Provoked at this, Salaheddin declared to Nial, the lord of Manbedj, bearer of the missive, that the inviolability of an ambassador alone preserved his head, and marched with his troops to Aleppo, in order, as he said, to have a personal interview with his young prince. On his way he took Hama and Hemss, and encamped in the vicinity of Aleppo. The inhabitants and the young prince, led by his guardian, the eunuch Gumushteghin, instead of coming to a peaceful conference with Salaheddin, advanced against him in arms. “God is my witness,” exclaimed he, “that I wish it not to come to arms! but since ye will have it so, they shall decide.” The troops of Aleppo were defeated, and fled in disorder to the city, which their opponents now began to besiege in due form.[186] Gumushteghin, who saw no protection at hand from the swords of his valiant besiegers, had recourse to the daggers of the Assassins. At that period reigned, as grand-prior at Massiat, the point, as we have seen, of the Syrian power of the Ismailites, Rashideddin Sinan,[187] a man, whose name and deeds are to this day remembered in their annals.[188] Massiat lies in the mountain range Semak, which, running parallel with the coast of the Mediterranean, unites itself with that of Lebanon.[189] This village, with eighteen others, belongs to the territory of Hama (Epiphania). At that time it was the chief of ten mountain forts, forming the strength of the Ismailites, whose numbers are reckoned by the cotemporary annalists of the Crusaders to amount to more than sixty thousand men.[190] The names of these places are found in Hadji Khalfa’s Geography;[191] three have already been mentioned in this history; namely, Massiat, Kadmus, and Kahaf; the seven others were, Akkar, Hossnalekiad, Safita, Alika, Hossnalkarnin, Sihinn, and Sarmin, and were the first colonies of the Ismailites in Syria.[192] By means of these strongholds, and the daggers of the Assassins, Rashideddin Sinan was supreme in the mountainous parts of the north of Syria. Salaheddin, the proper defender of the faith, who had given the final blow to the Fatimite khalifate in Egypt, and whose increasing power threatened to ingulph that of the Atabegs in Syria, was the natural and most dangerous enemy of the order, and consequently their daggers were unceasingly aimed against him. A large sum of money contributed to procure easier access to the grand-prior Sinan, for the prayer of Gumushteghin, that Salaheddin should be the victim of their mutual revenge. Three Assassins attacked him in the camp before Aleppo; fortunately, they inflicted no mortal wound, and were themselves cut in pieces.[193]