Louis was so calm that he knelt for a moment on the sand. ‘Thy will be done!’ he murmured. Then he sprang up and rushed into the fight. As the day wore on, Queen Marguerite as she watched, saw the oriflamme of France push slowly up the beach. Ship after ship that had guarded the river mouth sank. They were pierced by the prows of the French vessels. Ere night the victory was won. The crusading camp rang with shouts of joy. [Illustration: Louis sprang into the water] In the morning a blaze of fire was seen in the south. Damietta, the town that Louis hoped to take for his own, was in flames. The foe had burned the city. No riches were left to tempt the army, so the burning of the city both helped and hindered Louis. Queen Marguerite landed and formed her court within the charred and ruined walls of Damietta. The army waited for more ships and men. But while they waited, bands of Arabs came whirling down on the camp. They came to any part of it that seemed less guarded, entered the tents, killed those they found there, and carried off the heads of all they killed. These wild men took the heads of the Crusaders to the sultan, who gave a golden coin for each one. Their horses were so swift and light that they could always escape from the heavy chargers of the knights. While the troops led by Louis were waiting here, the sultan was busy. The town of Mansourah stands at the place where the great river Nile breaks into many channels and forms the delta at its mouth. There the Moslem leader made ready to fight the French king. He built walls and towers, and made the town strong against the armies of the Cross. At last the Crusaders marched, but when they reached Mansourah they found a great stream of water between them and the city. They could not fight the foe until they had crossed the channel. Then Louis bade his men build a causeway across the stream. But even as they built, the enemy on the other side dug away the sandy bank, and the stream flowed on as broad as before. A shout was heard ‘A ford, a ford.’ It was not a good ford that had been found, still it was possible to cross by it, and the eager armies hastened to it. Robert, the king’s brother, begged to be allowed to cross first with his men. He said he would wait on the other bank and guard the ford till the rest of the army had crossed over. A band of Moslems tried to keep him from landing. He drove them back. They fled across the sand. Then Robert forgot his promise to stay by the ford. The masters of the knights of Jerusalem who rode with him begged him to think. They knew that it was a great mistake to break away from the other warriors. But Robert was too eager to listen. He said bitter things to them and seemed to think that they wished to keep all the power in their own hands. They were very angry at this, and the master of the Templars, to show that he was neither a coward nor wilful, shouted out: ‘Raise then the standard.’