_ 51 _ Commander, Amarcal, chancellor of Rhodes, who had been wounded in the nose and teeth by bombard which hit a [?cannon] and killed three English and a Portuguese. When the news of this defeat was known in Constantinople, they quickly put together a fleet to besiege Rhodes, which was not to be scorned because there were thirty six galleys and eight six laten-rigged galleys and fifty ships, although there were not more than fifteen thousand men, because the rest were all with Grand Turk. The Captain sent a very discourteous and insulting letter to the Grand Master, asking for things which he knew would be refused to which the Grand Master replied in kind, but without being rude. Then he equipped his islands and castles, and all his men gathered in their ships, ready in such order as the circumstances and the threat required. There was a month when all the priors and knights for the order went to carry stones in carts and fill in holes and gaps and do all the other things necessary for the siege and no one whatever his standing was excused. Rhodes up in arms was certainly a beautiful sight to see. The artillery was set in place and the knights arrayed with notables and foreigners and the natives, who included some six thousand good men and fifteen hundred musketeers and a thousand crossbow-men. And yet there was great of
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