Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/202

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TRAVELS AND DISCOVERIES

the second assault they succeeded after a tremendous bombardment in mounting the breach, and were only driven back when D'Aubusson himself at the head of a chosen band of Knights regained possession of the ramparts and hurled the assailants back into the fosse. To commemorate this repulse the brave Grand Master built the chapel of Notre Dame de Victoire within the angle of the fortifications at the commencement of the eastern mole, which has been already noticed.71

On this mole stand three windmills, beyond which is a battery armed on both sides; and on the point of the mole a circular tower, called in later chronicles the Castle of St. John.72 This mole rests on Hellenic foundations. On the opposite side of the harbour is the stately tower built by the Grand Master De Naillac, at the extremity of a mole running out to the east from the north-eastern angle of the fortress. (Plate 11.)

The date of this tower is probably about A.D. 14OO. It is sometimes called by Bosio the tower of St. Angelo, and by later writers the tower of St. Michael, a name for which there seems to be no authority. It consists of three square stories, crowned by a machicolated parapet with overhanging turrets at the four angles, above which rises an octagonal lantern. Round the outside of this lantern a winding staircase leads to the summit, which commands a most interesting bird's-eye view of the town and environs of Rhodes. This tower is 150 feet high. Under the parapet is the escutcheon of De Naillac with that of the Order. In the basement