[1333] Balbi, Verdadera Relacion, fol. 33.

[1334] The two principal authorities on whom I have relied for the siege
of Malta are Balbi and Vertot. The former was a soldier, who served
through the siege, his account of which, now not easily met with, was
printed shortly afterwards, and in less than three years went into a
second edition,--being that used in the present work. As Balbi was both
an eye-witness and an actor, on a theatre so limited that nothing could
be well hidden from view, and as he wrote while events were fresh in his
memory, his testimony is of the highest value. It loses nothing by the
temperate, home-bred style in which the book is written, like that of a
man anxious only to tell the truth, and not to magnify the cause or the
party to which he is attached. In this the honest soldier forms a
contrast to his more accomplished rival, the Abbe de Vertot.

This eminent writer was invited to compose the history of the order, and
its archives were placed by the knights at his disposal for this
purpose. He accepted the task; and in performing it he has sounded the
note of panegyric with as hearty a good will as if he had been a knight
hospitaller himself. This somewhat detracts from the value of a work
which must be admitted to rest, in respect to materials, on the soundest
historical basis. The abbe's turn for the romantic has probably aided,
instead of hurting him, with the generality of readers. His clear and
sometimes eloquent style, the interest of his story, and the dramatic
skill with which he brings before the eye the peculiar traits of his
actors, redeem, to some extent, the prolixity of his narrative, and have
combined, not merely to commend the book to popular favor, but to make
it the standard work on the subject.

[1335] By another ordinance, La Valette caused all the dogs in La Sangle
and Il Borgo to be killed, because they disturbed the garrisons by
night, and ate their provisions by day. Balbi, Verdadera Relacion, fol.
29.

[1336] Vertot, Knights of Malta, vol. III. p. 2.

[1337] Ibid., p. 4.--Balbi, Verdadera Relacion, fol. 64.--Calderon,
Gloriosa Defensa de Malta, p. 94.--Sagredo, Monarcas Othomanos, p. 296.

[1338] Calderon, Gloriosa Defensa de Malta, p. 91.--Vertot, Knights of
Malta, vol. III. p. 3.--De Thou, Histoire Universelle, tom. V. p.
67.--Cabrera, Filipe Segundo, lib. VI. cap. 26.--Sagredo, Monarcas
Othomanos, p. 246

[1339] Balbi, Verdadera Relacion, fol. 61, 62, 68.--Ca