His eldest son Abul-Kasim, who had twice led expeditions into Egypt, succeeded to the caliphate with the title of El-Kaim, 934-946. He began his reign with warlike vigor. He sent out a fleet in 934 or 935, which harried the southern coast of France, blockaded and took Genoa, and coasted along Calabria, massacring and plundering, burning the shipping, and carrying off slaves wherever it touched. At the same time he despatched a third army against Egypt; but the firm hand of the Ikshid now held the government, and his brother, Obeid-Allah, with fifteen thousand horse, drove the enemy out of Alexandria and gave them a crushing defeat on their way home. But for the greater part of his reign El-Kaim was on the defensive, fighting for existence against the usurpation of one Abu-Yezid, who repudiated Shiism, cursed the Mahdi and his successor, stirred up most of Morocco and Barbary against El-Kaim, drove him out of his capital, and went near to putting an end to the Fatimite caliphate. It was only after seven years of uninterrupted civil war that this formidable insurrection died out, under the firm but politic management of the third caliph, El-Mansur (946-953), a brave man who knew both when to strike and when to be generous. Abu-Yezid was at last run to earth, and his body was skinned and stuffed with straw, and exposed in a cage with a couple of ludicrous apes as a warning to the disaffected. The Fatimites so far wear a brutal and barbarous character. They do not seem to have encouraged literature or learning; but this is partly explained by the fact that culture belonged chiefly to the orthodox caliphate; and its learned men could have no dealings with the heretical pretender. The city of Kayrawan, which dates from the Arab conquest in the eighth century, preserves the remains of some noble buildings, but of their other capitals or royal residences no traces of art or architecture remain to bear witness to the taste of their founders. Each began to decay as soon as its successor was built. With the fourth caliph, however, El-Moizz, the conqueror of Egypt, 953-975, the Fatimites entered upon a new phase. El-Moizz was a man of politic temper, a born statesman, able to grasp the conditions of success and to take advantage of every point in his favor. He was also highly educated, and not only wrote Arabic poetry and delighted in its literature, but studied Greek, mastered Berber and Sudani dialects, and is even said to have taught himself Slavonic in order to converse with his slaves from Eastern Europe. His eloquence was such as to move his audience to tears. To prudent statesmanship he added a large generosity, and his love of justice was among his noblest qualities. So far as outward acts could show, he was a strict Moslem of the Shiah sect, and the statement of his adversaries that he was really an atheist seems to rest merely upon the belief that all the Fatimites adopted the esoteric doctrines of the Ismailian missionaries.