once absolved from their allegiance.

The Emperor went on steadily with his preparations, and then went to
Brundisium. He was met by papal messengers who strictly forbade him to
leave Italy until he had offered satisfaction for his offences against
the Church. In his turn Frederick, having sailed to Otranto, sent his
own envoys to the Pope to demand the removal of the interdict; and
these, of course, were dismissed with contempt.

In September the Emperor landed at Ptolemais; but the emissaries of
the Pope had preceded him, and he found himself under the ban of the
clergy and shunned by their partisans. The patriarch and the masters
of the military orders were to see that none served under his polluted
banners. The charge was given to willing servants: but Frederick found
friends in the Teutonic Knights under their grand master Herman de
Salza, as well as with the body of pilgrims generally. He determined
to possess himself of Joppa, and summoned all the crusaders to his
aid.

The Templars refused to stir, if any orders were to be issued in his
name; and Frederick agreed that they should run in the name of God and
Christendom. But while the enemy was aided greatly by the divisions
among the Christians, the death of the Damascene sultan Moadhin was of
little use to Frederick. The Egyptian sultan, Kameel, was now in a
position of greater independence, and his eagerness for an alliance
with the Emperor had rapidly cooled down.

Frederick, on his side, still resolved to try the effect of
negotiation. His demands extended at first, it is said, to the
complete restoration of the Latin kingdom, and ended, if we are to