Page:Christianity in China, Tartary, and Thibet Volume I.djvu/255

243 CHAP. VII. INSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY OF BROTHER TRAVELLERS FOR JESUS CHRIST JOURNEY OF KING HAYTON IN TARTARY. — THE NEGO- TIATIONS. HOULAGOU LEADS HIS ARMY TOWARDS JERUSALEM. DESTRUCTION OF THE ORDER OF THE ASSASSINS. END OF THE CALIPHATE OF BAGDAD. THE TARTARS DRAW NEAR TO THE CHRISTIANS. ALEXANDER III. DETERS BELA, KING OF HUNGARY, FROM FORMING AN ALLIANCE WITH THE MONGOLS. THE FORTY- NINE MARTYRS OF SANDOMIR. — HOULAGOU AND NASSIR. HOU- LAGOU AND ALEXANDER IV. STRIFE BETWEEN THE MONGOLS AND THE CHRISTIANS OF SIDON. DEFEAT OF THE TARTARS IN EGYPT. KUBLAI, THE GRAND KHAN OF THE TARTARS. CHANGE OF POLICY. DEATH OF HOULAGOU. MARRIAGE OF HIS SON ABAGA WITH THE DAUGHTER OF MICHAEL PAL^EOLOGUS. ABAGA AND CLEMENT IV. TARTAR AMBASSADORS AT LYONS. THEY GO TO ENGLAND. — MISSION OF THE TWO VASSILLI. NICHOLAS III. SENDS MISSIONARIES AND LETTERS TO CHINA AND TARTARY. Whilst the ambassadors of Louis IX. were proceeding to the ends of the world to preach the Gospel to the hordes of Tartary, the Papacy was organising the work of the propagation of the faith on a vast scale in Europe. In 1252, Innocent IV. conceived the project of form- ing a body of missionaries, the members of which, taken from the spiritual families of St. Francis and St. Do- minic, should be as numerous as they were zealous, and always ready to set out on the most distant and peril- ous journeys, for the aggrandisement of the kingdom of Jesus Christ. This body received a name that happily indicated its R 2 '