Deep-Sea Plunderings

by Frank Thomas Bullen

On the eve of the nativity of our Blessed Lord A.D. 1551 there was profound peace in Gozo.

The assaults of the infidel had for so long a time been intermitted, that the simple hardy islanders had almost come to believe that they would always be left in peace to cultivate their tiny fields, to worship God after their own sweet manner, and to rest quietly in their little square stone dwellings, secure from the attacks of the swarthy, merciless monsters that, not content with the possession of their own sunny lands, had so often swarmed across the bright blue stretches of sea separating the Maltese Islands from Africa.

Over the main thoroughfare of Rabato, the principal town of the tiny island that hung like a jewel in the ear of Malta the Beautiful, the great square citadel of the knights kept grim watch and ward. It rose sheer from the street for one hundred feet of height, a mass of quarried stone cemented into a solidity scarcely less than that of the original rock from whence its ashlar had been hewn with such heavy toil, a mountainous fortress, to all outward seeming impregnable. Upon its highest plateau towered the mighty cathedral, fair to view without in its stately apparel of pure white stone, and all glorious within by reason of the numberless gifts showered upon it by the loving hands of those who desired thus to show their gratitude to God.

In truth it was a goodly fane. Not merely because of the blazing enrichments of gold and silver and precious stones with which it glowed and sparkled, but because of the many signs of loyalty and truth evidenced in the sculptured tombs of the illustrious dead. The knights who kept vigilant watch around its sacred walls and came daily to worship within its cool aisles were never left without a solemn witness to the fealty of those who had gone before them. The most careless among them could not help being impressed by the fact that here in the midst of the Great Sea had been planted an outpost of Christendom of which they were the custodians—a fortress of the utmost value for the keeping back of the Paynim hordes who bade fair to overwhelm all Christian countries, and bring them under the abhorrent rule of Mahomed the Accursed One.

In this there is no exaggeration. If there be one fact more clearly established than any other, amid the welter of misleading rubbish that floods the world to-day, it is this, that the fearless self-sacrifice of the knights of Malta, buttressed by the devotion of those over whom they held no gentle sway, saved Europe from being overrun by the pitiless Mussulman, saved Europe from being to-day a depraved, debased, and miserable land, wherein all the horrors of Eastern Africa would have their full and awful outcome.

Raimondo de Homedes, only son of the Grand Master of that name, Juan de Homedes, was on this most momentous Christmas Eve in command of the Gozo garrison. The general feeling was one of security. The last attack of the infidel in 1546 had been repulsed with such terrible loss to the invader that the high-spirited garrison could not help coming to the conclusion that it would be at least a generation before any such attempt would again be made.

She was to him brightest and best of all damsels.

Raimondo de Homedes, then, went the rounds of his great command in the citadel of Gozo with a carefree heart. His thoughts were mainly occupied with the question of how soon he should be free to meet his lady-love, the stately daughter of Alfonso de Azzopardi, chief of all the notables in Gozo. She was, to him at least, brightest, best of all the damosels whose charms fired the palpitating hearts of those warriors of the Cross who were holding these islands for the commonweal of Christian Europe.

While he thus meditated, receiving the replies to his perfunctory challenges of the sentries on guard with an ear that hardly conveyed to his brain the meaning of the words, there came running to him a page, a lad of parts who was an especial favourite. Breathless, panting with excitement, the child (he was scarcely more) gasped out, “Messer Raimondo, the sentinel on the eastern tower says that since you passed his guard-house he has been mightily exercised by the appearance of some black masses on the sea. He knows not what they can be, but he fears they are galleys and that they can be coming for no good purpose. He prays you to return and look for yourself, in case there should be any mischief intended of which we have had no warning by our spies.”