Page:A History of the Knights of Malta, or the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.djvu/472

438 and leave his brethren to their fate by maintaining St. Elmo at all cost8, until it should be wrested from him by actual capture.

He therefore directed Medrano to return to his post and point out to his comrades the absolute necessity for their holding out to the last extremity. When this stern decree became known, the garrison perceived that they were being deliberately sacrificed for the general safety. Many among them, particularly those who, having grown grey in the service of the Order, were perhaps the more ready to lay down their lives at the will of their chief, prepared to obey the mandate. Others, however, there were of the younger knights—and also of those who, whilst serving under the White Cross flag, were not enrolled in its ranks—who were by no means so willing to await in calm obedience the fate to which the decree of La Valette had doomed them. They were perfectly ready to brave an honourable death in the face of the enemy, with the prospect of striking one last blow in the good cause before they fell; but the present was a very different case. They conceived that they were being needlessly sacrificed merely to prolong the resistance of the fort for a few days; loud exclamations of astonishment and indignation arose therefore amongst their ranks when Medrano delivered his message.

This insubordination did not find vent merely in idle murmurs. That same night a petition was forwarded to the Grand-Master, signed by fifty-three of their number, urging him to relieve them instantly from their untenable post, and threatening, in case of refusal, to sally forth and meet an honourable death in open fight rather than suffer themselves to be buried like dogs beneath the ruins of St. Elmo. La Valette was highly incensed at the insubordinate tone of this document. He informed the bearer that, in his opinion, the vows of the Order imposed upon its members the obligation, not only of laying down their lives when necessary for its defence, but further, of doing so in such a manner and at such a time as he, their Grand-Master, might see fit to appoint. Fearful, however, lest the recusants might be driven to desperation, and in reality execute the threat they had held out, and being, moreover, anxious to prolong, if only for a day, the retention of the