Page:A General Sketch of Political History from the Earlist Times.djvu/192

 180 THE LATER MIDDLE AGES gathered before Acre, but were held inert by feuds among their leaders. The feuds only became the fiercer with the late arrival of Richard of England, the ablest soldier among them, but the most impracticable of allies. Acre was taken, but enthusiasm for the cause had vanished. Princes and dukes one after another began with one accord to discover excellent reasons for returning to their own dominions. Richard and those who remained with him performed brilliant feats of arms, but neither achieved a conquest, nor displayed statesmanship nor diplomacy ; and the third crusade ended with an armistice which left the sea- board in the hands of the Christians from Tyre to Jaffa, but kept Jerusalem in the hands of the Turks. The inspiration of the third crusade was the most powerful which had moved Europe since the time of Peter the Hermit. The crusade itself had been wrecked by the persistent inability of the Christians to subordinate personal claims and ambitions to victory in what all professed to regard as the cause of Christianity. The first enthusiasm had died out, and was never to be aroused again. There were more great expeditions, but it is difficult to say how many of them are entitled to be called crusades. That which is generally called the fourth Fourth followed hard after the third. It was organised Crusade. by the German Emperor, Henry vi. ; but he took no part in it himself, and its successful beginnings turned into ignominious collapse. The fifth crusade came with the opening of the thirteenth century. It was transformed into an attack on the Greek Empire instead of on the Moslems. We shall hear more of Fifth it in another chapter. Here it will be sufficient to Crusade, say that the Imperial dominion in Europe was 1203, partitioned, and the so-called Latin Empire set up, which lasted for about half a century, after which there was a Greek restoration. The sixth crusade was undertaken by the Emperor Frederick ii. But the pope and the emperor were in extreme antagonism to each other, and matters reached a stage at which Frederick found that whether he started or whether he did not start his