[Footnote 99: The idea of the emirs to choose Louis for
their sultan is seriously attested by Joinville, (p. 77,
78,) and does not appear to me so absurd as to M. de
Voltaire, (Hist. Generale, tom. ii. p. 386, 387.) The
Mamalukes themselves were strangers, rebels, and equals:
they had felt his valor, they hoped his conversion; and such
a motion, which was not seconded, might be made, perhaps by
a secret Christian in their tumultuous assembly. Note:
Wilken, vol. vii. p. 257, thinks the proposition could not
have been made in earnest. - M.]