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THE HISTORY OF THE ORDER OF [book IV.

the cavalier to descend, a last resource. But ontheir coming, the enemy retired, with perhaps afeigned panic. There was breathing time, evensome hours.

But lo! when least they expected it, and ban-daging their wounds, and otherwise seeking somerefreshment, at ten forenoon, sounded is the fourthassault general, and suddenly the foe rushes, andfinds a passage open on every side. Alreadyknowing by experience that we were wholly withoutdefence of wild-fire, gunpowder, or anything, andrendered quite harmless from wounds and debility,the infidels no longer employed the least screen,but swarmed and menaced all round . 1 ColonelMas, seeing all was lost, and determined to sell hislife dear, like a brave soldier, since his leg wasfractured, had himself seated on a log at his postof command, and brandishing a great two-handedsword—a weapon he used to manage with singularskill—'slew several Turks, most valorously, to hisultimate gasp; after which he was cut up into minutebits, by exasperated pigmies. Universal massacreensued, and all defence ceased. Sir Francis Lang-freducci, severely wounded as he was, in manyplaces, contrived to hobble to the post oppositeRennella, and there, where the wooden drawbridge

1 Bosio : par. iii. 573.