Flushed with victory, Louis hastened onward two days’ march beyond Laodicea. Here he divided his force into two bands for the safer passage of a mountain ridge. The vanguard was ordered to encamp upon the heights until joined by their comrades, that they might make descent in full force upon the farther plains. But the impatience of the soldiers in the advance, encouraged by Queen Eleanor, could not brook the cautionary command; they descended the other side of the ridge. The wary Turks quietly took the ground thus unwisely abandoned. The second division of the French, mistaking them for friends, climbed the ascent without regard to orderly array, and were welcomed by a murderous assault. The king barely escaped after witnessing the slaughter of thirty of his chief nobles at his side. Alone upon a rock which he had climbed, he kept his assailants at bay until they, mistaking him for a common soldier, withdrew for some worthier prize. The heavy arms of the Franks were worse than useless against the storm of rocks and arrows which the Turks rained upon them, and the morning that dawned after a night of unparalleled terror revealed a miserable remnant of the French force fighting or stealing its way to the vanguard. Placing the command in the hands of the veteran Gilbert, and Evrard des Barras, Grand Master of the Templars, who had marched from the East to assist the new crusaders, Louis pressed on. Winter fell with unwonted severity upon his ragged and starving retainers. The Greeks held Attalia and refused to allow the Franks to enter that city. At length Louis accepted their offer to transport a portion of his army by sea to Syria. Leaving a large proportion of his camp, the king set sail, and arrived at Antioch in March, 1148. Less than one quarter of his followers met him on the Syrian soil. The Franks, thus abandoned by their king, had incessantly to fight with the swarming Turks, until human nature succumbed. Their leaders, Archambaud and Thierri, deserted them and followed the king over the sea. Seven thousand essayed to pursue their journey overland, and were massacred, or perished amid the dangers of the way. The old chronicle says, “God alone knows the number of the martyrs whose blood flowed beneath the blade of the Turks and even under the sword of the Greeks.” Three thousand are said to have lost their faith in the protection of Christ and sought the pity of the Moslems by confessing the Prophet.