Shortly after this event, the King of Navarre returned to Europe, and Richard, Earl of Cornwall, with many knights and large forces, arrived in Palestine. Their expedition had been sanctioned by all the authorities of Europe, except the Pope. Henry III. conducted them in person to the shore; the prayers and benedictions of the people and the clergy followed them, and their journey through France was accompanied by shouts and acclamations. On his arrival in Palestine, Richard instantly marched upon Jaffa, but he was met by envoys from the Sultaun of Egypt--who was now at war with the Sultaun of Damascus--offering an exchange of prisoners, and a complete cession of the Holy Land,[848] with some unimportant exceptions. Richard instantly accepted such advantageous proposals; Jerusalem was given up to the Christians, the rebuilding of the walls was commenced, the churches were purified, and the earl returned to Europe with the glorious title of the deliverer of Palestine. The Templars would not be parties to this treaty, as the Hospitallers had refused to participate in the other; and thus, one of the great military Orders remained at war with the Sultaun of Damascus,[849] and the other with the Sultaun of Egypt. While these events had been passing in Palestine, a new dynasty had sprung up in the north of Asia, and threatened a complete revolution in the whole of that quarter of the world. Genjis Khan and his successors had overturned all the northern and eastern governments of Asia; and, spreading over that fair portion of the earth precisely as the Goths and Huns had spread over Roman Europe, had reduced the more polished and civilized nations of the south, by the savage vigour and active ferocity of a race yet in the youth of being. Among[850] other tribes whom the successors of Genjis had expelled from their original abodes, was a barbarous and warlike horde called the Corasmins; and this people, wandering about without a dwelling, destroying as they went, and waging war against all nations, at length directed their course towards Palestine. So quick and unexpected had been their arrival, that the Christians employed in the re-edification of the city-walls never dreamed of invasion till fire and massacre had swept over half the Holy Land.[851] No troops were collected, no preparations made, the fortifications of the city were incomplete, and the only resource of the people of Jerusalem was to retire in haste to the shelter of Jaffa, under the guidance of the few Templars and Hospitallers who were on the spot. Some few persons remained, and made an attempt at defence; but the town was taken in a moment, and every soul in it put to the sword.[852] The bloodthirsty barbarians, not satisfied with the scanty number of victims they had found, artfully raised the banner of the Cross upon the walls, and many of the Latins who had fled returned. Seven thousand more were thus entrapped and massacred;