Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Chivalry,
armament was equipped against Ehodes , and this bulwark of Christendom , left tio its fate by the princes of Europe , was won , with the loss of above 100 , 000 lives . On the 26 th of June , 1522 , the Turkish fleet came in sight of Ehodes : there were 400 sail , having on board 140 , 000 soldiers , and 60 , 000 serfs from the forests of the Danube , to
serve as pioneers ; to these were opposed only 5 , 000 regular troops , 600 of them being the Knights , and the mariners of the port , and the inhabitants of ^" the city and villages . Solyman appeared at the camp on the 26 th of August , determined to conquer or end his days there . The details of this siege are replete with interest ; in one assault 2 , 000 Turks fell , and but 50 of the Knights ; in another ^ when the
English Knights were headed by their commander , John Buck , the Turks lost 3 , 000 men , the gallant John Buck himself being slain . In a subsequent assault , 15 , 000 Turks were left dead in the breaches and at the loot of the walls . Other assaults were repelled in a like manner ; but after hoping against hope that some of the Christian powers of Europe would send them succour , the Knights ( who would ,
had the issue been solely with reference to themselves , have made Ehodes their grave ) , in the humane desire to protect the women and children from the brutal treatment that characterized all the Turkish captures , accepted a friendly overture from the Ottoman camp . Deputies were despatched to arrange the terms of capitulation , and the conditions Solyman imposed were certainly of the most clement des & iption ; but the articles that allowed the inhabitants to preserve their property , and
their churches , were violated . Be I'Isle Adam , and the small remnant of his Knights , with grief bid an eternal farewell to their home , which for two hundred years had been an impregnable barrier to the Ottoman arms . Solyman , in token of respect for the vanquished Knights , refrained from defacing the armorial insignia and inscriptions on their buildings , and we are told that to this day they venerate it as a place worthy of being held for ever holy and illustrious in the estimation of mankind .
The melancholy band now had to seek a new home , and at last landed at Messina , to await the messenger whom the Grand Master had despatched to Eome to inform the Pope of thejsad issue . The plague appearing at Messina , the magistrates conceiving the disease had beeh carried by the emigrants , ordered them to depart . They then set sail for Civita Vecchia , and there received the Pope ' s
desire of a personal interview . De I'Isle Adam , attended by all his Knights , went to Eome , and was honoured by a friendly embrace 3 the Pontiff designating him the hero and defender of the Christian faith , —" words which / 'Vertot says , " were much less expense than the succours necessary for the preservation of Ehodes would have
been . " The Pope died soon after , and Giulio di Medici , who had formerly been a Knight of St . John , was elected as Clement VII . The Pope offered the Knights , as a temporary asylum , the town of Viterbo about forty miles from Eome , the fleet being permitted to remain at Civita Vecchia . There were many commotions in Europe between the Emperor Charles V ., the King of France , and the Pope , but the
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Chivalry,
armament was equipped against Ehodes , and this bulwark of Christendom , left tio its fate by the princes of Europe , was won , with the loss of above 100 , 000 lives . On the 26 th of June , 1522 , the Turkish fleet came in sight of Ehodes : there were 400 sail , having on board 140 , 000 soldiers , and 60 , 000 serfs from the forests of the Danube , to
serve as pioneers ; to these were opposed only 5 , 000 regular troops , 600 of them being the Knights , and the mariners of the port , and the inhabitants of ^" the city and villages . Solyman appeared at the camp on the 26 th of August , determined to conquer or end his days there . The details of this siege are replete with interest ; in one assault 2 , 000 Turks fell , and but 50 of the Knights ; in another ^ when the
English Knights were headed by their commander , John Buck , the Turks lost 3 , 000 men , the gallant John Buck himself being slain . In a subsequent assault , 15 , 000 Turks were left dead in the breaches and at the loot of the walls . Other assaults were repelled in a like manner ; but after hoping against hope that some of the Christian powers of Europe would send them succour , the Knights ( who would ,
had the issue been solely with reference to themselves , have made Ehodes their grave ) , in the humane desire to protect the women and children from the brutal treatment that characterized all the Turkish captures , accepted a friendly overture from the Ottoman camp . Deputies were despatched to arrange the terms of capitulation , and the conditions Solyman imposed were certainly of the most clement des & iption ; but the articles that allowed the inhabitants to preserve their property , and
their churches , were violated . Be I'Isle Adam , and the small remnant of his Knights , with grief bid an eternal farewell to their home , which for two hundred years had been an impregnable barrier to the Ottoman arms . Solyman , in token of respect for the vanquished Knights , refrained from defacing the armorial insignia and inscriptions on their buildings , and we are told that to this day they venerate it as a place worthy of being held for ever holy and illustrious in the estimation of mankind .
The melancholy band now had to seek a new home , and at last landed at Messina , to await the messenger whom the Grand Master had despatched to Eome to inform the Pope of thejsad issue . The plague appearing at Messina , the magistrates conceiving the disease had beeh carried by the emigrants , ordered them to depart . They then set sail for Civita Vecchia , and there received the Pope ' s
desire of a personal interview . De I'Isle Adam , attended by all his Knights , went to Eome , and was honoured by a friendly embrace 3 the Pontiff designating him the hero and defender of the Christian faith , —" words which / 'Vertot says , " were much less expense than the succours necessary for the preservation of Ehodes would have
been . " The Pope died soon after , and Giulio di Medici , who had formerly been a Knight of St . John , was elected as Clement VII . The Pope offered the Knights , as a temporary asylum , the town of Viterbo about forty miles from Eome , the fleet being permitted to remain at Civita Vecchia . There were many commotions in Europe between the Emperor Charles V ., the King of France , and the Pope , but the