With the termination of this treaty the Christian strongholds fell one by one to the Moslems, and the dislodged inhabitants took final and fatal refuge in Acre. Here were gathered the heterogeneous remnants of Christian populations, together with as diverse bands from all parts of the world, who for greed or piety had taken the sword of the waning cause. The city was rent with dissensions, the various parties contending as a pack of dogs for the last bone. Even the Templars and Hospitallers fought in the streets for such shadows of military honor as might be left in the general disgrace. Thus for twenty years Acre remained a monument of the mercy or indifference of the Moslems. In 1291 Pope Nicholas IV. sent a band of seventeen hundred mercenaries to protect the place. These men, failing to receive the pay promised them, looted the stores of Saracen merchants. The Sultan Khalil, second successor of Bibars, demanded redress; it was refused. Khalil marched his troops beneath the walls. The capture of the place was inevitable. The certain destruction that awaited them affected the inhabitants as once the people of Jerusalem, who cried, “Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.” The revelry of the self-abandoned multitude ceased only in their ruin. The assault of the foe was quickly rewarded. Just a century after its recovery from the Moslems through the valor of Richard Cœur de Lion, Acre fell back again to their possession. Sixty thousand Christians were borne away to slavery or put to death. Thus faded from the land of the Christ the last ray of hope of its occupation by His people, until it shall be conquered by the weapon which He appointed—“the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.” RESULTS OF THE CRUSADES. CHAPTER XLV. KINGSHIP—UNITY OF EUROPE—THE PAPACY—LIBERAL THOUGHT—INCREASED KNOWLEDGE—ARTS—LITERATURE—COMMERCE—THE TURKISH POWER.