the Capuchin
church in Rome. This church, it will be remembered, contains Guido's
renowned Archangel Michael.

CHAPTER XIV.

The Chivalric Order of St. John.--Humble Beginning of the
Organization.--Hospitallers.--Days of the Crusades.--Motto
of the Brotherhood.--Peter Gerard.--The Monk lost in the
Soldier.--At Acre, Cyprus, and Rhodes.--Naval Operations.
--Siege of Rhodes.--Garden of the Levant.--Piratical Days.
--Six Months of Bloodshed.--Awful Destruction of Human
Life.--A Famous Fighting Knight.--Final Evacuation of
Rhodes by the Order.

Our story of Malta would be incomplete unless we gave a succinct and
consecutive account of the famous Order of the Knights of St. John, to
whom we have so often alluded in the foregoing pages, and who have left
upon this island more of their personality than all the other
sovereignties that preceded or have succeeded them. While we freely
reprehend their many and glaring faults, we are forced to admire and
praise their energy, their heroic bravery, and their undoubted spirit of
enterprise. Providence saw fit to raise up this fraternity for its own
good purpose, and perhaps it was the one element needed to cope with the
exigencies of the troublous times in which they flourished. They played
their important and tragic part in the great drama of the ages, and
passed away. The ashes of their last representatives now lie beneath the
mortuary mosaics of the church of St. John.

The beginning of the organization was, as already intimated, of a very
humble character, but being in its purpose founded upon true Christian
principles, it challenged at the outset the just admiration of many
sincere and devout people, who gladly joined in furthering its estimable
object, and thus it grew, though very slowly at first, until finally it
became a great power throughout the civilized nations, exercising in its
day a vast degree of both religious and political influence. The Grand
Masters of the order took position among the highest potentates of the
age, and were given the post of honor next to that of royalty itself, at
all assemblies of state to which they were called.

A few sincere, energetic, and practical individuals, said to have been
Italian merchants from Amalfi, then belonging to the kingdom of Naples,
impressed by the peculiar exigencies of the time and place, solemnly
joined themselves together as a sacred fraternity, at Jerusa