ches were shut against him, and he could not even
find a priest to officiate at his coronation. He had despised the papal
authority too long to quail at it now, when it was so unjustifiably
exerted, and, as there was nobody to crown him, he very wisely crowned
himself. He took the royal diadem from the altar with his own hands, and
boldly and proudly placed it on his brow. No shouts of an applauding
populace made the welkin ring; no hymns of praise and triumph resounded
from the ministers of religion; but a thousand swords started from their
scabbards to testify that their owners would defend the new monarch to the
death.

It was hardly to be expected that he would renounce for any long period
the dominion of his native land for the uneasy crown and barren soil of
Palestine. He had seen quite enough of his new subjects before he was six
months among them, and more important interests called him home. John of
Brienne, openly leagued with Pope Gregory against him, was actually
employed in ravaging his territories at the head of a papal army. This
intelligence decided his return. As a preliminary step, he made those who
had contemned his authority feel, to their sorrow, that he was their
master. He then set sail, loaded with the curses of Palestine. And thus
ended the seventh Crusade, which, in spite of every obstacle and
disadvantage, had been productive of more real service to the Holy Land
than any that had gone before; a result solely attributable to the bravery
of Frederic and the generosity of the Sultan Camhel.

Soon after the emperor's departure a new claimant started for the throne
of Jerusalem, in the person of Alice queen of Cyprus, and half-sister of
the Mary who, by her marriage, had transferred her right to John of
Brienne. The grand military orders, however, clung to Frederic, and Alice
was obliged to withdraw.

So peaceful a termination to the Crusade did not give unmixed pleasure in
Europe. The chivalry of France and England were unable to rest, and long
before the conclusion of the truce, were collecting their armies for an
eighth expedition. In Palestine also the contentment was far from
universal. Many petty Mahomedan states in the immediate vicinity were not
parties to the truce, and harassed the frontier towns incessantly. The
Templars, ever turbulent, waged bitter war with the sultan of Aleppo, and
in the end were almost exterminated. So great was the slaughter among them
that Europe resounded with