Christians. Louis had not been dismayed by danger or discouraged by reverses, nor could he be daunted by disappointment: he at once threw his whole energy into a consideration of the position of the Christians in Syria and Palestine; he made every effort both to insure their present safety and also to train and prepare them as a basis of support in future crusades. {88} He resolved to spend in the fortification of their towns the 200,000 livres which he was now prevented from devoting to the ransom of Christian prisoners in Egypt, and preparations were at once begun for putting St. Jean d'Acre, Jaffa, Cæsarea, and Sidon in a state of defence; he visited them constantly, and in case of need protected them against the attacks of the Saracens with such forces as he had,--the Crusaders who had not deserted him, the Templars and Hospitallers, and the Christian population of the East. He had sent a great number of workmen to fortify Sidon; the Saracens surprised them, and massacred nearly all of them,--two or three thousand, say the chronicles. The King resolved to avenge them, and to pay them a solemn act of homage; after making a raid upon the towns and lands of the Mussulmans in the vicinity, he arrived before Sidon. 'The corpses of the Christian workmen had been left unburied on the ground, and emitted a pestilential stench. The King did not content himself with giving orders that they should receive Christian burial, nor even with superintending their interment; he put his own hands to the work, touching the ghastly remains with the greatest reverence, and helping to place them in sacks which had been prepared for the purpose. "Let us go," he would say in the morning to his attendants, "let us help to bury those martyrs who have suffered death for the sake of our Lord. And do not be weary in well-doing, for they have endured far greater things than this will cost us." And when he saw his knights shrink with disgust from the task, "Do not loathe these poor bodies," he said, "for these men are martyrs and in Paradise."' [Footnote 33] [Footnote 33: M. Faure, who gives this account, has collected his material from scattered notices in Joinville, the Confesseur de la Reine Marguerite, Guillaume de Nangis, Guillaume de Chartres, &c.] {89}