Friday, 31 August

During the night a Maltese who had been taken by the enemy at the beginning of the siege escaped from the galleys and by good luck came into the Birgu. He said to the Grand Master publicly in the square, that the losses of the Turks were heavy and much greater than we imagined, that not one of them had the courage to attack, and that many of their labourers were dying from hunger and disease. He further said that the fleet did not sail because it was disarmed and that sixty galleys were without their complement of sailors and oarsmen.