The residence of the order at Limisso lasted for about eighteen years; during which period the temporary success of the Tartars, under their great khan, Gazan, seemed at one time to give hopes of a re-establishment of the Christian power in Palestine. Gazan, though not a Christian himself, was always solicitous for the alliance of the Christian sovereigns. He had Christians from the Asiatic provinces among his troops, and to please them is said to have even placed the cross upon his banners. The better to pursue his hostilities against the Saracens, he entered into a league with the kings of Armenia and Cyprus, and the orders of the Hospitallers and Templars; and at the head of their united forces made himself master of Syria. Once more did the Christian knights find themselves within the walls of the Holy City; and whilst gazing on the ruins of their old home, or on the grassy mounds which were all that remained to show the fate of their brethren of Nicopolis, they doubtless thought the day was come for the Cross once more to triumph, and that they should behold the hospital of Jerusalem rise from its ashes in all its ancient splendour. But Gazan was recalled to his own dominions; and the forces of the Christians were too weak to hold the country they had conquered. The ambassadors of the khan were seen indeed at the court of Rome; and had Bonifice VIII., who then filled the papal see, been able to unite the European powers in a fresh crusade, it is probable that a greater advantage might have been obtained than had ever yet attended their arms,—for the Saracens had lost the prestige of success; but the pontiff was engaged in a quarrel with the most powerful of those princes who would naturally have lent their aid to such an enterprise, and whilst France was governed by Philip le Bel no undertaking preached by Boniface could look for support from that nation. The whole plan, therefore, fell to the ground; and the Hospitallers, whose continuance in Cyprus gave rise to many jealousies on the part of the sovereigns of the island, began to see the necessity of abandoning their hopes of returning to Palestine, and of looking out for some other settlement in the neighbourhood of its shores, where their independence might be undisputed.