PROJECTED MARRIAGE BETWEEN THE EMPEROR AND THE DAUGHTER OF BONIFACE - THE CRUSADERS RAVAGE THE LANDS OF JOHANNIZZA

Then came to the camp, as envoy, a baron, Otho of La Roche by name, belonging to the Marquis Boniface of Montferrat. He came to speak of a marriage that had been spoken of aforetime between the daughter of Boniface, the Marquis of Montferrat, and the Emperor Henry; and brought tidings that the lady had come from Lombardy, whence her father had sent to summon her, and that she was now at Salonika. Then did the emperor take council, and it was decided that the marriage should be ratified on either side. So the envoy, Otho of La Roche, returned to Salonika.

The emperor had reassembled his men, who had gone to place in safe holding the booty taken at Veroi. And he marched day by day from Adrianople till he came to the land of Johannizza, the King of Wallachia and Bulgaria. They came to a city called Ferme, and took it, and entered in, and won much booty. They remained there for three days, and overran all the land, got very much spoil, and destroyed a city called Aquilo.

On the fourth day they departed from Ferme, which was a city fair and well situated, with hot water springs for bathing, the finest in the world; and the emperor caused the city to be burned and destroyed, and they carried away much spoil, in cattle and goods. Then they rode day by day till they came back to the city of Adrianople; and thev sojoumed in the land till the feast of All Saints (1st November 1206), when they could no longer carry on the war because of the winter. So Henry and all his barons, who were much aweary of campaigning, turned their faces towards Constantinople; and he left at Adrianople, among the Greeks, a man of his named Peter of Radinghem, with ten knights.