14
THE HISTORY OF THE ORDER OF [book i.
not show them for fear of discouraging the Chris-tians. His poor son died soon—the second—for thefirst had remained at home as regent . 1 One goodcame of it, that deadly Asia Minor was renouncedfor ever. The sea for all future crusades ! 2
Scarce had Acre fallen to Islam, when Conrad, son1 ^ of that Marquis of Montferrat who as related,
had been taken at Hattim by Saladin, comingin a ship from Europe, found out his mistake beforelanding, so remained on board as a merchant in theport; till hearing the Christian flag still flew at Tyre,profited by a favourable wind to sail out of the net,and got to the Tyrians, who were so encouragedand elated also on observing his engineeringability, that they acceded to his proposal to makehim their prince. Had Saladin gone against Tyreimmediately from the victory of Tiberias, he wouldhave perhaps succeeded; but his delay followed byConrad’s coming, spoiled all . 3 As to Acre, it had be-come Mahometan, with the rest, which occurred im-mediately after the overthrow at Tiberias. And verysoon after the fall of Jerusalem, a small Christiandetachment had begun to observe,ifnot besiege Acre.Against whom Saladin marched; but went round byTyre, and for the third time essayed to reduce it by
1 Arab. Chron., 279. 2 Id., 282.
3 Id., 219.