IV.] EXTENSION TO THE SOUTH. 39 fever brought him to the point of death. In it he vowed to make a crusade to the Holy Land, where the Christian cause was in a more woful state than ever, owing to the quarrels between the popes and the Emperor Fredet-ick II. The title of King of Jerusalem had descended to the Emperor by marriage, and he hadactually won back Jerusalem for a while. But the Popes opposed him everywhere. Gregory IX. had vainly tried to stir up Lewis to head a crusade against him, and had in 1240 actually offered the im- perial crown to Lewis' brother, Robert^ Count of Artois; but the king, whose unseltishness made his views of duty singularly clear, would not be drawn into the quarrel, and refused the offer. The preparations for the crusade occupied three years, during which he was building that gem of early Pointed architecture, the Sainte Chapelle at Paris, the chapel of the King's palace, as a shrine for what were believed to be the instruments of the Pas- sion, the sponge, the lance-head, and above all the crown of thorns, all sold to him in 1241 by the Latin Emperor Baldwin of Constantinople. Lewis, having made peace with all his neighbours, left the government to his mother, and took with him his wife, his brothers, a body of Enghsh under William, Earl of Salisbury, and a host of bishops and knights, among whom the most valuable to us was ]omLord of Joiin'ille, Lewis' friend and biographer, who places him before us in all his blameless glory as a " selfless man " full of courage and resolution. 12. The Seventh Crusade, 1248. — Saladin had had weak successors, and the kingdom had been broken up ; but as part of Palestine was still united with Egypt under the Sultan Nedjid Eddin, it was thought that to attack Cairo was the way to win Jerusalem. Lewis left Aigues Mortes,2L haven which he had lately founded on the Medi- terranean, in August, 1248 ; but he was kept five months at Cyprus, the meeting place, before he was joined by numbers enough to make the attempt. Sailing at last for Daniietta, he foixed his way to land by great personal bravery, in June, 1249, in the teeth of the Memlooks. These were the chief warriors of Egypt, who were re- cruited from infant Circassian slaves, and had become a praetorian guard, as much the terror of their lord as of his foes. They did not however attempt to defend Dami- etta, and, had Lewis pushed on at once during their panic, he would probably have won Cairo. But he tarried another five months for his biother Alfonso with
