nched themselves in Jaffa with all the chivalry of
Palestine that yet remained, and endeavoured to engage the Sultans of
Emissa and Damascus to assist them against the common enemy. The aid
obtained from the Moslems amounted at first to only four thousand men,
but with these reinforcements Walter of Brienne, the Lord of Jaffa,
resolved to give battle to the Korasrains. The conflict was as deadly
as despair on the one side, and unmitigated ferocity on the other,
could make it. It lasted with varying fortune for two days, when the
Sultan of Emissa fled to his fortifications, and Walter of Brienne fell
into the enemy's hands. The brave knight was suspended by the arms to a
cross in sight of the walls of Jaffa, and the Korasminian leader
declared that he should remain in that position until the city
surrendered. Walter raised his feeble voice, not to advise surrender,
but to command his soldiers to hold out to the last. But his gallantry
was unavailing. So great had been the slaughter, that out of the grand
array of knights, there now remained but sixteen Hospitallers,
thirty-three Templars, and three Teutonic cavaliers. These with the sad
remnant of the army fled to Acre, and the Korasmins were masters of
Palestine.

The Sultans of Syria preferred the Christians to this fierce horde for
their neighbours. Even the Sultan of Egypt began to regret the aid he
had given to such barbarous foes, and united with those of Emissa and
Damascus to root them from the land. The Korasmins amounted to but
twenty thousand men, and were unable to resist the determined hostility
which encompassed them on every side. The Sultans defeated them in
several engagements, and the peasantry rose up in masses to take
vengeance upon them. Gradually their numbers were diminished. No mercy
was shown them in defeat. Barbaquan, their leader, was slain, and after
five years of desperate struggles they were finally extirpated, and
Palestine became once more the territory of the Mussulmans.

A short time previous to this devastating irruption, Louis IX. fell
sick in Paris, and dreamed in the delirium of his fever that he saw the
Christian and Moslem hosts fighting before Jerusalem, and the
Christians defeated with great slaughter. The dream made a great
impression on his superstitious mind, and he made a solemn vow that if
ever he recovered his health, he would take a pilgrimage to the Holy
Land. When the news of the misfortunes of Palestine, and the awful