In spite of its honorable surrender the Moslems hastened to loot Damietta and put to death every Christian that remained. This breach of treaty and their new taste of blood infuriated the mob of Moslems for further deeds of dishonor and cruelty. The galleys of the French were ordered to reascend the Nile. It was proposed to complete the tragedy in one act by slaughtering all the invaders. The Moslems were diverted from this outrage only by the consideration, as expressed in the speech of one of them, that “the dead pay no ransom,” and that to massacre the remnant of the French army would be to deprive themselves of the bezants pledged as the price of their lives. So the miserable exodus of the crusaders was resumed, not, however, without anticipation that the fickle temper of their captors might again change. At the mouth of the Nile a Genoese vessel received the king; as soon as he was on deck an array of archers sprang to the bulwarks and dispersed the Egyptians, and the vessel sped rapidly out to sea. Louis put in at Acre, bringing to the meagre force there but a few more war-wasted men, wider demands upon its diminished resources, and a pestilent disease, which slew scores daily. In vain did France call for her king to return; pride or piety led him to refuse to desert his unhappy followers. There were still twelve thousand Frenchmen in the prisons of Egypt or scattered as slaves over the lands bordering the Nile. These he must endeavor to rescue. The Hospitallers, Templars, and Teutonic Knights, together with the nobles of Palestine, entreated his presence with them. For several weeks there were almost daily councils, some, among them the king’s two surviving brothers, declaring that France, threatened by England, needed the king, while his presence almost without following in Palestine could be no help to the Christian cause, if it did not excite the everywhere victorious Moslems to greater rapacity. Others among them, like Prince Joinville, advocated remaining. Louis listened to the latter. The king’s brothers, the dukes of Anjou and Poitiers, returned to France. The Moslems of Egypt, grown quickly tired of the Sultana Chegger-Eddour, made her yield up the sceptre. She shrewdly passed it to a favorite, Aibek, by marrying him, and thus retained the substance of power.