At this period king Amauri, having partaken somewhat too plentifully of a favourite dish of fish, was seized with an alarming illness, and died at Acre on the 1st of April, A. D. 1205. He had issue by Isabella one daughter; but before the close of the year both the mother and the child died. The crowns of Jerusalem and Cyprus, which were united on the heads of Amauri and Isabella, were now after their decease again divided. Mary, the eldest daughter of the queen, by the famous Conrad, marquis of Montferrat, was acknowledged heiress to the crown of the Latin kingdom, and Hugh de Lusignan, the eldest son of Amauri by his first wife, succeeded to the sovereignty of the island of Cyprus. This young prince married the princess Alice, daughter of Isabella by king Henry, count of Champagne, and half sister to the young queen Mary by the mother’s side. The young and tender princess who had just now succeeded to the throne of the Latin kingdom, was fourteen years of age, and the Templars and Hospitallers became her natural guardians and protectors. They directed the military force of the Latin empire in the field, and the government of the country in the cabinet: and defended the kingdom during her minority with zeal and success against all the attacks of the infidels. As soon as the young queen arrived at marriageable years, the Templars and Hospitallers sent over the bishop of Acre and Aimar, lord of Cæsarea, to Philip Augustus, king of France, requesting that monarch to select a suitable husband for her from among his princes and nobles. The king’s choice fell upon the count of Brienne, who left France with a large cortége of knights and foot soldiers, and arrived in Palestine on the 13th of September. The day after his arrival he was married to the young queen, who had just then attained her seventeenth year, and on the succeeding Michaelmas-day, he was crowned king of Jerusalem.