Page:A History of the Knights of Malta, or the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.djvu/378

348 troops rendered them unable to execute for themselves. A description of the fortress has been given in Chapter XII., showing what portion of the general line was attached to each langue. It remains only to say that the reserve was divided into four bodies, commanded respectively by the chancellor D’Amaral, who was to support the quarters of Auvergne and Germany; the Turcopolier, John Buck, for Spain and England; the grand-prior of France, Peter de Cluys, for France and Castile; and the grand-prior of Navarre, George de Morgut, for Provence and Italy. The Grand-Master himself, with his lieutenant, Gabriel de Pomeroys, at the head of his body-guard, was reserved for general purposes. The tower of St. Nicholas was placed under the command of Guyot de Castellan, a knight of Provence, and was garrisoned by twenty knights and 300 men-at-arms.

L’Isle Adam did not content himself with merely making these military dispositions. He also directed prayers and intercessions to be offered in all the churches, invoking the intervention of the Almighty to rescue them from their enemies. The town was divided into two creeds, the Latin and the Greek. At the head of each was an archbishop, the Latin dignitary being Leonard Balestin, and the Greek, Clement. Fortunately these ecelesiastics zealously co-operated with each other for the public weal, and maintained the most complete harmony between their respective flocks. They both issued most earnest exhortations to secure faithful and unswerving obedience to their common chief. The address of the Greek archbishop has been recorded by Fontanus, and is an excellent specimen of the declamation of the period. L’Isle Adam was certainly fortunate in possessing, at this crisis, two such able and energetic coadjutors, men whose position gave them ample power to sway the opinions and feelings of their countrymen.

The emperor Solyman was, during this time, busily engaged in collecting his forces in readiness for an attack on the island, and when all was prepared he, as a last measure, prior to commencing operations, despatched the following summons to surrender:—“The sultan Solyman, to Villiers do L’Isle Adam, Grand-Master of Rhodes, to his knights and to