Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/383

OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 361 grandson of the brother of Saladin, sent a robe of honour to his royal captive ; and his dehv^erance^ with that of his soldiers, was obtained by the restitution of Damietta i^'-' and the payment of four hundred thousand pieces of gold. In a soft and luxurious climate, the degenerate children of the companions of Noureddin and Saladin were incapable of resisting the flower of European chivahy ; they triumphed by the arms of their slaves or Mama- lukes, the hardy natives of Tartary, who at a tender age had been purchased of the Syrian merchants, and were educated in the camp and palace of the sultan. But Egypt soon afforded a new example of the danger of praetoi-ian bands ; and the rage of these ferocious animals, who had been let loose on the strangers, was provoked to devour their benefactor. In the pride of conquest, Touran Shah,^^ the last of his race, was murdered bv his [a.d. 1250, ^ May 4] Mamalukes; and the most daring of the assassins entered the chamber of the captive king, with dra-nTi scymetars, and their hands imbrued in the blood of their sultan. The firmness of Louis commanded their respect ; ^i- their avarice prevailed over cruelty and zeal ; the treaty was accomplished ; and the king of France, with the relics of his army, Avas permitted to embark for Palestine. He wasted four years within the walls of Acre, un- able to visit Jerusalem, and unwilling to return without glory to [Retnmto his native country. a.d. 1254] The memory of his defeat excited Louis, after sixteen years of wisdom and repose, to undertake the seventh and last of the crusades. His finances were restored, his kingdom was enlarged ; a new generation of waiTiors had arisen, and he embarked with fresh confidence at the head of six thousand horse and thirty 11" For the ransom of St. Louis, a million of byzants was asked and granted ; but the sultan's generosity reduced that sum to 800,000 byzants, which are valued by Joinville at 400,000 French livres of his own time, and expressed by Matthew Paris by 100,000 marks of silver (Ducange, Dissertation xx. sur Joinville). m[Al-MuaEzam Turan Shah, a.d. 1249-50.] 112 The idea of the emirs to choose Louis for their sultan is seriously attested by Joinville (p. 77, 78), and does not appear to me so absurd as to M. de Voltaire (Hist. G^n^rale, tom. ii. p. 386, 387). The Mamalukes themselves were strangers, rebels, and equals ; they had felt his vrJour, they hoped his conversion : and such a motion, which was not seconded, might be made perhaps by a secret Christian in their tumultuous assembly. [An interesting monument of Mamluk history at this time is a coin of the Mamluk queen, Shajar ad-Durr, the Tree of Pearls, who had risen from the condition of a slave. When the French landed in 1249, she concealed the death of her husband .Salih. After the battle of Mansurah. the heir died, and she was proclaimed queen, and reigned alone 2A months. Then she married one Aibak ; slew him ; and was herself beaten to death by the slaves of a divorced wife of Aibak. The coin was struck at the moment of the discomfiture of St. Louis. See Stanley Lane-Poole, Coins and Medals, p. 158-161.]