me
Maltese troops, with whom they had some lively skirmishes. Unfortunately,
in one of these the Chevalier was captured, put to the torture, and
eventually beheaded for having wilfully misled the Turks. A council of war
was held by Piali, Mustafa, and their principal officers, to deliberate on
the best manner of prosecuting the enterprise on which they were engaged.
The admiral, wishing to conform strictly with the instructions of Soliman,
voted to delay all initiative until the arrival of the famous corsair.
Mustafa, however, held a different opinion: the unfortunate Chevalier La
Riviere had, before his death, informed the Turkish general that large and
powerful succours were expected daily from Sicily. Secretly disquieted by
this news, which he had at the time affected to disbelieve, Mustafa now
urged immediate action. His opinion was that, in the first instance, they
had better attack the castle of St. Elmo. It was a small and insignificant
fort which at best would only delay them some five or six days; when this
had fallen they could proceed to the more serious business of taking Il
Borgo, the principal fortress on the island in which the Grand Master and
most of the Knights were established. By the time St. Elmo had been taken
they might reasonably expect that Dragut and his corsairs would have
arrived, and, with these seasonable reinforcements, proceed to the really
formidable portion of their task. In their decisions both admiral and
general were wrong; to delay attack, once the troops were landed, was a
counsel of pusillanimity hardly to be expected of Piali, but showing at the
same time how he dreaded above all else departing one iota from the
instructions which he had received. To attack the castle of St. Elmo first
was a military mistake, because it could be--and was during the whole of
the siege--reinforced from its larger sister Il Borgo.

The discourse of Mustafa prevailed in the council of war, and the siege of
St. Elmo was decided upon and immediately begun.

CHAPTER XX

THE SIEGE OF MALTA

The siege of Malta by the Turks; The capture of the fortress of St.
Elmo; The death of Dragut-Reis

[Illustration: JEAN PARISOT DE LA VALETTE, GRAND MASTER OF THE KNIGHTS OF
MALTA, AT THE SIEGE OF THAT ISLAND BY THE TURKS IN 1565.]

There was an entire disregard of human life among the leaders of the
Ottoman Turks at this time which is almost incredible; to attain their end
in war they sacrificed tho