and the Corasmins exercised every sort of barbarous fury on those objects they thought most sacred in the eyes of the Christians. At length the fugitives at Jaffa received a succour of four thousand men from their allies, the Sultauns of Emissa and Damascus,[853] and resolved to give battle to the barbarians. The Patriarch of Jerusalem precipitated the measures of the army, and after a dreadful struggle the Latins were defeated, the Grand Masters of the Temple and St. John slain, the three military Orders nearly exterminated, and the Sultaun of Emissa forced to fly for shelter to his fortifications. Walter de Brienne, the lord of Jaffa, was taken; and to force that town to surrender, the Corasmins hung the gallant knight by the arms to a cross, declaring to the garrison that he should there remain till the city was yielded. Walter heard, and raising his voice, unmindful of his own agonies, solemnly commanded his soldiers to hold out the city to the last.[854] The barbarians were obliged to retire, and Walter was sent captive into Egypt. The Sultaun of Emissa soon raised the standard a second time against the barbarians and after several struggles, in which the monarch of Egypt sometimes upheld, and sometimes abandoned the Corasmins, they were at length entirely defeated, and not one, it is said, escaped from the field of battle.[855] Barbaquan, their leader, was slain; and thus Asia was delivered of one of the most terrible scourges that had ever been inflicted on her. At this time a monarch reigned over France who combined in a remarkable degree the high talents of his grandfather Philip Augustus with the religious zeal or, perhaps I may say, fanaticism of his father, Louis VIII. Louis IX. was in every respect an extraordinary man; he was a great warrior, chivalrous as an individual, and skilful as a general: he was a great king, inasmuch as he sought the welfare of his people more than the aggrandizement of his territories: he formed the best laws that could be adapted to the time, administered them often in person, and observed them always himself: he was a good man, inasmuch as he served God with his whole heart, and strove in all his communion with his fellows to do his duty according to his sense of obligation. Had he been touched with religious fervour to the amount of zeal, but not to the amount of fanaticism, he would have been perhaps too superior to his age. Previous to the news of the Corasminian irruption, St. Louis had determined to visit the Holy Land, in consequence of a vow made during sickness.[856] It appears, that after the signal defeat which he had given to Henry III. of England at Saintonge, Louis's whole attention was turned to the sufferings of the Christians in Palestine; and so deeply was his mind impressed with that anxious thought, that it became the subject of dreams, which he looked upon as instigations from heaven. The news of the destruction of