felt sure that he heard them calling to him (as the Man from Macedonia had called to St. Paul)—­“Come over and help us.”  St. Paul had brought the story of Jesus Christ to Europe; and had suffered prison and scourging and at last death by the executioner’s sword in doing it; must not Francis be ready to take the same message back again from Europe to the Near East and to suffer for it?