'Sire,' replied John de Valery, 'may God grant that your hopes be realised.'
And the nobles and princes separated to make the necessary preparations for marching to Cairo.
Little did they foresee the terrible circumstances under which many of them were to reach that city.
CHAPTER XVII.
FACE TO FACE.
WHILE the Crusaders were preparing to leave Damietta, march up the Nile, and attack Cairo, Melikul Salih, after struggling desperately with the great destroyer, yielded to his fate, and breathed his last at Mansourah. The death of the sultan was regarded by the emirs as most untimely; for his son, Touran Chah, was then in Mesopotamia, and they were apprehensive of the most serious troubles. At this crisis, however, a woman, whose great ability enabled her to comprehend the emergency and to deal with it, suggested measures for averting the ruin with which the empire of Egypt was menaced.
Her name was Chegger Eddour, and she is said to have been an Armenian. She had originally been brought to Cairo as merchandise, and purchased by Melikul Salih as a slave. But her wit and beauty won the sultan's heart, and he became so enamoured that he elevated her to the position of favourite sultana, and carried her about with him wherever he went. One son whom she had by the sultan died young. Nevertheless her influence daily increased; and the Arabian historians, while eloquent in praise of her courage, agree in saying, that 'no woman surpassed her in beauty, and no man excelled her in genius.'
No sooner did Melikul Salih depart this life, than Chegger Eddour assembled the principal emirs at Mansourah, and made them acknowledge Touran Chah as sultan. Moreover, she impressed upon them the necessity of concealing the death of her husband till the arrival of his successor. The policy she recommended was adopted. Orders were still issued in Melikul Salih's name; the Mamelukes still guarded the gates of the palace as if he had been living; and prayers for his recovery were still offered up in the mosques, where the Moslems worshipped. All these precautions, which were the work of the sultana, were skilfully taken, and for a time the Saracens hoped that Melikul Salih might yet recover from his malady, and save them from the foe by whom they were threatened.