number of fifty-three, wrote a letter to the Grand Master, demanding permission to abandon St. Elmo and retire to Il Borgo.  If their request were denied they announced their design to sally forth, sword in hand, and perish in the ranks of the enemy.  The Commandeur de Cornet was the bearer of this letter, which was received by the Grand Master with sorrow and indignation.  To reassure them, he sent three commissioners to inspect the place.  This was done, and one of them, a Knight of Greek descent named Constantine Castriot, reported that the fort could still hold out a while longer.  When he announced this at St. Elmo the recalcitrant Knights were so furious with him that the Baili of Negropont had to sound “the alarm” to prevent a disgraceful fracas.  The commissioners returned to Il Borgo.  After hearing their report La Valette wrote a letter to those by whom he had been memorialised to the following effect: 

“Return to the convent, my brothers; you will there be in greater security; and on our part we shall feel a greater sense of security in the conservation of so important a place, on which depends the safety of the island and the honour of our Order.”

Never were men so taken aback as were the Knights in St. Elmo when they received this response; here it was intimated to them that that which they refused to do on account of the danger thereof was to be undertaken by others.  This was no more than a fact, as La Valette was besieged with applications from, not only the Knights, but also the simple soldiers of the garrison, to be allowed to pass over to St. Elmo and die if necessary to the last man.  It was, therefore, with prayers and tears that the Knights besought the Grand Master to allow them to remain.  At first La Valette was adamant.  He preferred, he said, the rawest militia which was prepared to obey his orders, to Knights who knew not their duty.  In the end, however, he yielded, and in the fortress of St. Elmo, that crushed and ruined charnel-house, its defences gaping wide, its every corner exposed night and day to a sweeping murderous fire, there remained a host of men sadly torn and battered, but animated by such a spirit that nothing the Turks could devise made upon it the least impression.  These great and gallant gentlemen had had their moment of weakness; they had been heartened to the right conception of their duty by the noble veteran who was their chief.  To him had they turned at last, as his obedient children who had had their moment of rebellion in a trial as hard as was ever undergone by man.  And now, as the inevitable end drew near, it was as if they would imitate the Roman gladiator with that terrible chorus of his:  “Ave Caesar morituri te salutant.”

All day and every day did the garrison fight, snatching such repose as was possible when their pertinacious enemies, worn out by fatigue and the terrible heat, could no longer be led to the attack against those whom they now firmly believed to be in league with Shaitan himself; “For how else,” demanded Janissary and Spahi alike, “could infidels like these make head against those chosen of the Prophet like ourselves.”