Page:A History of the Knights of Malta, or the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.djvu/221

Rh Unfortunately for Heredia, he was induced by the Venetians to extend his conquests still further in the Morea, and the city of Corinth was selected as the next point of attack. Whilst making a reconnoissance before this place with a very slender escort, Heredia was surprised by an ambuscade of the enemy. After a most energetic but fruitless resistance, he was captured and carried off into the city. The chiefs of the expedition were so dismayed at this untoward event, that they offered the restoration of Patras as his ransom. This, however, the Turks refused, asserting that they should soon be in a position to re-capture the town for themselves. Upon this the Christians supplemented their offer by the further proposal to pay a large sum of money, and to leave the three grand-priors of England, St. Gilles, and Rome, all of whom were then with the army, as hostages for the payment. It is stated by almost all the historians who have narrated the event, that this offer having been accepted by the Turks, Heredia himself put his veto on it, stating that it was far better that an old man like himself should perish in slavery than that three more youthful and valuable members should be lost to the Order, even for a time. He also declined the payment of any ransom out of the public treasury, asserting that he had sufficiently enriched his own family to enable them to come to his assistance in this his hour of need. No entreaties, they add, could change the indomitable resolution of the gallant old man, and his companions were reluctantly compelled to leave him in the hands of the enemy, where he remained for a period of three years, until, in 1381, he was ransomed by his family, and thus enabled to proceed to Rhodes.

Such is the story as told by the leading historians, with, however, one notable exception. Bosio, the Italian writer, who is in many respects the most trustworthy chronicler of his epoch, asserts that Heredia was eventually induced to permit his ransom to be effected by the Order, pending the arrival of the necessary funds from his family in Spain; and that the three grand-priors were left as hostages until the money was sent from Rhodes. This certainly seems the most rational solution of the difficulty, and it is very probably the true record of what did actually take place.

During this interval a schism had sprung up in the Church,