Condottieri di ventura

CHAPTER XIX

DRAGUT-REIS

How Sinan Basha and Dragut raided the islands of Malta and Cozo and captured the town of Tripoli. How the Knights of Malta captured "the puissant galleon" belonging to the Kustir-Aga and the Odalisques of the harem of the Grand Turk. The despair of the ladies and the advice of the Imaum to Soliman the Magnificent. A great armada is fitted out in Constantinople. The preparations for defence on the part of La Valette and the Knights. The expedition sails from Constantinople and lands in Malta.

Great must have been the consternation of the Knights when the armada, commanded by Sinan Basha, appeared off their coasts, and bitter must have been the reflections of Juan d'Omedes, the Grand Master, who had all along contended that so formidable an expedition could not possibly be directed against Malta. The inhabitants of that island were, however, not left long in doubt, as Sinan, immediately on his arrival, entered the Grand Harbour, or "the Great Port," as it was called in those days. Sinan, in his royal galley, led the way in, contemptuously assured of an easy victory over so insignificant a place of arms. He had his first rude awakening before he had traversed some quarter of a mile of the placid waters of the Great Port. The harbour, as is well known, though long, is very narrow, and, on the starboard hand of the Turkish galleys as they entered, the Commandeur de Guimeran, a Spanish Knight, had ambushed three hundred arquebusiers. As the galley of Sinan came abreast of the ambush, the Commandeur gave the order to fire. The volley at so close a range had a terrible effect, especially among the "chiourme," or the slaves who rowed the galley, some hundred of whom were placed _hors de combat_. Sinan, in a furious rage, ordered an immediate disembarkment; but when his men landed and scaled the heights of Mount Sceberras (the elevated land on which the city of Valetta now stands) there was no one to be found, the Commandeur and the men who had formed the ambush having disappeared. Gazing from the heights at Il Borgo, the fortress on the opposite side of the harbour where the Knights then dwelt, Sinan demanded of Dragut, "If that," pointing to the fortress, "was the place which he had told the Sultan could easily be taken?"

Dragut, whom no peril ever daunted, coolly replied:

"Certainly, no eagle ever built his nest on a rock more easy of access."

A corsair, who had been slave to the Knights, now approached Sinan, and told him that he had assisted at the building of the fortress; which, he averred, was so strong that if the admiral delayed until he had taken it that the winter would be upon them, although it was then only the month of July. Sinan, as we have said, was a hesitating commander. He had the ever-present fear of the Grand Turk before his eyes, and was not inclined for so difficult and dangerous an enterprise as this was represented to be. Leaving the fortress in his rear, he marched off to the high land in the centre of the island, on which was situated the Città Notabile, the capital of Malta, some seven miles distant from the sea. On their march through the island the Turks committed their usual atrocities, murdering the wretched inhabitants, firing their dwellings, destroying their crops, and carrying off their women. Had the siege of Notabile been pressed, the city must have fallen; but Sinan declared to Dragut that the principal object of the expedition was the reduction of Tripoli, and, in consequence, he had not the time to devote to its reduction. Dragut, furious at this temporising policy, urged an immediate assault, and, while the contention was waxing sharp between the two leaders, a letter was brought to Sinan which had been captured in a Sicilian galley. It was from the "Receiver" of the Order, who dwelt at Messina, to the Grand Master, informing him that he had expressly sent this ship to inform him that Andrea Doria had just returned from Spain and was hastening with a large fleet to attack the Turks. The letter was a ruse on the part of the "Receiver," and contained not a particle of truth. It was, however, quite enough for Sinan, who immediately called a council of war and imparted this alarming news to its members. The council, after the invariable fashion of such bodies, decided to take the safest and easiest course: the name of the terrible Andrea was one of evil omen to the Ottomans, and, as one man, they voted for prosecuting their voyage to Tripoli before the Genoese seaman should put in an appearance. In vain was the fury of Dragut, who had counted on a full revenge on his ancient enemies the Knights. The armada sailed to the adjacent island of Gozo, which was thoroughly sacked with every refinement of cruelty. Every house on the island was burned, and six thousand of its inhabitants carried off to slavery. One incident is deserving of record. In Gozo dwelt a certain Sicilian with his wife and two daughters: sooner than that they should fall into the hands of the Turks this man stabbed his wife and daughters and then threw himself, sword in hand, into the ranks of his enemies, where he slew two of them, wounded several others, and was then hacked to pieces. The fleet then proceeded to Tripoli, which was taken almost without opposition, as it was defended by a mere handful of the Knights and some utterly unreliable Calabrian infantry, who had never before seen a shot fired: these men very soon mutinied and refused to fight any longer. Dragut became the autocrat of Tripoli, as his great predecessor Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa had been of Algiers: from hence, in the years that were to come before his death, he carried on his sleepless and unending warfare with his Christian foes, on whom he was destined to inflict another terrible defeat when they attacked this stronghold which he had made his own.

Claude de la Sangle dying on August 18th, 1557, Jean Parisot de la Valette was chosen Grand Master of the Knights of Malta in his stead on August 21st of the same year. He was, as we have said before, in succession, soldier, captain, councillor, general, and Grand Cross; he was as wise in council as he was terrible in battle; he was as much esteemed by his brethren as he was feared by the infidel. Under his governorship "the Religion" regained the ancient authority which it had once possessed, especially in some of the German Provinces and in the Republic of Venice. So great was the influence of La Valette that he succeeded in making the "Languages" (or confederations of Knights) of Germany and Venice pay their "responsions," which had been allowed to get into arrear. These "responsions" were a tax levied on the "Languages " exclusively for the purpose of combatting the infidel, and La Valette brought all the firmness of his high character to bear, in order to induce these Knights to do what, he reminded them, was their simple and obvious duty. Fired by the highest conception of the office he had been called upon to execute, La Valette allowed none of those under his command to be slack in their performance of their duties. In him dwelt the real old crusading spirit. He saw life with the single eye, for that which was paramount was the utter destruction of the infidel. There are many men who have a high conception of duty; there are but few who can inspire those with whom they are brought in contact. Of these latter was Jean Parisot de la Valette; in him the pure flame of religious enthusiasm burnt with so clear a light as to act as an illuminant for the paths of others. In him dwelt that rare quality of lifting others almost to that plane on which he dwelt himself, of making men nobler and better almost in spite of themselves. So it was that, when La Valette stooped to remind others of his brother Knights that they owed money to the Order, that money was paid at once.

Having thus restored order to the finances, the Grand Master turned his attention to the state of affairs (as he had received them from his predecessor) connected with the territorial possessions of the Knights. For long years now the fortress of Tripoli had been in the hands of the renowned Dragut, who was the scourge and the terror of the Christians. The corsair dwelt in his stronghold in insolent defiance of the Knights, whose property it once had been. Years before he had wrested it from them by the strong hand: what, then, more necessary in the eyes of such an one as La Valette than to expel this audacious pirate? The Grand Master invited the co-operation of Juan la Cerda (a Spanish Grandee, Duke of Medina-Celi, and Viceroy of Sicily for the King of Spain) in this enterprise. The Viceroy joyfully acceded to the request, and informed his master. Philip II. approved the project, and sent orders to the Duke of Sesse, Governor of Milan, to the Duke of Alcala, Governor of Naples, and to John Andrea Doria, General of the Galleys, to join forces and to repair to Sicily, placing themselves under the orders of the Duke of Medina-Celi, who was expressly charged to take no action save by the advice of the Grand Master. The expedition assembled, the Duke took it to Malta, where it wintered, and in the spring it sailed and attacked Tripoli.

They found this fortress, however, in a very different state from that which they expected. Dragut, says De Vertot, "avoit faire terasser les murailles de cette place." Bastions had been constructed, and every advantage taken for defence which was permitted by the terrain, or that the art of fortification admitted at this epoch. The castle, which was not advantageously placed, was, notwithstanding, put in a state of defence by an enormous expenditure of money. Great towers, in which were mounted many big guns, defended the entrance to the port, which had become the headquarters of the vessels owned by Dragut, and also of those corsairs who sailed their craft under the crescent flag of the Sultan of Constantinople. It was against such a fortress as this that the Duke of Medina-Celi went up: we have no space to deal here with the details of this attack, which ended in the hopeless and irremediable defeat of the Christian forces. The Duke was an incompetent commander; he was opposed to one of the greatest leaders of the age--an expert in almost every branch of the science of war, in command of a large body of the fiercest fighters of the day, who ever feared the wrath of Dragut more than the swords of the enemy.

La Valette, though he mourned over the repulse of the Christian forces from Tripoli, did not on that account allow his pursuit of the infidel to grow faint; the galleys of "the Religion" were always at sea, and both the corsairs and the Ottoman Turks were perpetually losing valuable ships and costly merchandise. Under the General of the Galleys, the Commandeur Gozon de Melac, and that celebrated chevalier, the Commandeur de Romegas, the sea forces of the Knights were everywhere in evidence. Into the hands of the Christians fell the Penon de Velez, situated on the northern coast of Africa opposite to Malaga--a fortress much frequented by the corsairs; the Goletta at Tunis was also taken, and the pirates became so much alarmed that they demanded succour from Constantinople. They represented to Soliman that, at this rate, the whole of Northern Africa would soon be in the hands of the Christians to the total exclusion of the true believer.

Soliman listened to their complaints and promised that soon he would send forth an armament which should put an end to the misfortunes from which they were suffering. Once again preparations were begun in the arsenals of Constantinople, and while these were in progress an event took place which had an important bearing on the situation. Just after the taking of the Penon de Velez seven galleys of "the Religion," under the command of the chevaliers de Giou and De Romegas, which were cruising in the neighbourhood of Zante and Cephalonia, fell in with "a puissant galleon" filled with the richest merchandise of the East, armed with "twenty great cannons of bronze," and a number of smaller guns, under the command of the Reis Bairan-Ogli, having on board "excellent officers of artillery," as well as two hundred Janissaries for her defence. This great ship was the property of Kustir-Aga, the chief Eunuch of the Seraglio of the Sultan, and many of the ladies of the harem were interested in a pecuniary sense in the safe arrival of this vessel at Constantinople. The galleys of "the Religion" attacked, and, after a most obstinate resistance, in which one hundred and twenty of the Christians and an even larger number of the Turks were killed, the galleon was captured. If there had been an outcry in Constantinople before this occurrence it was all as nothing to that which now arose. Kustir-Aga and the Odalisques of the Harem prostrated themselves at the feet of Soliman the Magnificent, and with streaming eyes, dishevelled hair, and frantic gestures, demanded the instant despatch of an expedition to utterly exterminate these barbarian corsairs, the Knights of Malta, who had thus injured them and lacerated their tenderest susceptibilities. The Grand Turk, autocrat as he was, had no peace day or night; he was surrounded by wailing women and sullen officials, all of whom had lost heavily by the capture of the puissant galleon. The Imaum, or preacher in the principal mosque, called upon the Sultan in his discourse to fall upon the audacious infidel and smite him hip and thigh. He reminded the Padishah that, in the dungeons of the Knights, true believers were languishing; that on the rowers' benches of the galleys of "the Religion" Moslems were being flogged like dogs. In a furious peroration he concluded: "It is only thy invincible sword which can shatter the chains of these unfortunates, whose cries are rising to heaven and afflicting the ears of the Prophet of God: the son is demanding his father, the wife her husband and her children. All, therefore, wait upon thee, upon thy justice, and thy power, for vengeance upon their cruel and implacable enemies."

Contrary to all precedent, which enjoins the most perfect silence in the mosque, these bold utterances were received with something more than murmurs of applause: never in all his long and glorious reign had the great and magnificent despot heard so plainly the voice of his people. Apart, however, from eunuchs, women, and Mullahs, Soliman had long been importuned by Dragut to take the course which was now being urged upon him with so much insistence. There was at this time no warrior in all his _entourage_ for whose opinion the Sultan had the same respect as he had for that of the ruler of Tripoli. Dragut had more than a tincture of learning: he was first of all an incomparable leader of men and an entirely competent seaman. He was also a scientific artillerist, and was learned in the technique of the fortification of his time. Added to this he was--albeit by no means so cruel as most of his contemporaries--one of those men before whom all trembled: as we have seen in the case of the corsairs who defended "Africa," "they feared the wrath of Dragut more than death itself."

It was this renowned leader who warned Soliman against the Knights; he pointed out that they were far more dangerous now than they had been in 1523, the year of their expulsion from Rhodes. When established there they were, so to speak, surrounded by the Turkish Empire; in Malta, on the contrary, they were easily succoured from Sicily, which belonged to Spain, another implacable enemy of the Moslem; that Malta lay right on the route which all the ships of the Sultan must take on passage from the East to Constantinople; and in consequence the Order was a standing and perpetual menace to the trade of the Empire. All this was so undeniably true that so shrewd a man and so competent a ruler as Soliman could not fail to be impressed by the soundness of the reasoning.

Besides all this, he knew quite well that now he could not hold back, had it been even against his inclination--which was by no means the case; for there had arisen one of those storms of popular opinion--all the more formidable because of their infrequency--before which even the most hardened of despots must bend. Accordingly the Sultan called a conference of his fighting men, which was held on horseback in the open-air. The inclination of the Sultan being known, most of the generals, like good courtiers, voted for immediate war with the Knights. At this conference was present that Ali Basha, or Occhiali, or Uluchali, as he was indifferently called, of whom we shall have more to say later on. Upon this occasion he was present as the representative of Dragut, and urged, on behalf of his master, that the time was not yet ripe for an attack on Malta. First, he contended, it was necessary to recapture the Goletta and the Peñon de Velez, and to defeat the Moors of Tunis, who were feudatories of the Spanish king and avowed enemies of the Ottoman Empire. Ali was supported by one Mahomet, an old warrior who had grown white in the service of the Sultan, who strongly opposed the contemplated campaign on the ground that the Knights would in all probability have the full strength of Europe at their backs.

Numbers, however, added to the personal inclination of the Sultan, carried the day. The die was cast, the memorable expedition was decided upon, and all the Sultan's vast Empire soon rang with the note of preparation. The Capitan Basha, Piali, was in command of the fleet, and the direction of the land forces was confided to Mustafa, an old officer sixty-five years of age, a severe disciplinarian, and of a sanguinary and cruel disposition to any of his enemies who had the misfortune to fall into his hands.

Once again did Europe lose itself in speculation: against whom, all men were asking, was this new expedition to be directed? Spain feared for her African possessions, as the Goletta was the key to the kingdom of Tunis, while the Peñon de Velez was one of the bulwarks of Algeria. In consequence Don Garcia de Toledo passed over from Sicily to confer with the Grand Master of the Knights. Garcia de Toledo was by no means a favourable specimen of the illustrious race from which he sprang, and was a complete antithesis to La Valette; he was to prove himself in the terrible days that were to come to be sluggish, incompetent, a ruler who could not rule, a person for ever letting "I dare not wait upon I would." Just as long as Spain considered this new expedition was directed against herself considerable activity was shown; when the attack developed and it was seen that the objective of the Turks was Malta, the procrastinating Spanish king and his incompetent viceroy allowed matters so to drift that, had any other man than La Valette been in command at Malta, the fall of that island had been inevitable.

We have seen how Juan d'Omedes had dealt with a previous crisis in the affairs of the Order; very different was it in the opening months of the year 1565. La Valette was well served by his spies in Constantinople, and the Grand Master was under no illusions from the very first as to what the destination of the army of the Sultan would be. He recognised that against the small islands of Malta and Gozo all the strength of the mightiest Empire in the world was about to be directed, and with serene confidence set about the task of preparation. His first care was to send out "a general citation" to those Knights living in their own homes in different countries in Europe, commanding them to repair at once to Malta and take part in the defence of that Order to which they had vowed to consecrate their lives. The agents of the Order in Italy succeeded in raising two thousand infantry, and the Viceroy of Sicily sent over two companies of Spanish infantry which he had promised. All the galleys of "the Religion" were called in from distant service and were set to work importing ammunition, stores, provisions, and all requisites for the withstanding of a siege. As the galleys passed backwards and forwards to Sicily, in each returning vessel came noble gentlemen of every country in Europe, in answer to the summons of their Grand Master. They were received with the tenderest affection by him and by those others already assembled; never in all its long and glorious history had the Order assembled in circumstances more grave; never in its history, either in the past or in the future, did it quit itself with so supreme a heroism as in those days of 1565 which were yet to come. In Malta the orderly bustle of preparation went on ceaselessly; the Italian and Spanish troops and the inhabitants of the island, for the most part hardy mariners well accustomed to the ceaseless _guerre de course_ of the Knights, were formed into companies, officered by the members of the Order, and assigned to different posts.

Meanwhile the Grand Master caused copies of the letters which he had received from Constantinople to be sent to all the great princes of Europe; showing them the straits to which the Order was shortly to be reduced and imploring of them to send timely succour. But it was not upon outside aid that La Valette counted overmuch; he was preparing to confront the Turks with such forces as he had at his own disposal; content, if necessary, to leave the issue in the hands of the God in whom he trusted. As the chevaliers came flocking to the standard of St. John he received them, we are told, "as a kind father receives his beloved children, having provided in advance for their food and lodging." He personally entered into the most minute details of his charge; he reviewed his infantry, he instructed his artillery, he planned sites for hospitals, he sketched out new fortifications, and then went among the humblest of his followers and wielded the pick and shovel in the burning sun. Everywhere his cheering presence was felt, his equable and serene temperament diffused confidence and hope.

All things being thus in train he assembled his brethren and addressed them in the following terms:

"A formidable army, composed of audacious barbarians, is descending on this island; these persons, my brothers, are the enemies of Jesus Christ. To-day it is a question of the defence of our faith as to whether the book of the Evangelist is to be superseded by that of the Koran? God on this occasion demands of us our lives, already vowed to His service. Happy will those be who first consummate this sacrifice. But that we may indeed be worthy to render it come, my dear brothers, to the foot of the altar, where we may renew our vows. Let each one rely on the blood of the Saviour of men and in the faithful practice of the sacraments; in them we shall find so generous a contempt for death that we shall indeed be rendered invincible."

The Knights then, headed by the Grand Master, took themselves in procession to the church. Here they confessed and received the sacrament. "They went out from thence as men who had received a new birth." The Knights, we are then told, tenderly embraced one another in all solemnity; vowing to shed the last drop of their blood in defence of their religion and its holy altars. It was in this lofty frame of mind that the Knights of Malta awaited the coming of their hereditary foe. Into the hearts and minds of these gallant gentlemen of the best blood in the world the Grand Master had instilled some leaven of the greatness by which he himself was inspired. When belief is so wholehearted as it was in the case of La Valette; when it is allied to a genius for war, and a supreme gift for the inspiration of others, then that man and the force which he commands are as near to invincibility as it is permitted to fallible human beings to attain. There were two things in which the Knights were supremely fortunate on this occasion: the first was that they had La Valette as Grand Master, the second that Dragut was not in supreme command of the Turks, and that the siege had opened before he arrived upon the scene. In this expedition, as in previous ones, the Turkish commanders had orders to attempt nothing really important without the advice of Dragut. They found themselves without him when they arrived and made an initial mistake. With La Valette in command there was no room for blundering; the ultimate result of their blunder was the defeat which they sustained.

Grand Master, Knight, and noble, soldier, peasant, and mariner, strove valiantly with the task of putting the island into a state of defence, and when at last the long-expected armada of their foes rose above that distant blue horizon in the north all had been done that skill and experience could dictate.

It was upon May 18th in the year 1565 that the Turkish fleet arrived at Malta. It was composed of one hundred and fifty-nine galleys and vessels propelled by oars: on board of these was an army for disembarkation of thirty thousand men, composed of Janissaries and Spahis, the very pick and flower of the Turkish army. Soliman the Magnificent was leaving as little to chance as was possible on this occasion; he well knew the temper of the Knights, and that this expedition had before it a task which would try both the army and its leaders to the very utmost of their strength. Behind the main body of the fleet came a host of vessels, charged with provisions, the horses of the Spahis, the siege-train of the artillery, all the innumerable appliances and engines of war which were in use at that day. The initial mistake on the part of the Turks was in embarking cavalry for a siege; they knew, or they should have known, of the extreme smallness of the island which they were about to attack, and that they were by no means likely to be met with armies in the field owing to the enormous preponderance of numbers which they had assured to themselves.

Piali, as we have said, was in command of the fleet, and Mustafa of the army; the corsairs did not arrive on the scene till some days afterwards.

The Turks landed some men who encountered the Chevalier La Riviere and some Maltese troops, with whom they had some lively skirmishes. Unfortunately, in one of these the Chevalier was captured, put to the torture, and eventually beheaded for having wilfully misled the Turks. A council of war was held by Piali, Mustafa, and their principal officers, to deliberate on the best manner of prosecuting the enterprise on which they were engaged. The admiral, wishing to conform strictly with the instructions of Soliman, voted to delay all initiative until the arrival of the famous corsair. Mustafa, however, held a different opinion: the unfortunate Chevalier La Riviere had, before his death, informed the Turkish general that large and powerful succours were expected daily from Sicily. Secretly disquieted by this news, which he had at the time affected to disbelieve, Mustafa now urged immediate action. His opinion was that, in the first instance, they had better attack the castle of St. Elmo. It was a small and insignificant fort which at best would only delay them some five or six days; when this had fallen they could proceed to the more serious business of taking Il Borgo, the principal fortress on the island in which the Grand Master and most of the Knights were established. By the time St. Elmo had been taken they might reasonably expect that Dragut and his corsairs would have arrived, and, with these seasonable reinforcements, proceed to the really formidable portion of their task. In their decisions both admiral and general were wrong; to delay attack, once the troops were landed, was a counsel of pusillanimity hardly to be expected of Piali, but showing at the same time how he dreaded above all else departing one iota from the instructions which he had received. To attack the castle of St. Elmo first was a military mistake, because it could be--and was during the whole of the siege--reinforced from its larger sister Il Borgo.

The discourse of Mustafa prevailed in the council of war, and the siege of St. Elmo was decided upon and immediately begun.

CHAPTER XX

THE SIEGE OF MALTA

The siege of Malta by the Turks; The capture of the fortress of St. Elmo; The death of Dragut-Reis

[Illustration: JEAN PARISOT DE LA VALETTE, GRAND MASTER OF THE KNIGHTS OF MALTA, AT THE SIEGE OF THAT ISLAND BY THE TURKS IN 1565.]

There was an entire disregard of human life among the leaders of the Ottoman Turks at this time which is almost incredible; to attain their end in war they sacrificed thousands upon thousands of men with an absolutely callous indifference. In no chapter of the bloodstained history of their Empire was this trait more in evidence than it was at the siege of Malta. There was, however, a reason for this, which developed itself more and more as the ceaseless assaults on the positions of the Knights went on. From a military point of view, all the operations which took place were those of the siege of a fortress; as when at length St. Elmo fell the Turks turned their attention to the fortress of Il Borgo. The time-honoured method of the attack on a fortress, of approaching it by sap and mine, was here almost an impossibility, as the island of Malta is composed of solid rock through which it was practically impossible to drive trenches. It is true that the rock is of an exceptionally soft nature, easily cut through with proper tools; but you cannot cut through rock, no matter how soft it may be, when your operations are opposed at every step by a brave and vigilant enemy. Mustafa and the council of war had, as we have said, decided to begin operations by the siege of the fortress of St. Elmo. This place had been built from the designs of the Prior of Capua, an officer of the Order, and was situated at the extreme end of the promontory of Mount Sceberass, which juts out between the Great Port and the harbour of Marsa Muzetto. The fort was in a commanding position and dominated the entrance to the two principal harbours in the island. It was admirably adapted for repulsing an attack from the sea; but, owing to the proximity of other points of land upon which artillery could be mounted, was easily capable of attack by such an enemy as that by which it was now assailed.

The principal preoccupation of the militant Prior of Capua had been to make it formidable on the side facing the sea; perhaps the designer had never contemplated the possibility that the day might dawn when it would be attacked from the landward side! However this may have been, Mustafa decided that it could and should be carried on this, its weakest face, and made his preparations accordingly.

As far as it was possible to open trenches this was done, at the most prodigal expenditure of the lives of the pioneers. Where the rock proved absolutely impossible of manipulation redoubts were constructed of massive beams on which thick planks were bolted, the whole covered with wet earth which had to be collected with incredible toil from the country at the back. Disembarking their siege-guns, and utilising the cattle of the islanders for transporting them, the great cannon of the Turks were dragged up the slopes of the Mount and got into position; and by the 24th of May fire was opened on St. Elmo with ten guns which threw balls weighing eighty pounds. Besides these there were two culverins which threw balls of sixty pounds, and a huge basilisk, the projectile from which weighed no less than one hundred and sixty pounds. A terrible fire was opened against the walls of the fort, and so destructive did it immediately become that the Bailli of Negropont, the Knight in command, very soon became aware that his trust must be in the stout hearts and strong arms of his garrison; as the walls by which they were surrounded were hourly crumbling into nothingness.

Regarding the matter from this point of view, he sent at once to the Grand Master by the Chevalier La Cerda demanding succour; this officer, "rendered eloquent by fear," exaggerated the peril to which the fort was exposed and stated that it could not possibly hold out for more than another eight days.

"What losses have you had?" demanded the Grand Master.

"Sire," replied La Cerda, "the fort may be compared to a sick man in his extremity, in the last stage of weakness, unable to sustain himself except by perpetual cordials and remedies."

"Then I myself will be your physician," said the Grand Master with contempt, "and I will bring others with me. If that cannot cure you of fear it will, at all events, prevent the infidels from seizing upon the fort."

There was no real hope in the mind of La Valette that St. Elmo could be saved from the enemy. The place was too weak, and none knew this fact better than the man to whom all the defences of the island were as familiar as the hilt of his own good sword; but, though he secretly deplored the necessity, he felt that if Malta were to be preserved it could only be done by delaying until succour should come from outside; every day, nay, every hour, was of importance, and he was prepared to sacrifice St. Elmo and the lives of its entire garrison to attain his end. He did not, however--to continue the simile of La Cerda--prescribe for others a medicine which he himself was not prepared to take, and when he said that he would go to the fort of St. Elmo it was no mere figure of speech. The council of the Knights, however, would not hear of the Grand Master thus sacrificing himself; well did these noble gentlemen know that there was none among them like unto him, that his name and his influence were worth an army in themselves. The outcry was so loud that La Valette had to yield; which he did the more readily when he saw the splendid emulation among his brethren to cross over to the beleaguered and crumbling fortress which promised nothing but the grave to those who should pass within the circle of fire by which it was now surrounded. To the Chevaliers Gonzales de Medran and de la Motte was conceded the proud privilege for which all the Knights were clamouring; and, accompanied by the tears and the prayers of their brethren, they passed to that place where, if death were certain, honour at least was immortal. Truly the heart warms somewhat to the days of chivalry when one reads of what was done at the siege of Malta. The motto of _Noblesse oblige_ was no dead letter in the sixteenth century. By this time the whole of Europe was awake to the peril of the Order, and, galloping for dear life across Europe, came the Knights, anxious and willing to share in the danger. For most of these gentlemen Sicily was the goal at which they aimed; arrived there they flung themselves into any boat or shallop which they could hire, and, heedless of the risk of capture by the Turkish fleet, totally ignorant of what was passing in Malta save that the infidel was at her gates, they passed across the channel which separates the two islands and joined their fellows at Il Borgo.

Greatly heartened by the reinforcements brought to them by de Medran and de la Motte, the garrison of St. Elmo made a sortie, surprised the Turks in their entrenchments, and, under cover of the guns of the fort, succeeded in destroying nearly all the works which the enemy had so painfully built up. The Turks, however, when they had recovered from the surprise, were in such large numbers as to be able to rally and drive the Christians from the vantage points which they had gained; and to oblige them once again to retire into the fort. From this time onward there was never a day in which the garrison and the besiegers were not hand to hand in the trenches.

Just after the first reinforcements had been thrown into St. Elmo there arrived on the scene Ali, the Lieutenant of Dragut. This corsair came from Alexandria with six galleys, on board of which were nine hundred men, reinforcements for the Turkish army. A few days after this the famous Dragut himself appeared, with thirteen galleys and two galleots, on board of which were sixteen hundred men.

What must not have been the despairing feelings with which the defenders viewed the arrival of this augmentation to the swarming ranks of their foes! From afar they noted the vessels and knew, while Philip of Spain and Garzia de Toledo still procrastinated, that now was added to the number of their enemies the most famous captain who served the autocrat of the Eastern world. Very naturally the arrival of Dragut was hailed with acclamation by the Turks: every gun in that vast armada spoke in salute, every trumpet blared, every drum rolled to welcome the man honoured of the Padishah, notorious throughout the whole world of Europe for his implacable enmity to the Knights. The first preoccupation of the corsair was to inform himself as to the conduct of the operations. These, when disclosed to him, by no means met with his approval. This real leader immediately made it clear to Piali and Mustafa that which they should have done. In the first place they should have made themselves masters of the castle of Gozo, and then captured the Città Notabile. By doing this the supplies to the town and fortress of Il Borgo would have been cut off: besides--and more important than aught else--they would in this manner have closed the road to those succours expected by the Christians. Piali, who had desired from the first to undertake nothing without the advice of Dragut, now said that the siege of St. Elmo was not so far advanced after all, and, if the Basha of Tripoli should so direct, it could be raised at once. To this, however, Dragut would by no means consent.

"That would have been well enough," he said, "if the affair had not gone so far; but, after the opening of the trenches and several days of attack, it is not possible to raise the siege without sullying the honour of the Sultan and discouraging the valour of the soldiers."

It cannot be denied that, in acting as he did, the corsair displayed a self-restraint and a loyalty to the Sultan hardly to be expected in the circumstances. The jealousy which so often obtains among rival commanders was singularly in evidence in the forces of the Padishah: Dragut had good cause to be dissatisfied with the dispositions which had been made, and yet, for the reasons which we have quoted, he allowed them to proceed. Before the Basha had left Tripoli he had been engaged in communications with Muley Hamid, the then King of Tunis, who was feudatory of Spain. Anxious as was the corsair to aid in attacking his implacable enemies, the Knights, he could not afford to leave his own flank unguarded in Africa. He succeeded, however, in arriving at an understanding with the King of Tunis, and, further than this, he had assured himself, by means of his spies, that the succours which were to be sent from Sicily by the Spanish King could not possibly arrive for another two months. It was the negotiations which he was obliged to undertake with Muley Hamid which had caused his late arrival. As far as it is possible to judge, it was this circumstance, which (added to their own incomparable valour) turned the scale in favour of the Knights.

Among all those brave men at Malta, on both sides, in this flaming month of June 1565, there were none who excelled the Basha of Tripoli. "No one had ever seen a more intrepid general officer," says de Vertot. "He passed entire days in the trenches and at the batteries. Among his different talents none understood better than did he the direction and conduct of artillery, which was his special _métier_. By his orders on June 1st a second battery was constructed closer to the fort and parallel to the one already in existence, in order that an absolutely continuous fire might be maintained. He mounted four guns on the opposite side of Marsa Muzetto Harbour on a projecting point of land, from which a further enfilading fire smote the doomed fortress on the flank: this point has been known ever since as the Point Dragut."

A ravelin in advance of the fortress on the land side was scourged without ceasing by the arquebus fire of the Janissaries. One evening, as the return fire had slackened and all seemed quiet within this work, some Turkish engineers stole forth from the trenches to reconnoitre. Approaching the cavalier, all was still as death; the bold sappers pushed on as far as the ditch by which the work was surrounded, creeping on hands and knees. They let themselves down noiselessly into the ditch, and then, one standing on the shoulders of another, peeped in upon their Christian foes. Whether or no the sentry had been slain by a stray shot, or whether he too slept, can never be known; but the cavalier was unguarded; all within it slept the sleep of men utterly exhausted. The sappers crept back to their trenches, fetched scaling-ladders, swept like a flood over the rim of the cavalier, and put to death every man whom they found. Profiting by their advantage, the Turks dashed over the bridge connecting the cavalier with the fort; here, however, they were met by Sergeant-Major Guerare and a handful of soldiers aroused by him. These men were instantly succoured by the Chevaliers de Vercoyran and de Medran, who were immediately followed by the Bailli of Negropont and several other Knights. An obstinate hand-to-hand combat now ensued; fresh Turks came up to the attack, but were mown down in swathes by an enfilading fire from two cannons which the defenders of the fort managed to bring to bear upon them. More pioneers arrived from the trenches, carrying planks and sacks filled with wool. These men tried to effect a permanent lodgment, but the fire was too hot on the Christian side, and men fell in hundreds. Nothing daunted, the Turks reared their scaling-ladders against the sides of the fortress itself, and attempted to scale the walls; but for this the ladders were too short, and the assailants were hurled back into the ditch. This attack, in which the Turkish arms were rewarded by the capture of the ravelin behind the cavalier, is said to have cost them the lives of three thousand men. It lasted from daybreak until midday.

On the side of the Christians twenty Knights and one hundred soldiers were slain; but worst of all, from their point of view, the ravelin remained in the hands of their enemies. The chevalier Abel de Bridiers de la Gardampe having received a ball through his body, some of his comrades ran to place him under cover. "Count me no longer among the living," said the Knight. "You will be better employed in defending the rest of our brethren." He then, unassisted, dragged himself to the foot of the altar in the chapel, where his dead body was discovered when all was over.

So far communication remained established between St. Elmo and their comrades in Il Borgo on the opposite side of the harbour; in consequence the wounded were removed and their places taken by one hundred fresh men under the Chevalier Vagnon. To the Bailli of Negropont and the Commandeur Broglio, La Valette sent a message to return to Il Borgo. These gallant and aged veterans, both of whom were wounded, whose faces were scorched by the sun and blackened with powder, whose bodies were well-nigh worn out with perpetual vigil and hand-to-hand fighting, refused stoutly to quit their post, which now was naught but a dreadful shambles filled with corpses mangled out of recognition and heads and limbs which had been torn and hacked from their bodies.

Dragut now proposed to erect batteries on the same side of the Great Port as that on which Il Borgo was situated; on the point now known as Ricasoli, but which was then and for centuries afterwards known as the Punta Delle Forche (or Point of the Gallows, because it was here that all pirates was executed; and their bodies, swinging in chains, were the first objects that met the eye on entering the Great Port). In this he was overruled ruled by Piali, who declared that he had not sufficient men to spare, and the Knights of II Borgo would soon render the battery untenable even if they should succeed in erecting it, which the Turkish admiral now considered extremely doubtful. The siege of St. Elmo, which Mustafa had said would last at the outside for five or six days, had now been in progress for four weeks; and, although the fort was in a ruinous condition, nothing seemed capable of daunting those invincible warriors by which it was held.

The position in St. Elmo now was that the Turks still held on to the ravelin which they had captured; this they had built up to such a height that they could look over the parapet of the fortress and shoot down with arquebus fire any one whom they could see. Meanwhile the Turkish sappers delved night and day in their endeavour to undermine the parapet, which, if blown up, would give them free access to the interior of the fort; while another party, by use of the yards of galleys and huge planks of wood, busied themselves in constructing a bridge to connect the ravelin with the parapet. Lamirande, one of the most active of the defenders of the fort, viewed these preparations without undue alarm, as he was aware that, by the nature of the ground, it would be almost impossible to excavate sufficiently under the parapet to place an effective mine. As, however, the sapping was causing the parapet to incline outwards, and it was possible that it might almost at any moment fall over into the ditch, he caused a second parapet to be erected inside the first and artillery to be mounted thereon. Having done this he caused a false sortie to be made on the following night, and when the Turks rushed to the attack he, accompanied by a party of sappers, sallied out into the ditch and burned the bridge which had been made. The Turks, returning after their fruitless assault, found their bridge destroyed, but with untiring activity set to work and constructed it afresh. Dragging cannon to the very edge of the ravelin, they, on the very next evening, revenged themselves by also making a false attack: they swarmed into the ditch, and, placing their scaling-ladders against the walls, pretended that an escalade was to be attempted. The garrison, deceived, appeared on the parapet in large numbers, when a murderous fire at point-blank range was opened upon them from the ravelin. So great was the execution done on this occasion that the garrison lost more men than had hitherto been the case in the most determined attacks which they had sustained.

It now seemed as if indeed the end had come, that the garrison had done all that was in the power of mortal man and nothing was left for them but to retire while there was yet time. Accordingly choice was made of the chevalier Median to represent the desperate extremities to which they were reduced to La Valette. It was well known that for none among the Knights had the Grand Master more respect than he had for Medran, one of the bravest and most chivalrous of them all. He, at least, could never be suspected of cowardice, feebleness, at a desire to desert his post. This gallant Knight crossed the harbour on his dolorous errand and was received by his chief: to him he represented the state of affairs as it has here been set down, assuring him that at best the fort could but hold out for a few days longer.

A chapter of the Knights Grand Cross was immediately held and the most part of them were of opinion that the time had come to abandon a hopeless position. But this decision did not meet with the approval of the Grand Master. No one was more sensible than he of the peril to which their brethren were exposed; at the same time, he contended, that there were occasions on which it was necessary to sacrifice a certain number for the good of the whole Order. He had certain information that, if St. Elmo were abandoned, the Viceroy of Sicily would hazard nothing for the relief of the island; that upon the arrival of succours depended the existence of their ancient and honourable confederacy: therefore, at no matter what cost, they were bound to hold out as long as possible. So dominant was the personality of the Grand Master that, in a short time, he had won over the votes of the chapter and Medran was ordered to return to St. Elmo and deliver to the garrison a message that the siege must take its course.

Medran accordingly returned and reported to his comrades the result of his embassy. Several of the older Knights received the command with due submission, but among those who were younger there were murmurings. These men deemed the answer to their appeal hard and cruel; they could see no object in the loss of their lives, which they well knew would all be sacrificed in the next assault. They accordingly, to the number of fifty-three, wrote a letter to the Grand Master, demanding permission to abandon St. Elmo and retire to Il Borgo. If their request were denied they announced their design to sally forth, sword in hand, and perish in the ranks of the enemy. The Commandeur de Cornet was the bearer of this letter, which was received by the Grand Master with sorrow and indignation. To reassure them, he sent three commissioners to inspect the place. This was done, and one of them, a Knight of Greek descent named Constantine Castriot, reported that the fort could still hold out a while longer. When he announced this at St. Elmo the recalcitrant Knights were so furious with him that the Baili of Negropont had to sound "the alarm" to prevent a disgraceful fracas. The commissioners returned to Il Borgo. After hearing their report La Valette wrote a letter to those by whom he had been memorialised to the following effect:

"Return to the convent, my brothers; you will there be in greater security; and on our part we shall feel a greater sense of security in the conservation of so important a place, on which depends the safety of the island and the honour of our Order."

Never were men so taken aback as were the Knights in St. Elmo when they received this response; here it was intimated to them that that which they refused to do on account of the danger thereof was to be undertaken by others. This was no more than a fact, as La Valette was besieged with applications from, not only the Knights, but also the simple soldiers of the garrison, to be allowed to pass over to St. Elmo and die if necessary to the last man. It was, therefore, with prayers and tears that the Knights besought the Grand Master to allow them to remain. At first La Valette was adamant. He preferred, he said, the rawest militia which was prepared to obey his orders, to Knights who knew not their duty. In the end, however, he yielded, and in the fortress of St. Elmo, that crushed and ruined charnel-house, its defences gaping wide, its every corner exposed night and day to a sweeping murderous fire, there remained a host of men sadly torn and battered, but animated by such a spirit that nothing the Turks could devise made upon it the least impression. These great and gallant gentlemen had had their moment of weakness; they had been heartened to the right conception of their duty by the noble veteran who was their chief. To him had they turned at last, as his obedient children who had had their moment of rebellion in a trial as hard as was ever undergone by man. And now, as the inevitable end drew near, it was as if they would imitate the Roman gladiator with that terrible chorus of his: "Ave Cæsar morituri te salutant."

All day and every day did the garrison fight, snatching such repose as was possible when their pertinacious enemies, worn out by fatigue and the terrible heat, could no longer be led to the attack against those whom they now firmly believed to be in league with Shaitan himself; "For how else," demanded Janissary and Spahi alike, "could infidels like these make head against those chosen of the Prophet like ourselves."

At this time the garrison took into use a device attributed to the Grand Master himself. This consisted in hoops of wood which were first thoroughly soaked in alcohol and then boiled in oil; they were then tightly bound with cotton or wool, also soaked in inflammable liquids mixed with saltpetre and gunpowder. Once these fiendish contrivances were set alight nothing availed to put them out, and they were feared as was naught else by the Turks during the remainder of the time they were in Malta. They were particularly deadly against the Turks, and at times two or more soldiers mounting the breach would be caught in one of these fiery circles, and the unfortunate wretches would be burnt alive. Even the Janissaries refused to advance at times when these fireworks were being flung down upon their flowing garments.

On June 16th another attack was made on the fortress, and, incredible as it may seem, it was repulsed with such awful slaughter that at last the Turks would not face the swords of the garrison. Alter this the enemy succeeded in drawing so close a cordon round the place that no more succours could reach it, and the end was but a matter of time. The day before it came Dragut, who, with his usual intrepidity, was standing in the midst of a hot fire, was struck on the side of the head by a stone dislodged from a wall by a cannon-ball. At the moment when this happened he was holding a council of war in the trenches with Piali, a Sanjak, and the principal Turkish engineer. The same shot which wounded Dragut killed the Sanjak on the spot. Piali caused a cloak to be thrown over the body of the corsair in order that his state should not be observed by the soldiers, and as soon as possible had him removed to his tent, where he lay unconscious till the following day.

The council on which the corsair had been engaged when he received his mortal wound had for its object the complete isolation of St. Elmo from Il Borgo; his dispositions were completed and his orders given to the engineer just before he was struck.

The agony of St. Elmo was drawing to an end; completely hemmed in by the latest dispositions of Dragut, the fortress was at its last gasp; a brave Maltese swimmer managed to slip through the cordon, swim the harbour, and deliver to the Grand Master a letter from the Bailli of Negropont. The Grand Master made one last effort to throw succours and reinforcements into the place, but these were beaten off with terrible slaughter: nothing now remained but to await the inevitable tragedy.

[Illustration: DEATH OF DRAGUT AT THE SIEGE OF MALTA.]

On the night of June 22nd the defenders of St. Elmo, having now lost all hope of being supported, made ready for death. Into them La Valette had breathed his own heroic spirit, and none among them counselled or dreamed of surrender. The Order to which they had given their allegiance now demanded of them the last sacrifice which it was in their power to make, and this was offered in the manner most fitting to its tenets. These exhausted, war-worn, battle-scarred warriors repaired to the chapel, where they confessed, and made ready by partaking together of the sacrament, "and, having thus surrendered their souls to God, each retired to his post to die on the bed of honour with arms in his hand." Those among the Knights who were too severely wounded or too ill to stand caused chairs to be carried to the breach in which they seated themselves and awaited the assault. For four hours did these indomitable men withstand the might of a host innumerable: at the conclusion of this period there remained alive but sixty of the garrison. Mustafa ceased the assault for a few moments only to replace the storming party by fresh troops, and then the end came. Almost the last to fall were the Chevalier Lamirande and the veteran Bailli of Negropont, and when the crescent banner was planted on the walls there remained alive not one of those defenders who had held the fort. Several of Dragut's officers ran to his tent and announced the taking of St. Elmo. The great captain was in his last extremity and unable to speak, "He, however, manifested his joy by several signs, and, raising his eyes to heaven as if in thankfulness for its mercies, immediately expired: a captain of rare valour and even abundantly more humane than are ordinarily these corsairs."

The Basha Piali, on entering the fort and observing with what miserable resources it had so long been held exclaimed, as he looked across the harbour to Il Borgo:

"What will not the parent do to us, when so small a son has cost us the lives of our bravest soldiers?"

There is no record of what that cruel savage, Mustafa, said on this occasion; his deeds, however, spoke eloquently. He caused the bodies of the Knights to be decapitated and nailed to wooden crosses, while across their corpses were slashed a cross in derision of the religion of his foes. The bodies were then cast into the harbour, and were washed up at the foot of Il Borgo. Instantly the Grand Master ordered the decapitation of all the Turkish prisoners, and their heads were fired from cannon into the camp of Mustafa.

With the remainder of the siege, which was yet to last till September 18th, we have no concern in this book. It is only necessary to say that the men of Il Borgo were worthy to stand in the same category with the defenders of St. Elmo, which is equivalent to stating that in them also was discovered the last limit of heroism. The Grand Master survived the siege, his monument is the noble city of "Valetta" built on Mount Sceberras. The Turks abandoned the siege and returned to Constantinople on the arrival of some insignificant reinforcements from Sicily. So terrible had been the resistance of the Knights that no heart was left in their armada. Of Dragut there remains but little to be said: he was perhaps the best educated of the corsairs and less cruel than was usually their habit. Although not so renowned as his more celebrated master, Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa, this is, perhaps, because his career was cut short at the siege of Malta at a comparatively early age. Although he never attained the rank of Admiralissimo to the Grand Turk, that potentate, as we have seen, placed in him the greatest confidence, and relied largely on his judgment, especially when sea-affairs were in question. Like the Barbarossas before him, he rose from nothing to the height to which he eventually attained by sheer force of intellect and character. In the stormy times in which his lot was cast he never faltered in his onward way, never repined, never looked back, sustained as he was by a consciousness of his own capability to rule the wild spirits by whom he lived surrounded. So it is that, whatever other opinion we may hold of Dragut, we cannot deny that in this captain of the Sea-wolves were blended rare qualities, which caused him to shine as a capable administrator, a fine seaman, but above all as a supreme leader of men. Dragut died with arms in his hands fighting those whom he considered to be his bitterest enemies. He did not live to see the repulse of Piali and Mustapha, and it is to be presumed that he died assured in his own mind that victory would rest with the Moslem host. For such a man as this no death could have been more welcome.

CHAPTER XXI

ALI BASHA

Ali, the Basha of Algiers, succeeds to Dragut--He conquers the Kingdom of Tunis, captures four galleys from the Knights of Malta, joins Piali Basha in his raidings preliminary to the battle of Lepanto--The gathering of the Christian hosts and the arrival of Don John of Austria in the Mediterranean to take command.

"Now I have heard several mariners and captains of the sea, nay, even Knights of Malta, debate among themselves this question, as to which was the greater and better seaman, Dragut or Occhiali? And some held for one and some for the other; those who held for Occhiali declaring that he had held greater and more honourable charges than Dragut, because he commanded as General and Admiral for the Grand Turk and that _il fit belle action_ at the battle of Lepanto." Pierre de Bourdeille, the Seigneur de Brantôme, from whom we make the above quotation, was himself present at the siege of Malta and, besides this, as is well known, gossiped in his own inimitable way concerning men and women of his time, from corsairs to courtesans. When such contemporary authorities as those mentioned could not agree it is quite certain that we of the twentieth century cannot decide on the rival claims to distinction between the Bashaw of Tripoli and his follower Occhiali, as he was known to the Christians, or Ali Basha, as he was called by the Turks. Ali Basha has a title to fame in the fact that he is mentioned by Cervantes in his _Don Quijote de la Mancha_ under the name of "Uchali" in chapter xxxix., "Donde el cautivo cuenta su vida y sucesos." The captive is supposed to have been no less a person than the famous Cervantes himself, and he briefly describes how Uchali became "Rey de Argel," or King of Algiers.

Ali was a Christian, having been born at a miserable little village in Calabria called Licastelli. Nothing whatever is known of his birth and parentage, and he does not appear even to have possessed a Christian name, although born in a Christian land. He followed from his earliest youth the calling of a mariner; "he was from infancy inured to salt water," says Joseph Morgan, in his _Compleat History of Algiers_, and he was, as a mere boy, captured by Ali Ahamed, Admiral of Algiers, and was chained to the starboard-bow oar in the galley of that officer. He was thus very early in life "inured" to suffering, and must have possessed a constitution of iron to withstand thus, in boyhood, the hardships of the life of a galley-slave, which as a rule broke down the endurance of strong men in a very few years. Morgan presents us with a description of him at this period which in these more squeamish days can certainly not be set down in its entirety: suffice it to say that he suffered all his days from what is known as "scald-head," and that personal filthiness was one of his principal characteristics.

For some years Ali remained at the heart-breaking toil of the rower's bench: cut off from home, which to him meant nothing, devoid of kinsfolk, alone--miserably alone in a world which, so far, had given him naught but the chain and the whip--it is not a matter for surprise that he became a Mussulman, thus freeing himself from slavery. From the time that he took this step his fortunes mended rapidly in that strange medley of savagery and bloodshed in which his lot was cast.

Alert, strong, capable, and vigorous, he became in early manhood chief boatswain in the galley in which his apprenticeship had been passed--a position which enabled him to accumulate a small store of ducats, with which he bought a share in a brigantine. Here he soon acquired sufficient wealth to become captain and owner of a galley, in which he soon gained the reputation of being one of the boldest corsairs on the Barbary coast. Having in some sort made a name for himself, his next step was to seek for a patron who could make use of his valour, address, and capability for command. His choice was soon made, as who in all the Mediterranean, in his early days, held such a name as Dragut? He accordingly entered the service of the Basha of Tripoli, and, under his command, became well known to the officers of the Grand Turk, particularly to the Admiral, Piali Basha, to whom he was able to render some important services.

There is no object to be gained in lingering over the earlier years of this notable corsair, as we should thus only be repeating what has been said about Dragut, whose lieutenant and trusted follower he became. He accompanied his master to the siege of Malta, and when Dragut was slain the Capitan-Basha, Piali, named him as successor to his chief as Viceroy of Tripoli. Ali sailed from Malta to Tripoli, taking with him the remains of Dragut, to be buried as that chieftain had directed. When he arrived on the Barbary coast he made himself master of the slaves and treasure which had been left behind by Dragut; shortly after this he was confirmed in his Vice-royalty of Tripoli by the Grand Turk; thenceforward increasing, both his wealth and the terror in which his name was held, by continual raids upon the Christians, more particularly on the coasts of Sicily, Calabria, and Naples. It is curious to observe the sort of spite which all the renegadoes seem to have harboured against the countries in which they were born.

In March 1568, owing to the fall of Mohammed Basha, the Vice-royalty of Algiers became vacant, and, through the good offices of his old friend Piali, Ali became Governor. He thus returned to occupy a position of literally sovereign power to the city which he had first entered as a galley-slave.

That he was no negligent Governor and that he took an entirely intelligent view of his functions, is proved by an occurrence which took place in this same year in Spain. The Moriscoes in the Kingdom of Granada revolted against their Spanish Governor, by whom they were sorely oppressed. They sent messages to Ali at Algiers, begging for succour against their persecutor. But the Basha would send no expedition; he permitted all and sundry to go as volunteers, but gave out publicly that "it more concerned him to defend well his own State than to interfere in the affairs of others." He even went farther than this, and when a number of Moriscoes, who were settled at Algiers, embarked a quantity of arms for transportation to the coast of Andalusia, he put an embargo on the vessels and would not allow them to sail, saying "he would never suffer the exportation of what was so necessary for the defence of his own dominions." At last, after much importunity, he consented "that all such as had two of a sort--as muskets, swords, or other weapons--might, if they thought fit, send over one of them, provided they did it gratis and purely for the cause' sake; but he would never allow any of them to strip themselves of their arms for lucre."

Ali, being now firmly established at Algiers, took up arms against the neighbouring State of Tunis. For long years now the King of Tunis had been protected by the Spaniards--a nation whom the Sea-wolves always held in singular abhorrence as the most bigoted of the Christian Powers, and who held in thrall many of their co-religionists. Hamid, son of Hassan, who now ruled in Tunis, had reduced that unfortunate State to anarchy bordering on rebellion, and the whole country, torn by internal feud, was ready to rise against him. The Goletta was in the hands of the Spaniards; Carouan, an inland town, had set up a king of its own, while the maritime towns passed from the domination of the Sea-wolves to that of the Christians, and from the Christians back to the Sea-wolves, according to which party happened to be the stronger for the time being.

El Maestro Fray Diego de Haedo, "Abad de Fromesta de la Orden del Patriarca San Benito" and "natural del Valle de Carranca," whose _Topografia e Historia de Argel_ (or Algiers) was printed in Valladolid in the year 1612, gives an account of Hamid at this time in which he describes that monarch as an "unpopular tyrant who sadly persecuted his vassals and the friends of his father; who could by no means suffer his tyrannies and those of his ministers, the scum of the earth ("hombres baxos"), to whom he had given the principal offices of the kingdom. Accordingly, since the time that Ali had become Basha of Algiers, letters had been written to him importuning him to come to Tunis that he might possess himself of that city and kingdom."

There were three principal conspirators--the Alcaid Bengabara, General of the Cavalry, the Alcaid Botaybo, and the Alcaid Alcadaar. Ali, however, was too shrewd a man to move until he had satisfied himself by reports from his own adherents; he, therefore, awaited the result of investigations made by spies from Algiers. At last, in the beginning of the year 1569, when the offers from the Alcaids had been three times renewed and the Basha was assured that the people in Tunis were sincere in their offer to him of the sovereignty of the kingdom--which they begged him to conquer and hold in the name of the Ottoman Empire--the ex-galley-slave no longer hesitated. He left Algiers in the month of October, leaving that city in charge of one Mami Corso, a fellow renegado. Unlike Dragut, who would have gone by sea, he set out by land with some five thousand corsairs and renegadoes. On the way he was reinforced by some six thousand cavalry of the wild tribes of the hinterland, then as ever ready to join in a fray with promise of booty: doubly ready in this case, as it was to harass so unpopular a tyrant as Hamid. Passing through Constantine and Bona, he continued to march towards Tunis, his following augmenting as he proceeded, and adding to his forces ten light field-guns. Arriving at Beja, a town which Haedo describes as being but two short days' march from Tunis, he came upon a fortress, recently erected by Hamid, mounting fourteen brass cannon. Here he halted, whereupon Hamid sallied out to give him battle at the head of some three thousand troops, horse and foot. The engagement had scarcely begun when the three Alcaids, who had been in communication with Ali, deserted with all their following. Hamid fled to Tunis, expecting to find shelter there, but he was hotly pursued by the corsairs, who followed him up to Al-Burdon, where his summer palace was situated. Hamid, finding that his people were everywhere in revolt, fled to the Goletta, carrying with him a quantity of money, jewels, and portable valuables, and placed himself under the protection of the Spanish garrison--not, however, without the loss of the major portion of his baggage, plundered from him by certain Moors in the course of his flight.

Like Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa, Ali was now lord of Algiers and Tunis, and as he was, for a corsair, a man of wide views, he treated his new subjects with consideration. He made, however, one curious mistake not to have been expected from one so politic: he demanded tribute from the tribes of the hinterland. In those days, particularly in Northern Africa, men paid tribute to an overlord because he was stronger than they; because retribution followed swiftly and suddenly upon refusal. To order tribute to be paid without being ready to strike was merely to expose the man making the demand to derision. Particularly was this the case with the fierce land-pirates of the desert, whose habit it was to exact and not to pay tribute. To Ali the Sheiks replied that "if he wanted tribute from them he must demand it lance in hand in the field, for there and nowhere else were they accustomed to pay: that their coin was steel lance-heads and not golden aspers." After this, says Morgan, "the Basha thought it well to dissemble."

Ali, being in no position to wage war in the desert against these people, had to swallow the insult and to turn his attention to regulating the internal affairs of his newly acquired kingdom. This he succeeded in doing sufficiently by the month of June in the following year to enable him to leave Tunis in the hands of one Rabadan, a Sardinian renegado, and to start himself for Constantinople. His reason for doing this was the old one of attempting to consolidate his power in Northern Africa by appealing to the Sultan for help. As long as the Goletta remained in the hands of the Spaniards no corsair could feel himself secure in either Tunis or Algiers. The object of Ali was to beg from the Grand Turk men and ships to assist him to chase the Spaniards out of Africa.

The month of June 1570, in consequence, saw Ali once more at sea in his "Admiral galley," steering northwards to the Golden Horn. Carrying with them a favourable breeze from the south-east, the galleys spread their huge lateen sails, and the straining rowers had rest awhile. The squadron consisted of twenty-four galleys. Off Cape Passaro, in Sicily, a small vessel was captured which gave information that five galleys of the Knights of Malta were at anchor at Licata, a small harbour in the neighbourhood, and that they were on the point of sailing for Malta. The decision of Ali was taken on the instant: were he to go in and attack them with the overwhelming force at his command the crews might escape to the shore; even the Knights of Malta could hardly be expected to fight twenty-four galleys with five. He was anxious to capture the ships, but above all to capture those by whom they were manned: to have the satisfactory revenge of seeing the proud Knights stripped naked and chained to the benches of his own fleet.

The hot Mediterranean sun poured down out of a cloudless sky as the Sea-wolves made their offing; out of sight of land they lay, but right in the course which the galleys of the Christians were bound to take. The great yards, with their lateen sails, were got down on deck, and, oar in hand, the Moslems awaited their prey. Presently the Maltese galleys were discovered coming leisurely along, under oars and sails, and then--when it was too late--the Knights discovered the snare into which they had fallen. There was but scant time for preparation or deliberation, and who shall blame four out of the five if they decided to try to escape? for it was escape or annihilation.

But there was one which did not fly, "Una galera hizo cara a los Turcos" (One single galley turned her bows towards the Turks), says that faithful chronicler Haedo. She was named the _Santa Ana_, but the name of her heroic commander has not come down to us. Even as Grenfell "at Flores in the Azores," stood upon the deck of the little _Revenge_ on that memorable August day in 1591, when "he chose to die rather than to dishonour himself, his country, and her Majesty's ship," so also did this Knight of Malta bear down on the twenty-four that were his foes.

When Don John of Austria, being at the time young and inexperienced in warfare on the sea, wrote to the Marquis of Villafranca, General of the Galleys of Sicily, requesting advice on the subject of galley attacking galley, that officer replied to him, "Never fire your arquebus at the foe until you are so close at hand that his blood will leap into your face at the discharge." If we bear in mind such an instruction as this it will help us to picture that close-packed sanguinary conflict upon which the Mediterranean sun looked down on this day. Eight to one, all that could find room to get alongside of the _Santa Ana_, fought with the Knight and his followers. The issue was, of course, never in doubt for a moment. "Muertos y cansados" (Dead and deadbeat), says Haedo, the caballeros and soldados of the Christian ship could at length hold out no longer. The Sea-wolves were victorious, the proud banner of Saint John was lowered; but never in all its history had it been more nobly upheld, and the galley _Santa Ana_, commanded by that unknown member of the great Christian military hierarchy of the sixteenth century, may well stand in the roll of fame alongside of the _Revenge_, the _Vengeur_, and the _Victory_.

The _Capitana_, or "Admiral's galley," of the Knights, being hotly pursued, ran ashore with one of her consorts at Licata: the crews landed, but were pursued and overtaken. One galley escaped altogether, but four out of the five were taken. So notable a victory as this over the Knights caused so much rejoicing in the fleet of the Sea-wolves that Ali determined to celebrate it by a triumphal return to Algiers instead of proceeding directly to Constantinople. Accordingly, the ships' heads were turned south once more, and upon July 20th, 1570, the fleet arrived in the African port, "on sus galeras todas llenas de muchas banderas"--with galleys gaily beflagged.

[Illustration: A GALLEY OF THE KNIGHTS OF MALTA.]

The procession entered the harbour in three divisions of eight galleys: and towing behind each division was one of the captured galleys of the Knights. In memory of his prowess Ali ordered that the shields and bucklers taken from the Maltese galleys, which bore upon them emblazoned the white cross of "the Religion," should be hung up in the great arched gate of the Marina. Also there was placed here the image of Saint John the Baptist, taken from the _Capitana_ galley, "all of which remain," says Haedo, "until this day" _(i.e._ 1612), except the image of Saint John, which in the reign of Hassan Basha, a Venetian renegado, was taken down and burned at the instance of the Morabutos, "los letrados de los Moros" (the learned among the Moors). It is an instructive commentary on the fear and respect in which the Knights of Malta were held that such a man as Ali should have considered it a triumph worth the celebrating when he defeated five of their vessels with twenty-four of his own.

The next occurrence in the life of Ali was one of those to which the Sea-wolves were subjected from time to time, and which do not seem to have caused them much trouble or anxiety. This was a mutiny of the Janissaries in Algiers, who very reasonably objected to being left without their pay. A mutiny of the Janissaries, however, was somewhat a serious matter, as they were accustomed to the enjoyment of many privileges, and were, as we have said elsewhere, a picked corps who had it in their power even to coerce the Sultan himself upon occasions.

Those of them who were in Algiers demanded "Who was this corsair who dared to keep the picked men of the army of the Grand Turk waiting for their pay, as if they were no better than his slaves?" Such a thing as a mutiny was, in the days of which we speak, a matter for which any prudent corsair had to be prepared. Ali was in no means discomposed, and, as the crisis had become acute on shore, he went to sea, where he was under no obligation to pay his men, who paid themselves at the expense of their enemies. He put to sea with twenty galleys, and, shortly after leaving Algiers, he met with a galley from the Levant, from which he received information that a powerful armada was preparing in Constantinople for an expedition against the Christians. He steered for Coron in the Morea, where he was almost immediately joined by the Ottoman fleet, the commander of which force was overjoyed to find so formidable a reinforcement under so renowned a captain as Ali.

Soliman the Magnificent had died in 1566, and had been succeeded by his son, Selim; this prince, bred in the Seraglio, was weak and licentious, given to that strong drink forbidden by the Prophet to an extent which caused him to be nicknamed by the Spaniards as "el ebrio," or "el bebedor."

This was a state of affairs which boded ill for the Turkish Empire, and Selim II. had been educated in a very different manner from that which had hitherto been the custom. Speaking of this, Gibbon says, "Instead of the slothful luxury of the Seraglio, the heirs of royalty were educated in the council and the field. From early youth they were entrusted by their fathers with the command of provinces and of armies; and this manly institution, which was often productive of civil war, must have essentially contributed to the discipline and vigour of the monarchy."

Drunkard and weakling as he was, Selim had his ambitions. He wished to signalise his reign by some great conquest, such as had added lustre to the rule of his father; and in consequence he laid claim to the island of Cyprus, then belonging to Venice, The Venetians, having strengthened the fortifications of the island and fitted out their navy, sought alliances in Europe to curb the pretensions of the Porte. In this they found support, instant and generous, from the Pope Pius V. Of this great ecclesiastic Prescott says: "He was one of those Pontiffs who seemed to have been called forth by the exigencies of the time to uphold the pillars of Catholicism as they were yet trembling under the assaults of Luther."

The Pope, Philip II. of Spain, and Venice formed what was known as the "Holy League," and, having formed it, immediately began to quarrel among themselves as to what its functions were to be. The Venetians wished all its efforts to be directed to safeguarding Cyprus, while Philip and his viceroys were anxious to attack the Sea-wolves on the coast of Africa in their strongholds. After much squabbling, an agreement was come to. The principal items of this were, that the Pope should pay one-sixth of the expenses, Venice two-sixths, and Spain three-sixths; that each party should appoint its own Commander-in-Chief, and that Don John of Austria should be in supreme command of the whole forces assembled. The contracting parties were to furnish 200 galleys, 100 transports, 50,000 foot, 4,500 horse, and the requisite artillery and stores.

While the Christians were negotiating and talking, the Turks were acting. It was in May that the Pope caused the treaty to be publicly read in full consistory; in April the Turkish fleet had got to sea and committed terrible ravages in the Adriatic, laying waste to Venetian territory.

While ships and men were gathering, and while the fleet which it was to be his fortune to defeat was pursuing its career in the Mediterranean, Don John of Austria left Madrid for the south on June 6th, 1571. When he arrived at Barcelona he made a pilgrimage to the Hermitage of Our Lady of Montserrat, where his father Charles V. had confessed and received the sacrament before he sailed on his voyage to the Barbary coast in his expedition against Barbarossa. From Barcelona he sailed with thirty galleys to Genoa, where he arrived on the 25th, and was lodged in the palace of Andrea Doria. In August he arrived by water at Naples.

By this time all Europe was aflame with excitement: warriors of noble birth were flocking to serve under the standard of the brother of the King of Spain, who was regarded as the very mirror of chivalry. The following description of Don John, at Naples, is from the pen of that great historian Prescott:

"Arrangements had been made in that city for his reception on a more magnificent scale than any he had witnessed on his journey. Granvelle, who had lately been raised to the post of Viceroy, came forth at the head of a long and brilliant procession to welcome his royal guest. The houses which lined the streets were hung with richly tinted tapestries and gaily festooned with flowers. The windows and verandahs were graced with the beauty and fashion of the pleasure-loving capital, and many a dark eye sparkled as it gazed upon the fine form and features of the youthful hero, who at the age of twenty-four had come to Italy to assume the baton of command and lead the crusade against the Moslems. His splendid dress of white velvet and cloth of gold set off his graceful person to advantage. A crimson scarf floated loosely over his breast, and his snow-white plumes drooping from his cap mingled with the yellow curls that fell in profusion over his shoulders. It was a picture which the Italian maiden might love to look on. It was certainly not the picture of the warrior sheathed in the iron panoply of war. But the young Prince, in his general aspect, might be relieved from the charge of effeminacy by his truly chivalrous bearing and the dauntless spirit which beamed from his clear blue eyes. In his own lineaments he seemed to combine all that was comely in the lineaments of his race."

At Naples Don John found a fleet at anchor under the command of Don Alvaro de Bazan, first marquis of Santa Cruz, of whom much was to be heard in the future in his capacity as Admiral of Castile. Here also he received from the hands of Cardinal Granvelle a consecrated banner sent to him by the Pope at a solemn ceremony in the church of the Franciscan Convent of Santa Chiara. On August 25th he left Naples and proceeded to Messina, where he landed under a triumphal arch of colossal dimensions, embossed with rich plates of silver and curiously sculptured with emblematical bas-reliefs. The royal galley in which the hero embarked was built at Barcelona: she was fitted with the greatest luxury, and was remarkable for her strength and speed; her stern was profusely decorated with emblems and devices drawn from history; no such warship had ever been seen in the world before.

Cayetano Rosell, in his _Historia del combate naval de Lepanto_, says that the number of vessels, great and small, in the Christian armada was over 300, of which 200 were galleys, the ordinary warships of the time. He goes on to say:

"In this spacious harbour [Messina] there were collected the squadrons of the League; the people who managed the oars and sails and the innumerable combatants making an immense number when added together. Since the days of Imperial Rome, never had been seen in these seas so imposing a spectacle, never had there been collected so many ships moving towards a single end dominated by a single will. Never was there a spectacle more gratifying in the eyes of justice, nor of greater incentive to men to fight for the cause of religion."

The Spanish fleet comprised 90 royal galleys, 24 nefs, and 50 fregatas and brigantines "los mejores que en tiempo alguno se habrian visto" (the finest that ever were seen at any time), as they were described by Don John. The Pope sent 12 galleys and 6 fregatas, under the command of Mark Antony Colonna. The Pope had also made a grant of the "Crusada" and "Excusada," and other ecclesiastical revenues which he drew from Spain, to the King of that country, to meet expenses.

Venice appointed Sebastian Veniero to the command of her fleet, which consisted of 106 galleys, 6 galeasses of enormous bulk and clumsy construction carrying each 40 guns, 2 nefs, and 20 fregatas. These vessels were, however, so miserably manned and equipped that Don John had to send on board Spaniards and Genoese to complete their complements. In a manuscript of the Bibliothèque du Roi (Number 10088) is an account of the battle of Lepanto by Commandeur de Romegas. He gives the number of the Turkish fleet at 333 ships, of which 230 were galleys, the rest galeasses and smaller craft. The total which he gives for the Christian fleet is 271. Ali Basha was in supreme command of the Turkish forces, "a man of an intrepid spirit, who had given many proofs of a humane and generous mature--qualities more rare among the Turks, perhaps among all nations, than mere physical courage." With Ali was the Basha of Algiers, that other Ali, the corsair, who since his arrival at Coron had done more than his share of the fighting, marauding, and devastating which were the preliminaries to the battle of Lepanto. In this historic conflict he was to show once again how, on the face of the waters, the Sea-wolves were supreme; as it was he and his corsairs, out of the whole of the Moslem host, who acquitted themselves with the greatest credit on that day so fatal to the arms of the Ottoman Turk.

CHAPTER XXII

LEPANTO

How Ali Basha fought at the battle of Lepanto: his subsequent career--Conclusion.

Lepanto, the last battle of first-class importance in which the Sea-wolves bore a leading part, is memorable in many ways. It is one of the most sanguinary which was ever fought, the element of personal hatred between the combatants, to which we have alluded more than once, being singularly in evidence on this occasion. As we have said, this campaign was brought about at the initiative of the Venetians, and an incident which occurred not long before the battle exacerbated the feelings with which the Turks were regarded by the Christians to the point of madness. The city of Famagusta, in Cyprus, had been captured by that Mustafa of whom we heard so much at the siege of Malta. The Venetian defenders made an honourable capitulation, but when the four principal Venetian captains were brought before Mustafa, that general caused three of them to be beheaded on the spot; the fourth, a noble and gallant gentleman who had been responsible for the magnificent defence of the city entrusted to his charge, he caused to be flayed alive in the market-square. He then had the skin stuffed with straw, and, with this ghastly trophy nailed to the prow of his galley, returned in triumph to Constantinople. Bragadino, the defender of Famagusta, did not die in vain; his terrible fate excited such a passion of anger in the whole of the armada of Don John that each individual of which it was composed felt that the sacrifice of his own life would be but a small thing if it only led to the destruction of such fiends as those against whom they were arrayed.

[Illustration: DON JOHN OF AUSTRIA.]

Lepanto was a magnificent triumph for the arms of Christendom, and taught a much-needed lesson to Europe that the Ottoman Turk was not invincible upon the sea; it was not, however, an interesting battle from the point of view of the student of war and its combinations. Of all the high officers in command on that memorable day there was only one who displayed real generalship and a proper appreciation of the tactical necessities of the situation; that officer was Ali Basha, the leader of the Sea-wolves. The account of the battle is somewhat obscured by the fact that on the side of the Moslems the name of the Ottoman Commander-in-Chief was also "Ali"; in order to avoid confusion in this narration, we shall allude to the Basha of Algiers by the name given to him by the Christians, "Occhiali."

It was on Sunday, October 7th, 1571, that the Christian fleet weighed anchor from Cephalonia and stood southwards along the Albanian coast, which is here fringed with rocky islets. The right wing was commanded by John Andrea Doria, the left wing by the Provéditeur Barbarigo, the centre, or "battle," as it was called, by Don John in person, who had on the one side of him Mark Antony Colonna, the General of the Galleys of the Pope, and on the other that fiery veteran Sebastian Veniero, the commander of the Venetians. Here also were stationed the Prince of Parma, nephew to Don John, Admiral of Savoy; Duke Urbino, Admiral of Genoa; the Admiral of Naples, and the Commandeur of Castile. The reserve, under the command of the Marquis of Santa Cruz, consisted of thirty-five galleys. Immediately in rear of the _Real_, or royal galley of Don John, was that of the Grand Commander Requesens. The number of seamen, soldiers, officers, and galley-slaves in the fleet amounted to over eighty thousand persons; twenty-nine thousand infantry had been embarked, of which number nineteen thousand were Spaniards. Opposed to the Christians on this day was a Turkish fleet which had on board no less than one hundred and twenty thousand men embarked in two hundred and fifty galleys, without counting an innumerable host of smaller vessels.

[Illustration: SEBASTIAN VENIERO. Inset, portraits of Don John and Pope Pius V. Heroic statue of Don John dominating Christian and Turkish Fleets. The breath of the Almighty destroying the Turkish fleet at Lepanto.]

The authorities on whose accounts of the battle this description is based are Prescott, the famous historian; P. Daru, a member of the Académie Française, who wrote an exhaustive _Histoire de Venise_ and Don Cayetano Rosell, member of the Spanish Academy, who is responsible for an exposition of the subject, known as _Historia del combate naval de Lepanto_. From a comparison of the works of these eminent men one fact emerges with great clearness, which is that the battle of Lepanto was an indiscriminate mêlée which was decided by some of the most desperate fighting ever recorded, but which depended hardly at all upon the tactical abilities of the men in chief command. It is true that we are told Don John issued written instructions to the commander of each ship, but we are left in the dark as to what these instructions were, while at the same time we discover that in his line of battle, which in the first instance appears to have been that of "single line ahead," the galleys of all nationalities were inextricably mixed up; making it thereby impossible for the Papal, Spanish, and Venetian commanders to deal, as they should have done, exclusively with their own men. On the other hand, Occhiali kept together the squadron of the Sea-wolves; he outgeneralled and had all but defeated John Andrea Doria, when the end came and he was obliged to retreat.

We are, however, anticipating. Don John passed down his own line in a light "fregata" giving a few words of exhortation and advice to each ship under his command. If the bastard brother of the King of Spain did not exhibit any large measure of ability as a leader on this occasion, he was perhaps none the less the right man in the right place, as he had about him so winning a way, he was so striking and gallant a figure, that the hearts of all under his command went out to him. The seamen and soldiers of the great armada greeted him with enthusiastic shouts of delight as he bade them remember in whose cause it was that they fought. The last of the Knights-errant must have made a brave show as he passed down that line four miles in length, the sun shining on his damascened armour, and his yellow curls streaming out from beneath his helmet.

Soon after sunrise the Turkish fleet was descried sailing towards the Christians, in such apparently overwhelming force that several of the Spanish commanders represented to Don John that it would be imprudent to risk a battle. To his honour be it recorded that he replied he had come out to fight the Turks and that the time for talk was now over. He then hoisted all his banners, and the executive signal for the combat to begin was given by displaying at his mainmast head the sacred banner blessed by the Pope. As this standard floated out upon the breeze there went up a great shout in unison from all that were under the command of Don John. The scene of the combat was that area of the Ionian Sea which is enclosed on the east by the coasts of Albania and Morea and on the west by the islands of Ithaca and Cephalonia, Just to the northward, at the entrance to the Gulf of Arta, sixteen hundred years before had been fought the battle of Actium between Antony and Octavius; the same spot had witnessed, in 1538, the memorable battle of Prevesa between Andrea Doria and Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa.

From the point of view of the seaman, who is naturally anxious to discover the dispositions of their fleets made by the rival Commanders-in-Chief, Lepanto is an almost hopeless puzzle. As far as can be gathered, however, it was that the two armadas approached one another in what is known as "line ahead," each ship being immediately astern of its next ahead in one long continuous line; and that, when they got within striking distance, these lines turned so that they formed "line abreast," when each ship, having turned at right angles, simultaneously the line advances abreast, the ships forming it being broadside to broadside.

When the Turks discovered the allies they were issuing from between the islets and the shore. Seeing John Andrea Doria moving to the right, they judged that he was executing a turning movement with the object of escaping to the northwards, from whence he had come; they were, at the time, unable to see the rest of the fleet, which was hidden by the land. With sound tactical judgment they accordingly advanced to attack the allies before they should have time to issue from the strait. They were, however, too far off to accomplish this, and, by the time they arrived within striking distance, the Christian fleet had cleared the strait and was ready for them, "drawn up for battle," says Monsieur Daru, which is somewhat vague in describing the disposition of a fleet. What is certain, however, is that in advance of the galleys of Don John were six great galeasses, which were armed with guns of immensely superior power to anything which could be mounted in galleys. As the Turks advanced to the attack these vessels opened fire, and did so much execution that Ali, the Turkish Commander-in-Chief, ordered his line to open out and thus avoid their fire. Whatever formation the fleet was in at the time--which was, as far as we can gather, "line abreast"--this opening-out process, to avoid the galeasses, threw it into hopeless confusion. The Turkish right wing, which was hugging the coast, and was the first to come into action, passed on in an endeavour to turn the left wing of the allies. While this manoeuvre was in progress Ali, the Capitan-Basha of the Turks, arrived in his vessel opposite to the royal galley of Don John. At the masthead of the galley of the Capitan-Bashaw floated the sacred standard of the Ottomans. This, the ancient banner of the Caliphs, was covered with texts from the Koran, and had upon it the name of Allah emblazoned no less than twenty-eight thousand nine hundred times in letters of gold. "It was," says Prescott, "the banner of the Sultan, having passed from father to son since the foundation of the dynasty, and was never seen in the field unless the Grand Seigneur or his lieutenant was there in person." Ali, the Commander-in-Chief, a favourite of the Sultan, had been entrusted with this most precious of all the possessions of the Padishah, as an incentive to him and all under his command to fight their hardest to do honour to the Prophet, and to prevent this symbol of their religion from falling into the hands of the Christian. Ali, like Don John, was young, and burning to distinguish himself; accordingly, as soon as the ships of the two leaders came opposite to each other neither regarded any enemy save his rival Commander-in-Chief. Ali drove his great galley straight on board of the vessel of Don John, and a most obstinate conflict ensued. Veniero and Colonna hastened to the assistance of their chief, who was sore beset.

The combat now became general, and, as has been said, was for the most part nothing but a melee, in which each ship sought out the nearest of her foes and closed with her. For some time the fight went hard with Don John; time and again the galley of the Moslem leader was boarded, but on each occasion the Spaniards were hurled back upon their own decks. Loredano and Malipier, two Venetian captains, fell upon seven Turkish galleys which were hastening to reinforce the attack on Don John, and sank one of them. They then fought with such fury and resolution with the six that remained that, although both captains were killed, it was conceded that they had saved their general, entirely altered the complexion of the battle in their neighbourhood, and facilitated the capture of the Turkish admiral. The determined conduct of the two Venetians allowed the Spanish division to close in on the Turkish flagship, which, after an heroic resistance, was captured, principally because there were practically none left alive to fight. The head of Ali was struck off by a Spanish soldier, the banner of the Moslems was replaced by the flag of the Cross, the head of Ali on a pike being exhibited in derision above it. The conquerors seem to have seen no incongruity in this performance. The lowering of the sacred standard of the Capitan-Basha had a disheartening effect upon the Turks; they knew by this that their Commander-in-Chief was dead and his ship captured, the result being that the resistance of the Ottomans began to weaken. Then thirty galleys took to flight from the neighbourhood of the Christian flagship; so hotly were they pursued that they ran on shore, the crews swimming or wading to the beach and making off inland.

On the right of the Christian line things had not been going so propitiously for them. Here Occhiali had managed, by his apparently persistent attempts to outflank John Andrea Doria, to decoy that commander away from his supports and from the main body of the Christians. This tactical manoeuvre of the corsair was successful; having drawn off some fifteen of the Christian galleys, he suddenly flung the whole of his greatly superior force into the gap and surrounded them. These galleys were Spanish, Venetian, and Maltese, and, although they offered a most vigorous resistance, they were mostly destroyed or captured. Doria, in spite of all his efforts, was on this day both outgeneralled and outfought: the Sea-wolves, under their grim leader, manoeuvring for position, obtaining it, and then falling like a thunderbolt on the foe. They were all brave men at Lepanto on this memorable October day; but few there were like the corsair king, in whom a heart of fire was kept in check by a brain of ice, who, during the whole combat, never gave away a chance, or failed to swoop like an eagle from his eyry when the blunders of his enemy gave him the opportunity for which he watched. It was the old story of "the veritable man of the sea" pitted against gallant soldiers fighting on an unfamiliar element. And yet it was against the best seaman on the Christian side that Occhiali pitted himself on this stricken field; and none can deny that with him rested such honour as was gained by the Turks on this day, the day which broke up for ever the idea of the invincibility of the Ottomans on the water. It needs not to say, to those who have read the story of the siege of Malta, how the Knights comported themselves in the battle; and yet Occhiali captured the _Capitana_, or principal galley of the Order, He was towing her out of action, a prize, when the Marquis of Santa Cruz bore down upon him with the reserve. By this time the battle was lost; the Moslems were in full retreat.

The corsair recognised that he could do no more: sullenly he cast off the tow, and, forming up some thirty of his galleys, still in a condition to navigate, stood boldly through the centre of where the battle had once raged, and escaped. The _Capitana_ of Malta had been taken; and to the Sultan did Occhiali present the great standard of Saint John, as an earnest of his achievement.

Bernardino de Escalente, in his work _Diálogos del arte militar_, printed in Seville in 1583, says that the Captain Ojeda, of the galley _Guzmana_, recaptured the _Capitana_ of Malta; and that, in recognition thereof, "the Religion" pensioned him for life. Ojeda, it is to be presumed, was under the orders of the Marquis of Santa Cruz during the battle.

There remains one incident connected with the battle of Lepanto which must be told. In the _Marquesa_ galley, in the division of Doria, was lying in his bed sick of a fever a young man twenty-four years of age; a Spaniard of Alcala de Henares, "de padres hidalgos y honrados," we are told, although these parents were poor. When this young man heard that a battle was imminent he rose from his bed and demanded of his captain, Francisco San Pedro, that he should be placed in the post of the greatest danger. The captain, and others, his friends, counselled him to remain in his bed. "Señores," replied the young man, "what would be said of Miguel de Cervantes should he take this advice? On every occasion up to this day on which his enemies have offered battle to his Majesty I have served like a good soldier; and today I intend to do so in spite of this sickness and fever." He was given command of twelve soldiers in a shallop, and all day was to be seen where the combat raged most fiercely. He received two wounds in the chest and another which cost him the loss of his left hand. To those to whom he proudly displayed them in after-years he was accustomed to say, "wounds in the face or the chest are like stars which guide one through honour to the skies." Of him the chronicler says: "He continued the rest of his life with honourable memory of this wonderful occurrence, and, although he lost the use of his left hand, it added to the glory of his right." How glorious was that right hand is known to all readers of _El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha._

The losses at the battle of Lepanto are something so prodigious that imagination boggles at them. It is said that the Christians lost five thousand men and the Turks no less than thirty thousand. Enormous as these numbers are, they represent probably a very conservative estimate of the loss. The Turks lost two hundred vessels, and when we recollect the number of men embarked on board of the sixteenth-century galleys we can see that the numbers are by no means exaggerated, especially as no quarter was given on either side. When the Captain Ojeda recaptured the battered wreck which had been the _Capitana_ of Malta, we are told that on board of her were three hundred dead Turks; if this were the cost of the capture of one galley we need not be surprised at the total.

With the results to Europe of this amazing battle we have nothing to do in this book. That which it demonstrated, as far as the Sea-wolves were concerned, was that they still remained the most competent seamen and sea-fighters in the Mediterranean, and that the legend of the invincibility of the Ottomans at sea rested on what had been accomplished during a long period of years by these insatiable pirates and magnificent warriors.

That which the fighting Pontiff, Pius V., said when he heard of the victory is in character with everything which history has told us of this remarkable occupant of the chair of Saint Peter. It was short but very much to the point, consisting of the one sentence, "Fuit homo misus a Deo cui nomen erat Joannes."

In a collection of epitaphs printed in Colonia in 1623 (and edited by one Franciscus Swertius) is one in Spanish by an anonymous author on Don John of Austria. In this, which takes the form of question and answer, it is asked of him "who with so much real glory lies so humbly 'neath this stone," what it is that Spain can do for him, what temple or what statue can she raise to his honour. To this the hero is made to reply that "My temple is found in my works, my statue has been my fame." This is not only a pretty conceit, but it is very substantially true when we think of the place in history which this man attained.

It remains to speak of the future career of Ali Basha after his experiences at Lepanto. He now returned to Constantinople, where he found that the bitter complaints of the Janissaries concerning their lack of pay had preceded him; this must have been annoying, as by this time so insignificant a circumstance had probably escaped his memory. His old friend and patron Piali Basha was still in power; the Basha used his influence, and the corsair laid at the feet of the Sultan the great Standard of Saint John captured by him from the Knights--which was the only trophy which came to Constantinople from that disastrous battle; and in consequence we are told that "instead of reprimands he was loaded with caresses and applauses."

There was in Ali the same dauntless quality of never knowing when he was beaten which had distinguished Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa. His exploits at Lepanto had secured him the high favour of the Sultan, which he used in a manner most grateful to that sovereign by approaching him with a request that he might be allowed to fit out another fleet to revenge himself on the Christians. The Sultan acceded to his request, and such diligence did he use that in June 1572, only eight months after the crushing defeat of the Turks, Ali took the sea with two hundred and fifty galleys besides smaller vessels. So powerful had he now become that Selim nominated him as his Admiralissimo, allowing him also to retain the Bashalic of Algiers. With his new fleet he sought out the allies once more, finding them at anchor in a port in the Morea. He lay outside the harbour defying them to come out, which they refused to do--"but they parted without bloody noses"--is Morgan's comment. Haedo attributes this inertia on the part of the allies to dissension among their leaders; but, however that may have been, Ali gained almost as much favour with the Sultan as if he had defeated them in a pitched battle. "But these are the judgments of God and things ordered by His divine providence and infinite wisdom," says Haedo. The connection is somewhat hard to establish.

In 1573 the Bashalic of Algiers passed into the hands of Arab Ahmed, and in this same year Don John of Austria recaptured Tunis from the Turks. Ali, with a fleet of two hundred and fifty galleys and forty smaller vessels, recaptured it again in a siege lasting forty days, and once more returned to Constantinople in triumph with thousands of Spanish captives. He was yet to live some years to harass the Christians, against whom he ever displayed a most inveterate rancour. In 1576 he set out from Constantinople with sixty galleys and ravaged the Calabrian coast, where he had been born. In 1578, the Janissaries of Algiers having assassinated Arab Ahmed the Basha, he was sent to chastise them, which he did with a heavy hand.

Ali was never married, and left no descendants; in the later years of his life he built himself a sumptuous palace some five miles from Constantinople, and no man in all the realm save the Sultan himself was so great a man as the Calabrian renegado, the unknown waif from Southern Italy who possessed neither name nor kindred. He was tall and robust in stature, but all his life suffered from "scald-head"; for a definition of which ailment we may refer the curious to the dictionary. He possessed, for a chieftain and a fighting man, the disadvantage of a voice so hoarse as to be inaudible at a few paces distant. In default of offspring he maintained at his charges five hundred corsairs, whom he called his children. He died in the year 1580, and with him what has been called the "Grand Period of the Moslem Corsairs" in this book may be said to have come to an end.

By the men whose deeds have been here chronicled the pirate States of Northern Africa were established; and, as we have seen, they maintained an unceasing warfare against all that was mightiest in Christendom, aided and abetted by the Sultans of Constantinople. In the sixteenth century the Sea-wolves had this at least to recommend them, that they feared neither King nor Kaiser, albeit these great ones of the earth were bent on their destruction. Villains as they were, they were none the less men to be feared, men in whom dwelt wonderful capabilities of leadership. Such, however, was not the case with those by whom they were succeeded; and the great and civilised nations of the world tolerated for centuries in their midst a race of savage barbarians whose abominable insolence and fiendish cruelty were only equalled by their material weakness and military impotence. Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli became recognised States, and the Great Powers degraded themselves by actually accrediting diplomatic agents to the "Courts" of these people.

"The Algerines are robbers, and I am their chief," was the remark made by the Dey of Algiers to the English Consul in 1641, and the man spoke the plain unvarnished truth. Yet at this time the Algerines had no more than sixty-five ships, and no organisation which could have held out for twenty-four hours against such attacks as had been successfully resisted on many occasions in the previous century.

On April 10th, 1682 (O.S.), "Articles of peace and commerce between the most serene and mighty Prince Charles II., by the Grace of God King of Great Britain, etc., and the most illustrious (_sic_) Lord, the Bashaw, Dey, and Aga, Governor of the famous city of Algiers in Barbary," were concluded by "Arthur Herbert, Esquire, Admiral of His Majesty's Fleet." It need hardly be said that such a treaty as this was not worth the paper on which it was written; that the barbarians by whom it was signed were as ignorant as they were unprincipled, and that the only argument which they understood at that, or any other time, was that of the right of the strongest.

When we of the present day read of the deeds of the corsairs we are filled with horror, we fail to understand how such things could have been tolerated, we seek for some explanation. When we hear of a "League of Christian Princes," and find that all its members could accomplish was to turn their arms the one against the other, we are even still more puzzled. What was it, then, that lay at the root of this problem? The answer would appear to be in the ethical standpoint of the sixteenth century. We are so accustomed in the present day to hear of the rights of man that we are apt to forget that, in the time of Barbarossa, of Dragut, of Charles V., and the Medicean Popes such a thing did not exist, and the only rights possessed by the common man were those vouchsafed to him by his sovereign lord. We have also to take another factor into consideration, which is that what we call "humanity" simply did not exist, the result being that the raids of the Sea-wolves were not judged by the great ones of the earth from the standpoint of the amount of suffering which they inflicted, but in what manner these proceedings affected the wealth and power of the lord of the territory which had been despoiled. So differently was society constituted in those days that the very victims acquiesced more or less meekly in their fate, each one unconsciously voicing that most pathetic saying of the Russian peasant that "God is high and the Czar is far away."

The fact of the intolerable lot of the common man in these times helps us to understand one thing which otherwise would be an insoluble problem: which was, why did Christian soldiers so often become renegadoes and fight for the corsairs under the banner of those who were the fiercest and most irreconcilable foes of themselves and their kindred? The life of the common soldier or sailor did not offer many advantages; it was generally a short and anything but a merry one, and the thing by which it was most profoundly affected was capture by the corsairs.

When this happened he became either a "gallerian," rowing out his heart on the benches of the Moslem galleys, or he festered in some noisome dungeon in Algiers, Oran, or Tlemcen. For him, however, there was always one avenue of escape open: he had but to acknowledge that Mahomet was the Prophet of God and the prison doors would fly open, or the shackles be knocked off the chain which bound him to the hell of the rower's bench. Many of the Christian captives had really nothing to bind them to the faith of their fathers--neither home nor lands, wealth nor kindred, and they were doubtless dazzled by the amazing success which accompanied the arms of the leaders of the pirates. Is it wonderful, then, that such men in such an age should grasp at the chance of freedom and throw in their lot with their captors?

It was treachery, it was apostasy, and no amount of sophistry can prove it to have been otherwise; but the man who would sit in judgment in the present day must try to figure to himself what the life of a galley-slave meant--a life so horrible and so terrible that it is impossible, in the interest of decency, to set down a tithe of what it really was.

We who in the present day sit in judgment upon the virtues and vices of a bygone age can, in the ordered security of our modern civilisation, see many things which were hidden from our forefathers, even as in another three hundred years our descendants will be able to point the finger of scorn at the mistakes which we are now committing. We have seen how it was that the pirate States arose; we have seen also how, in future generations, they were allowed to abide. We cannot, in common honesty, echo the words already quoted of the historian that "these are the judgments of God, and things ordered by His divine providence and infinite wisdom," neither can we acquit the heirs of the ages for that slackness which prevented them from doing their duty; we have, however, to ask ourselves this question, that, had it fallen to our own lot to deal with the problem of the extermination of the pirates, should we have done better?

One word in conclusion. That which they did has been set down here; the record, however, is not complete, as many of their acts of cruelty, lust, and oppression are not fitted for publication in the present day. It has been said, with truth, that no man is much better or much worse than in the age in which he lives; and to hold the scales evenly--if one were tempted to shock contemporary opinion by too literal a transcript of all that was done by the corsairs--it would also be necessary to cite the reprisals of their Christian antagonists. It has seemed better to leave such things unchronicled: to present, with as much fidelity as possible, the public lives and acts of these troublers of the peace of the sixteenth century. Looking back, as we do, over three hundred and fifty years, and judging as fairly as is possible, it would seem that there is little which can be said in their favour.

But we may at least concede that, no matter how infamous were the Barbarossas, Dragut, and Ali, they proved that in them dwelt one rare and supreme quality, which, in all the ages, has covered a multitude of sins. At a time when every one was a warrior and the whole world was an armed camp, men sought great captains in whose following to serve. Among the Moslems of Northern Africa, in ordered succession, there rose to the surface "veritable men of the sea," in the wake of whose galleys ravened the Sea-wolves. When we consider how undisciplined and how stupidly violent these pirates were by nature, and how they were welded into a homogeneous whole by those of whom we speak, we are forced to the conclusion that seldom, in all the ages, have abler captains arisen to take fortune at the flood, to dominate the minds and the bodies of a vast host, to prove that they were, in deed and in truth, supreme as leaders of men.