CIXAP. II.] ST. JOHN OE JERUSALEM. 41

many of our people at each. Nor did those blaz-ing orbs not drop by times upon the sea, and re-bounding seek the distant sky—charming, but forus terrible to witness.

Yet less with what happened before his corpo-real eye was the grand master then occupied, thanwith revolving deeply vexatious tidings receivedthat very night. And when asked Avhat, he calleda council to hear a letter from Toledo, who haddetained his nephew’s galley at Messina, and nowwrote by this Maltese felucca that his promise hadbeen on the clear understanding he should be lentthe order’s galleys, and galley slaves during thesiege; when they could be of no use at Malta, orworse, for the former might fall into the enemy’sclutches, and the latter were useless mouths atleast, and required being looked after; that theHospitallers could not expect him to keep his pro-mises, if they broke their own; that the properway was for each party to perform what they hadpromised, and then he would punctually executehis. The grand master’s reply (and his councilapplauded it) was that it was no fault of his, butthe Turks had taken him by surprise and made itquite impossible for him to send slaves and galleys,as the viceroy would know himself if he werehere; so that it required at least fifty knights and