The refusal of this exhausted the patience, not only of the sultan, but seemingly of Heaven also. With the rising of the Nile the Moslems opened the sluices, flooded all the canals of Lower Egypt, and inundated the Christians’ camp. Simultaneously the Moslem ships made their way up through the canals and destroyed the vessels of their foes. The Infidels occupied every rising knoll; “while,” says a letter from the camp, “we were thus caught in the midst of the waters like fish in a net.” In vain did the Christians endeavor to force a battle. Shrewdly retreating from the arbitrament of the sword, the Moslems left the invaders to the destruction which they proclaimed Allah had prepared for His insolent adversaries. Cardinal Pelagius now begged for the peace he had despised; nor did he stop with the old conditions. He would yield all he had taken or claimed, if only he might be permitted to lead the armies of Europe safely into the walls of distant Acre. This capitulation was reluctantly accepted by the Sultan of Cairo. The haughty cardinal, the brave King John of Brienne, the Duke of Bavaria, and many of the nobles meditated their disgrace as hostages in the hostile camp, while the Christian soldiers were still waiting the will of their conqueror in the marshes. King John of Brienne one day sat down at the feet of the sultan and burst into tears. The Moslem respected his courage and was grieved at the distress which seemingly had shaken it. “Why do you weep?” he asked. “To see my brave people perishing with hunger amid the waters.” The sultan immediately provisioned the Christian camp, and sent his own son to conduct the host in safety out of the land they had come to conquer (autumn, 1221). THE SIXTH CRUSADE. CHAPTER XLI. FREDERICK II. AND POPE GREGORY IX. Seven years elapsed before another attempt worthy of record was made for the recapture of Palestine. Frederick II. (Hohenstaufen) of Germany was its leader; hero it had none.