CCURAGE OF QUEEN MARGARET. 183

a way likely to convince them of the selfishness of
their conduct.

‘Gentlemen,’ said Margaret, rousing herself from
her prostration and raising her head; ‘as you love
God, do not leave this city; for if you do. you will
utterly ruin the king and his army, who are cap-
tives, and expose all within the walls to the ven-
geance of the Saracens.’

‘Madam,’ replied the Pisans and Genoese, utterly
unmoved by the royal lady’s distress, ‘we have no
provisions left, and we cannot consent to remain at
the risk of dying of hunger.’

‘Be under no such apprehension,’ said the queen
quickly; ‘you shall not die of hunger; I will cause
all the provisions in Damietta to be bought in the
kino’s name, and distributed forthwith.’

‘The Pisans and Genoese on hearing this assurance
consented to remain in Damietta; and, after an ex-
penditure of three hundred and sixty thousand livres,
Margaret provided for their subsistence. But the
men who were thus bribed to remain as a garrison
were not likely to make any very formidable resist-
ance in the event of an attack taking place; and
such an event was no longer improbable. Indeed
rumours, vague but most alarming, reached Damietta
that a Saracenic host was already on its way to capture
the city.

The rumour that the Moslems were actually coming
made the bravest men in Damictta quake, and inspired
_ the ladies who were in the city with absolute terror.
Even the courage of the queen, who had just given
birth to her son John, failed; and her faculties