The military power of the orders of the Temple and the Hospital in Palestine was at last completely broken by Bibars, or Benocdar, the fourth Mamlook sultan of Egypt, who, from the humble station of a Tartar slave, had raised himself to the sovereignty of that country, and through his valour and military talents had acquired the title of "the Conqueror." He invaded Palestine (A. D. 1262) at the head of thirty thousand cavalry, and defeated the Templars and Hospitallers with immense slaughter.[302] After several years of continuous warfare, during which the most horrible excesses were committed by both parties, all the strongholds of the Christians, with the solitary exception of the Pilgrim's Castle and the city of Acre, fell into the hands of the infidels. [Sidenote: A. D. 1266.] [Sidenote: A. D. 1268.] On the last day of April, (A. D. 1265,) Benocdar stormed Arsuf, one of the strongest of the castles of the Hospitallers; he slew ninety of the garrison, and led away a thousand into captivity. The year following he stormed Castel Blanco, a fortress of the Knights Templars, and immediately after laid siege to their famous and important castle of Saphet. After an obstinate defence, the Preceptor, finding himself destitute of provisions, agreed to capitulate, on condition that the surviving brethren and their retainers, amounting to six hundred men, should be conducted in safety to the nearest fortress of the Christians. The terms were acceded to, but as soon as Benocdar had obtained possession of the castle, he imposed upon the whole garrison the severe alternative of the Koran or death. They chose the latter, and, according to the christian writers, were all slain.[303] The Arabian historian Schafi Ib'n Ali Abbas, however, in his life of Bibars, or Benocdar, states that one of the garrison named _Effreez Lyoub_, embraced the Mahommetan faith, and was circumcised, and that another was sent to Acre to announce the fall of the place to his brethren. This writer attempts to excuse the slaughter of the remainder, on the ground that they had themselves first broken the terms of the capitulation, by attempting to carry away arms and treasure.[304] "By the death of so many knights of both orders," says Pope Clement IV., in one of his epistles, "the noble college of the Hospitallers, and the illustrious chivalry of the Temple, are almost destroyed, and I know not how we shall be able, after this, to find gentlemen and persons of quality sufficient to supply the places of such as have perished."[305] The year after the fall of Saphet, (A. D. 1267,) Benocdar captured the cities of Homs, Belfort, Bagras, and Sidon, which belonged to the order of the Temple; the maritime towns of Laodicea, Gabala, Tripoli, Beirout, and Jaffa, successively fell into his hands, and the fall of the princely city of Antioch was signalized by the slaughter of seventeen and the captivity of one hundred thousand of her inhabitants.[306] The utter ruin of the Latin