ILL-SUCCESS AND RETURN OF THE EMBASSY. 201 It may easily be imagined that King Louis little ex- pected such a result from his embassy, " and much repented of having sent it." * The ambassadors returned in two years from the time of their departure, and found the king in the town of Acre. Their narratives and descriptions must doubtless have keenly excited the curiosity of the Crusaders, who were themselves exposed to so many similar adventures. Among other marvellous things, they related to King Louis a story of a prince of a Mongol tribe, whom they had seen in Tartary, who had been converted to Christianity by a miracle. The story, which is reported by Mosheim f , though only as a silly fable, is that the prince in question, being ill of violent fever, was one night seized with a fit of delirium, and escaping from his tent, while all around him were buried in deep sleep, wandered away into the desert, and remained wan- dering for three days. On the fourth night his delirium left him, and he was very much frightened to find him- self in darkness in an unknown place, and knew not what to do, or which way to turn. Suddenly, however, the darkness was dispersed, and he saw on the summit of a mountain a resplendent light. He advanced to- wards it, crawling up the mountain on his hands and knees, and there perceived an innumerable multitude of men, remarkable for the beauty of their faces, and the magnificence of their attire. In the centre, on an ele- vated spot, was a golden throne, on which was seated a celestial king, distinguished above all the rest by the still greater beauty of his face, and the superior splen-
- Joinville, " Hist, de St. Louis," p. 102.
t Lepidam hie adjiciam fabulani. " Hist. Tart. Eccl.," p. 52.
