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III STORY OF MALTA.

the arrival of two Spanish regiments, together with the knights ofMalta, happily stopped their progress. \ illegagnon, a I rencliknight, distinguished himself most eminently *. With the naturalimpetuosity of his nation, he rushed into the midst of the enemy,and was wounded in the left arm by a Moorish cavalier; buthaving parried, with his right hand, a second stroke of a lance fromthe same cavalier, he sprang upon the horse of his assailant, andstabbed him to the heart. Savignac, likewise a Frenchman, carry-ing the standard of Malta, pursued the infidels to the very gates ofAlgiers, into which he struck his poignard, as a proof of thecourageous part he had taken in the attack.

The order lost seventy-five knights in the two first sallies; andthey were preparing to engage in fresh combats, when a mostdreadful tempest arose. The ships which conveyed the provisionswere, in the space of half an hour, either dispersed or destroyed.Fifteen galleys and eighty-six other vessels perished. Nothingcould possibly equal the horrors of the scene upon the shore, whichshortly appeared covered with pieces of wreck and dead bodies.The soldiers and sailors who were able to swim, perished on thecoast; for the Moors and Arabs wandering in the fields, repairedto the sea-side, and massacred, without the smallest sentiments ofcompassion, all those who attempted to land. On an occasion somemorably disastrous, the Maltese navy rose to the highest pitchof glory. The galleys of the order alone resisted the fury of the

* See La Relation du Siege d'Algiers, addressee an Pope Paul III. par leSecretaire de son Legat.