said Louis, "for they do not belong to me; the princes and the Christian
orders, in whose hands they are, can alone keep or surrender them." The
sultan, in anger, threatened to have the king put to the torture, or sent
to the Grand Khalif of Bagdad, who would detain him in prison for the
rest of his days. "I am your prisoner," said Louis; "you can do with me
what you will." "You call yourself our prisoner," said the Mussulman
negotiators, "and so, we believe you are; but you treat us as if you had
us in prison." The sultan perceived that he had to do with an
indomitable spirit; and he did not insist any longer upon more than the
surrender of Damietta, and on a ransom of five hundred thousand livres
(that is, about ten million one hundred and thirty-two thousand francs,
or four hundred and five thousand two hundred and eighty pounds, of
modern money, according to M. de Wailly, supposing, as is probable, that
livres of Tours are meant). "I will pay willingly five hundred thousand
livres for the deliverance of my people," said Louis, and I will give up
Damietta for the deliverance of my own person, for I am not a man who
ought to be bought and sold for money." "By my faith," said the sultan,
the Frank is liberal not to have haggled about so large a sum. Go tell
him that I will give him one hundred thousand livres to help towards
paying the ransom." The negotiation was concluded on this basis; and
victors and vanquished quitted Mansourah, and arrived, partly by land and
partly by the Nile, within a few leagues of Damietta, the surrender of
which was fixed for the 7th of May. But five days previously a tragic
event took place. Several emirs of the Mamelukes suddenly entered
Louis's tent. They had just slain the Sultan Malek-Moaddam, against whom
they had for some time been conspiring. "Fear nought, sir," said they to
the king; "this was to be. Do what concerns you in respect of the
stipulated conditions, and you shall be free." Of these emirs one, who
had slain the sultan with his own hand, asked the king, brusquely, "What
wilt thou give me? I have slain thine enemy, who would have put thee to