CHAPTER V. THE FOURTH TO THE SIXTH CRUSADES

B1ound for Holy Palestine, Nimbly we brush’d the level brine, All in azure steel array’d; O’er the wave our weapons play’d, And made the dancing billows glow; High upon the trophied prow, Many a warrior-minstrel swung His sounding harp, and boldly sung.

2--WARTON, _The Crusade_.

3[Sidenote: [1195-1229 A.D.]]

4Wars and rebellions had filled all the thoughts of Saladin, and he had established no principles of succession. Three of his numerous progeny became sovereigns of Aleppo, Damascus, and Egypt; others had smaller possessions, and the emirs and atabegs of Syria again struggled for independence. The soldiers of the late sultan rallied round his brother Saphedin [Saif ad-Din] whose wisdom and valour were familiar to them. Both by stratagem and liberal policy he reared a large fabric of empire in Syria, and he was the most powerful of all the Moslem princes, when the time for the expiration of the peace arrived. The Saracenic power was, however, palsied for a while by a dreadful famine in Egypt, and the Latins in Palestine suffered also from the miserable state of this general granary.

5The knights of St. John cast their regards towards Europe, and particularly to England, for succour, and entreated that new armies would march to Palestine, and destroy the exhausted Moslems.