The king came back glorious with his Egyptian exploit, only to hear of these reverses, and to march north in hopes of repairing them. He could do no more than place the best men he had in the fortresses, while Shírkoh gained possession of a stronghold named the Grotto of Tyre, by treachery, as was alleged—at least the Christian governor was hanged for it at Sidon. The fortress of Montreal, in Moab, fell at the same time, and the king was so indignant that he hung up twelve of the Templars who had been among the besieged, and had consented to its capitulation. Nothing, in fact, can explain the continual reverses of the Christians except the fact of their utter demoralization and cowardice, and the dwindling away of that full stream of pilgrim soldiers who had formerly flocked yearly to the East. The Second Crusade, indeed, was productive of the greatest harm in this respect to the Christian kingdom. It drained the West of all the men who wished to become pilgrims; and the fact that so few returned deterred effectually those who would otherwise have wished to go. Other causes, of course, were at work. Of these, the chief were the crusades against the Moors in Spain and the Pagans in Germany, and the development of pilgrimages to local shrines and saints. It was much easier and a great deal pleasanter, though not so glorious, to ride across a friendly country to a saint not many hundreds of miles away, than to journey in peril and privation along the long and weary road which led to Jerusalem.
But there was a lull in the incursions of Nûr-ed-dín. He and Shírkoh had other and vaster projects on hand. They sent to the caliph at Baghdad, and pointed out the manifest advantages which would accrue from the extinction of the Fatemite power, the union of both caliphates into one, and the possession of a country so rich and so fertile as Egypt, the people of which were enervated by pleasure and luxury, and absolutely unfitted for any kind of resistance. The caliph listened. Surrounded as he was by every luxury that the heart of man could desire, it mattered little to him whether another rich country was added to his nominal rule or not. But it mattered greatly that the divided allegiance of Islam should be made to run again in one stream, and he consented to give all his influence provided the war were made a religious war. To this Nûr-ed-dín and his general eagerly assented, and the caliph wrote to all the princes who owned his sway, commanding them to assist Shírkoh in his intended invasion of Egypt.