50 THE HISTORY OF THE ORDER OF [book III.

tors coming to enter a conquered cityand twodays afterwards, while Islam’s batteries were pre-paring, came before dawn to the walls (escape fromthe slavery of years as he pretended) a most dan-gerous clever spy, a German renegade, who waslifted up into the besieged town, and led to thegrand master as a Christian refugee; but was infact a pernicious turncoat, employing even truth it-self as a veil of concealment, and to intimidate others—avowing he was a founder by trade, and hadfounded recently sixteen huge cannons for Achmet,commander-in-chief of the very army before theireyes, the sultan’s vizier or general, a Paleelogosdegenerated into infidel, yet one of the cleverestofficers in the world, particularly for artillery.“ And, ” subjoined the diabolical hypocrite withseeming remorse, “ I founded many basilisks forhim, or double cannon eighteen feet long, throwingballs of from two to three feet in diameter . 2 Butabove everything his mortars are stupendouslydreadful, and belch huge marble globes of pro-digious size. And without doubt you will soonyourselves experience them, and then, indeed, re-quire your utmost precaution. The army is fully

1 Bouhours : Yie D’Aubusson, ii. 107.

2 A camion (now gone out of use), of forty-eightpounds of ball,of two bundredweigbt. Engineer’s Dictionary.