The Turks, accustomed to the military and pastoral life, did not aspire to the empire of the seas, but they never left the Christians at rest. They made themselves dreaded, not so much by their great armies, which were frequently nothing but confused and undisciplined multitudes, but by their continual, harassing incursions. Docile and patient, they endured hunger, thirst, and fatigue, better than they would face an enemy. Their knowledge of the country, their being accustomed to the climate, and the intelligence they kept up with the inhabitants, gave them, in all their warlike expeditions, a decided advantage over the Christians. Their soldiers surpassed the Franks in the arts of shooting with the bow, or hurling a javelin, as well as in horsemanship; and their leaders were practised, and excelled in all the stratagems of war. Their tactics consisted in wearing out their enemies, in preparing ambushes for them, or in drawing them into difficult positions, where they might triumph without fighting. The endless discord which prevailed among the Mussulman princes of Syria, and the revolutions which daily threatened their power, prevented them from following up, for any length of time, the same plan of defence or attack; but when in the enjoyment of a transient tranquillity, sometimes excited by a thirst for plunder, or sometimes animated by the prayers and the counsels of the caliph of Bagdad, they would burst like a sudden and unexpected storm over the territories of Antioch, Edessa, Tripoli, or the kingdom of Jerusalem. If the Mussulmans experienced a defeat, they retired with the hope of finding a more favourable opportunity; if they were conquerors, they ravaged the cities and the plains, and returned to their country, loaded with booty, singing these words: “_The Koran rejoices, and the Gospel is in tears_.”