The Knights of St. John

by Augusta Theodosia Drane

Mahomet left two sons, Bajazet and Djem;[17] the first a mild and pacific prince, the other generous and warlike, and no mean scholar for his age and nation. Hardly was Bajazet on the throne, when he made proposals of peace to Rhodes. D’Aubusson, unwilling to accede thereto on his own authority, sent, like a dutiful son of the Church, to consult the Holy See. But ere an answer came, a strange thing happened. A struggle for the imperial power between the partisans of the rival princes ended in the defeat and flight of Djem; and as the fate of a fallen prince, whose arms had been turned against his successful competitor, could be small matter of doubt, according to the ordinary policy of the Ottoman court, Djem, now a friendless fugitive, knew that his life was not worth an hour’s purchase should he fall into his brother’s hands. Whither should he go, or where apply for refuge? His decision was a singular one: something perhaps in his own frank and generous nature had endeared the name of D’Aubusson to his imagination; certain it is that he felt a warm and enthusiastic admiration for the heroic order which had defied his father’s invincible arms, and it was to the hospitality and magnanimity of the Knights of St. John that he resolved to trust his fortunes.

Before his messengers could reach the capital of Rhodes, the position of the unfortunate prince became still more desperate. Alone on the coast of Lycia,—for he had sent his followers away, bidding them seek their own safety,—a party of fifty mamelukes suddenly appeared from behind a rock and attempted to seize him. Throwing himself from his saddle, he leapt into the sea and struck out to a poor fishing-boat that he knew to own a Christian for its master; for, after the fashion of the times, it bore at its prow a rude wooden cross, without which no fisherman of that day would have thought of venturing to sea. The mamelukes, urging their steeds into the water, were close behind him,—a price was on his head living or dead; but as they almost touched their prize, the strong arm of the rowers lifted him over the side, and a few strokes of the oar sufficed to place the boat and its crew beyond the reach of the pursuers. Djem knew that his only safety was now to remain among the Christians; and hastily writing the following lines, he attached the letter to an arrow, and shot it among the mamelukes on the shore.

“King Djem to King Bajazet his inhuman brother.[18]

“God and the Prophet are witness of the unhappy necessity that drives me to take refuge among the Christians. Not content with depriving me of my just rights to the empire, you pursue me from country to country, and to save my life you force me to seek refuge among the Knights of Rhodes, the bitter enemies of our house. If our father could have foreseen such a profanation of the Ottoman name, he would have strangled you with his own hands; but Heaven will not fail to avenge your cruelty, and I trust yet to live to be witness of your punishment.”

Djem was received at Rhodes with the courtesy due to his rank, and with all pomp and ceremony. A horse richly caparisoned was prepared for him, and so mounted he passed through the streets thronged with spectators, and strewn for the occasion with sprigs of myrtle and odoriferous flowers, which, as they were pressed by his horse’s hoofs, emitted a delicious fragrance. Splendid hangings every where met his eye, and his ear was regaled with strains of martial music. The grand master himself came forth to greet him, mounted also on a noble steed, and followed by a brilliant train. It was a strange and might have been an embarrassing meeting: on the one side, the head of that great military order, whose very vocation it was to do battle with the infidel; and on the other, the brother of the reigning sultan, nay himself, in pretension, the very commander of the forces of Islam; and that too within those walls which had so lately and so successfully defied the Moslem arms. But it would seem that in the whole matter the order acted but in accordance with their grand duty of hospitality. To be the asylum of the destitute and oppressed was so natural to them, that their gates opened to receive the fugitive who claimed their protection, almost without a question of his faith; for a Hospitaller to have refused to receive a guest would have been a disgrace upon the name; and moreover the rules of chivalry exacted the most scrupulous courtesy to enemies. The question, therefore, of Djem’s reception was soon settled; and the treatment he received during his forty days’ residence there was noble and princely, as the unfortunate fugitive himself acknowledged in the manifesto he drew up before leaving them, to place himself under the protection of the French king. For, indeed, he felt Rhodes itself was too near his brother’s court; secret assassins could easily be found to reach him there; and so, with D’Aubusson’s consent, he departed, falling at his feet and embracing them as he bade his generous entertainer farewell, and vowing, were he ever restored to his rights, to observe an inviolable friendship with the Order of St. John. In France he met with but a cold reception, and retired to a priory of the order; being supported partly by an appanage which the grand master obtained from Bajazet for him by dint of skilful treaty, and partly by the private liberality of D’Aubusson himself. So munificent, indeed, was the grand master’s bounty, that the chapter general declared, after an examination of the accounts, that he ought to be reimbursed out of the treasury of the order the large sums he had expended on the prince.[19]

This singular episode in the history of the order has been represented by some as an artful stroke of policy on the part of the grand master; though, indeed, it would be difficult to see what he could gain by the open protection of Bajazet’s rival at the very moment when terms of peace were being negotiated with that monarch. As for any violation of safe-conduct, it does not appear how far such stipulation, if stipulation there were, extended; and Taaffe is of opinion that anyhow it was faithfully observed in according him a safe and honourable reception at Rhodes, and freedom to depart when he pleased. It seems incontestable, indeed, that in the terms of pacification afterwards made with Bajazet, the strict guardianship of Djem, so as to prevent his making further attempts against his brother’s crown, formed one of the conditions; but it does not seem unfitting, or in any way unworthy of D’Aubusson’s reputation, that, whilst protecting the life of the fugitive prince, he should also prevent him from forming new plots against the sultan, whose claims to the sovereignty as elder brother could scarcely be disputed. Our own history tells us how difficult a trust is the guardianship of a fallen and a hostile prince: in the end it must ever take the form of imprisonment; but that he was treated harshly or “like a prisoner,” the author we have quoted above declares to be “ridiculously untrue.” Reasons there were every way why he should be detained in honourable ward, were it only to keep a curb on Bajazet, and to save Christendom and the world from a renewal of the horrible atrocities of Turkish warfare. Besides, Djem’s partisans were known to be the most virulent of all the infidels in their hatred of Christians in general, and of the Knights in particular; and had he been allowed to put himself at their head, the greatest evils might have resulted to religion and civilisation.

The unhappy prince is supposed to have died of poison in Italy, whither by his own desire he had been removed from France. But the affair, even on the confession of those who are strong as to the fact, is involved in perhaps inextricable mystery; and indeed the whole history of those times, and of the papal court in particular, has been so overlaid with falsehood, that it is impossible, with all the existing materials before us, and after a careful and impartial collation of conflicting authorities, to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion. But anyhow they who most blame the grand master and the order for allowing the Turkish prince to pass out of their safe keeping, never so much as hint at their participation in his death. On the contrary, they say that the first step taken for carrying out the design against his life was the removal of his faithful Hospitallers. They describe the horror and indignation felt at Rhodes when the unhappy news arrived; and declare that it was as a death-blow to the grand master, who felt that such a catastrophe was a blot on the honour of Christian hospitality, and deeply lamented the loss of one whom in their short intimacy he had learnt to regard with interest and even with affection.

However, were any exculpation of D’Aubusson and his order required, it may be found in Djem’s own letter to the grand master, written shortly before his death, wherein he deplores his separation from the Knights, and assures them of his eternal gratitude; declaring, by the way, that, except that he was deprived of his usual guard of knights, which vexed him much and caused him infinite grief, he was “honourably and sufficiently well treated.”[20]

D’Aubusson’s was a proud position during the three-and-twenty years that his government lasted after the siege of Rhodes. The Pope presented him with a cardinal’s hat; all nations were proud of him; the emperor refused to declare war against the sultan without his assent; and the English king, sending him a present of guns and Irish horses, says courteously in his letter, “The guns are for the defence of Rhodes, but the horses for the use of him whom I love and reverence as my father.” When, towards the close of his life, a new Christian league was formed against the infidel, including the emperor, the republic of Venice, and the kings of France, Castile, Portugal, and Hungary, with most of the Italian princes, a general consent was given to the papal decree which named him generalissimo of the Christian armies. But the result of this great league was like most of those which preceded it. War between the European sovereigns themselves soon broke it up, and each power made peace with the Moslem on his own terms; so that the order was, as usual, left alone and unsupported to carry on the war.