During this peaceful period, which lasted several years, there was little opportunity to practise their attainments except in the pleasant but sometimes perilous chase, but soon knight Conrad’s weapons were taken from the armory and the castle resounded to the tramp of armed men. Fate ordained that the old knight Barbarossa, who had spent nearly his whole life on the battlefield, should not die peacefully at home. From that far-distant Eastern land where in youth he and Conrad had fought for the Holy Sepulchre, suddenly came the evil tidings that Jerusalem, which had been in Christian possession eighty-eight years, had again been taken by the Sultan Saladin.[16] Of all the conquests, which had cost so many lives, only Antioch and Tyre remained to the Christians. The Crescent was victorious everywhere, and persecutions were renewed, as in the period before Godfrey of Bouillon had rescued the country. The complications between the Pope and the Emperor were settled at once. Frederick’s old heroic spirit was aroused, and he looked forward to an expedition to the Holy Land as a fitting close to his life’s work. At an assembly of princes held at Mayence a crusade was decided upon. How could Conrad help joining it? Was he not the Emperor’s brother-in-arms? Had they not once, amid disasters of every kind, sworn to fight together and to help each other to the last breath? Could he remain behind and rest at ease, while the Emperor, who was no younger than he, was in the field? No! To have stayed at home would have been a stain upon his escutcheon. He went with a force to Regensburg, the rendezvous of the Crusaders, and by his side rode his two stalwart sons, barely twelve and thirteen years of age, but, notwithstanding their youth, exultant and eager to face any danger. Chapter VI The Third Crusade It will be remembered that the second Crusade, under Conrad III, was disastrous to the Christians in the Holy Land. The discords which everywhere prevailed and the wranglings and jealousies of Templars and Knights of Saint John were not unwelcome to the Turks. There appeared among the latter about that time the mighty hero, Saladin, of Kurdish origin.