ments immediately came, when wanted. The galley of Pertau Pasha fought alongside. Don John's force consisted of three hundred arquebusiers; but his forecastle artillery was, for the reasons above mentioned, more efficient, while his bulwarks, like those of the other Christian vessels, were protected from boarders by nettings and other devices with which the Turks had not provided themselves. Requesens, wary and watchful, lay astern with two galleys, from which he led fresh troops into the flagship from time to time. Alongside, Veniero and Colonna were each hotly engaged with an antagonist. The combat be the Turks were indulging in every kind of noise which Nature or art had furnished them with the means of producing. Shouting and screaming, they bade the Christians come on "like drowned hens," and be slaughtered; they danced, and stamped, and clanged their arms; they blew trumpets, clashed cymbals, and fired volleys of useless musketry. When the Christians had ended their devotions and stood to their guns, or in their ordered ranks, each galley, in the long array, seemed on fire, as the noontide sun blazed on helmet and corselet, and pointed blades and pikes, with flame. The bugles now sounded a charge, and the bands of each vessel began to play. Between the two chiefs was on the whole not fore Don John retired from the forecastle to his unequal, and it was fought with great gallantry proper place on the quarter-deck, it is said, by on both sides. From the Turkish forecastle one of the officers who has written an account the arquebusiers at first severely galled the of the battle, that he and two of his gentlemen, Christians. Don Lope de Figueroa, who com'inspired with youthful ardor, danced a gal-manded on the prow of the flagship, lost so liard on the gun-platform to the music of the many of his men that he was compelled to ask fifes." The Turkish line, to the glitter of for assistance. Don Bernardino de Cardenas, arms, added yet more splendor of color from who led a party to his aid, was struck on the the brilliant and variegated garb of the janis- chest by a spent ball from an esmeril, and in saries, their tall and fanciful crests and prodi- falling backwards received injuries from which gious plumes, and from the multitude of flags he soon expired. Considerable execution was and streamers which every galley displayed also done by the Turkish arrows, with which from every available point and peak.. Long portions of the masts and spars bristled. hefore the enemy were within range the Turkish Several of these missiles came from the bow cannon opened. The first shot that took effect of the Pasha himself, who was probably the carried off the point of the pennant of Don last commander-in-chief who ever drew a Juan de Cardona, who in his swiftest vessel bowstring in European battle. But, on the was hovering along the line, correcting trifling whole, the fire of the Christians was greatly defects of position and order, like a sergeant superior to that of the Turks. Twice the drilling recruits. About noon a flash was seen deck of Ali was swept clear of defenders, and to proceed from one of the galeasses of the twice the Spaniards rushed on board and adChristian fleet. The shot was aimed at the vanced as far as the mainmast. At that point flagship of the Pasha, conspicuous in the centre they were on each occasion driven back by the of the line, and carrying the sacred green stand- janissaries, who, though led by Ali in person, ard of the Prophet. Passing through the rig- do not appear to have made good a footing on ging of the vessel, the ball carried off a portion the deck of Don John. A third attempt was of the highest of the three splendid lanterns more successful. Not only did the Spaniards which hung on the lofty stern as symbols of pass the mast, but they approached the poop, command. The Pasha, from his quarter-deck, and assailed it with a vigorous fire. The Palooked up on hearing the crash, and, perceiv-sha led on his janissaries to meet them, but it ing the ominous mischief, said: "God grant we may be able to give a good answer to this question." (Vol. i., pp. 410, 411.) The action speedily assumed the fierce character of a personal combat. Ali and Don John had each directed his helmsman to steer for the flagship of the enemy. The two galleys soon met, striking each other with great force. The lofty prow of the Pasha towered high above the lower forecastle of Don John, and his galley's peak was thrust through the rigging of the other vessel until its point was over the fourth rowing-bench. Thus linked together the two flagships became a battlefield which was strongly contested for about two hours. The Pasha had on board four hundred picked janissaries-three hundred armed with the arquebus, and one hundred with the bow. Two galliots and ten galleys, all filled with janissaries, lay close astern, the galliots being connected with the Pasha's vessel by ladders, up which reinforce seems with small hope of making a successful resistance, for at the same moment he threw into the sea a small box, which was supposed to contain his most precious jewels. A ball from an arquebus soon afterwards struck him in the forehead. He fell forward upon the gangway (crueija). A soldier from Malaga, seizing the body, cut off the head and carried it to Don John, who was already on board the Turkish vessel, leading a fresh body of men to the support of their comrades. The trophy was then raised on the point of a lance, to be seen by friend and foe. The Turks paused for a moment panic-stricken; the Christians shouted victory, and, hauling down the Turkish standard, hoisted a flag with a cross in its place. (Vol. i., pp. 413-415.) This catastrophe, followed by the capture of the Turkish admiral's ship, decided the fate of the battle. Meanwhile the Venetian and Roman galleys on the right were fighting with equal spirit and success. Old Veniero fairly won his doge's cap on the quarter-deck of his vessel; a Contarini, a Loredano, a Malipieri, conquered or perished in the fray; from the flagship of Genoa the young prince of Parma leaped almost alone into a Turkish galley, and took the ship without a wound; in the flagship of Savoy the prince of Urbino greatly distinguished himself. Never did the maritime genius and valor of Italy shine with greater lustre and when we look back to the achievements of those days, we may indulge a hope that the naval power of Italy has not passed away forever, and that, in the noble array of modern ships of war which she has created in our own times, men will not be wanting to emulate the deeds of their an cestors. One other incident in the battle is too remarkable to be passed over in silence, for it relates to a masterly effort of seamanship, anticipating by centuries the celebrated manœuvre of breaking the enemy's line: the Count of Fuentes, signally distinguished himself; and a Zaragozan knight, Geronimo Ramirez, although riddled with arrows like another St. Sebastian, fought with such desPeration that none of the Algerine boarders Cared to approach him until they saw that he was dead. A knight of Burgundy leaped alone into one of the enemy's galleys, killed four Turks, and defended himself until overpowered by numbers. On board the Prior's ves sel, when he was taken, he himself, pierced with five arrow-wounds, was the sole survivor, except two knights, a Spaniard, and a Sicilian, who, being senseless from their wounds, were considered as dead. Having secured the banner of St. John, Aluch Ali took the Prior's ship in tow, and was making the best of his way out of a battle which his skilful eye soon discovered to be irretrievably lost. He had not, however, sailed far when he was in turn descried by the Marquess of Santa Cruz, who, with his squadron of reserve was moving about redressing the wrongs of Christian fortune. Aluch Ali had no mind for the fate of Giustiniani, and resolved to content himself with the banner of Malta. Cutting his prize adrift, he plied his oars and escaped, leaving the Prior, grievously wounded, to the care of his friends, and once more master not only of his ship, but of three hundred dead enemies who cumbered the deck, a few living Algerine mariners who were to navigate the vessel, and some Turkish soldiers, from whom he had just purchased his life. (Vol. i., pp. 417, 418.) The right wing of the Christians and the Turkish left wing did not engage each other until some time after the other divisions were in deadly conflict. Doria and Aluch Ali were, each of them, bent on out-manoeuvring the other. The Algerine did not succeed, like Sirocco, in insinuating himself between his adversary and the shore. But the seaman It is impossible within our limits to whose skill and daring were the admiration of convey to the reader the spirit with which the Mediterranean was not easily baffled. Find- Sir William Stirling Maxwell describes ing himself foiled in his first attempt, he this famous battle. He has drawn from slackened his course, and, threatening some-numberless sources, most of them buried times one vessel and sometimes another, drew in Spanish and Italian libraries, an inthe Genoese eastward, until the inferior speed finite number and variety of details which of some of the galleys had caused an opening throw a vivid lustre on the heroism and at the northern end of the Christian line. the chivalry of either combatant; and it Upon this opening the crafty corsair immedi- would be difficult to find in history a more ately bore down with all the speed of his oars, and passed through it with most of his galleys. brilliant and exciting passage than these This evolution placed him in the rear of the pages of his narrative. But we must borwhole Christian line of battle. On the ex-row his concluding remarks: treme right of the centre division sailed Prior Giustiniani, the commodore of the small Maltese squadron. This officer had hitherto fought with no less success than skill, and had already captured four Turkish galleys. The Viceroy of Algiers had, the year before, captured three galleys of Malta, and was fond of boasting of being the peculiar scourge and terror of the Order of St. John. The wellknown white-cross banner, rising over the smoke of battle, soon attracted his eye, and was marked for his prey. Wheeling round, like a hawk, he bore down from behind upon the unhappy Prior. The three war-worn vessels of St. John were no match for seven stout Algerines which had not yet fired a shot. The knights and their men defended themselves with a valor worthy of their heroic Order. A youth named Bernardino de Heredia, son of The victory of the Christians at Lepanto was in a great measure to be ascribed to the admirable tactics of their chief. The shock of the Turkish onset was effectually broken by the dexterous disposition made by the gal easses of Venice. Indeed, had the great ships been there to strengthen the sparse line formed by these six vessels, it is not impossible that the Turks would have failed in forcing their way through the wall of that terrible fire. Each Christian vessel, by the retrenchment of its peak, enjoyed an advantage over its antag. onist in the freer play of its artillery. When, however, the galleys of Selim came to close combat with the galleys of the League, the battle became a series of isolated struggles which depended more upon individual mind and manhood than upon any comprehensive admirable means in the hands of men whose plan or far-seeing calculation. But Don John | naval armament. Indeed the Bishop of of Austria had the merit or the good fortune Acqs wrote to Charles IX. from Venice of bringing his forces into action in the high- immediately after the battle: "Le grand est moral and material perfection; of placing Seigneur, avecque les riches trésors qu'il spirit was in the right temper to use them. a et la commodité du long temps qui lui servira d'ici au mois de may, pourra reHe struck his great blow at the happy moment when great dangers are cheerfully confronted mettre sus une bonne armée et néantand great things easily accomplished. moins en dresser une par terre, de la grandeur de laquelle on ne doute poinct : car il n'y a rien de gasté de ce cousté-là." * Don His plan of battle was on the whole admirably executed. The galleys of the various confederates were so studiously intermingled that each vessel was incited to do its utmost by the spur of rivalry. Veniero and Colonna deserve their full share of the credit of the day; and the gallant Santa Cruz, although at first stationed in the rear, soon found and employed his opportunity of earning his share of laurels. On Doria alone Roman and Venetian critics, and indeed public opinion, pro-rencia," a Papal vessel, being reduced to a nounced a less favorable verdict. His shoreward movement unquestionably had the effect of enabling Aluch Ali to cut the Christian line and fall with damaging force upon its in blood and less rich in prizes. (Vol. i., PP. rear, and of rendering the victory more costly 420, 421.) Amongst those who fought on board Doria's vessels, there was one whose fame is of another and more lasting kind, and whose striking features start with singular power from these graphic pages in an admirable illustration from an old print. Towards evening the milky sea and bright sunshine became troubled and overcast. John therefore collected his forces and prepared to take shelter in the haven of Petala, near the north-western limit of the Gulf. Of the captured galleys, he set fire to those which were in a sinking condition; and the "Flomere wreck, was also burned. At sunset the field of battle presented a remarkable scene of desolation. For miles around the victorious fleet the waves, as eye-witnesses asserted, with men's bodies and limbs, with shields, were reddened with blood, and were strewed with broken planks, masts, spars, and oars, weapons, turbans, chests, barrels, and cabin furniture, the rich scarf of the knight, the splendid robe of the pasha, the mighty plume of the janissary, the sordid rags of the slave, Boats and all the various spoils of war. moved hither and thither amongst the floating relics, saving all that seemed valuable except the lives of the vanquished; for if a wounded Turk uttered a feeble cry for help or pity, he thrust with a pike. As night closed over this heaving waste of carnage, the burning ships here and there revealed themselves to view, and cast a lurid glare across the waters, as they sent their wreaths of smoke and tongues of flame into the stormy sky. (Vol. i., p. 427.) These were the bold deeds of brave men, whose names are either forgotten or are pro-was answered by a shot from a musket or a nounced without emotion or interest. But on board the Marquesa" of Doria there was a military volunteer whose name is still familiar and delightful to thousands to whom Doria and Colonna are but strange sounds, and whose valor at Lepanto is a minor trophy of one whose achievements were to be accomIt has been said that the political replished by a better weapon than the sword. In that galley sailed Miguel de Cervantes, then sults of this great battle were less imporin his twenty-fourth year. On the morning of tant than they might have been; that the the battle he lay sick of a fever. Neverthe Christian armada might have attacked less, he rose from his bed and sought and Lepanto † or Cyprus with success, or even obtained the command of twelve soldiers post- sailed to the Golden Horn. But the ed near the long-boat (esquife), a position ex-moral effect of the Turkish defeat was posed to the hottest of the enemies' fire. He remained there until the combat was over, the Holy League was accomplished. The in Europe, and the chief purpose of great although he had received two wounds. One of these left him marked with an honorable allied forces could hardly have been distinction, the only military distinction ever brought to agree on ulterior operations of conferred upon him, the loss of "the move- war. The season was far advanced; and ment of his left hand for the honor of the towards the end of October Don John right." (Vol. i., p. 423.) received the peremptory orders of the So ended the battle of Lepanto, and so ended, as it was supposed, the preponderance of the naval power of the Moslem, which had for ages harassed and terrified the coasts of the Mediterranean from Gibraltar to Cyprus. The sequel proved, however, that the Turks had still the power to send to sea another powerful 206. Charrière, Négociations du Levant, vol. iii., p. t In the singularly modest despatch of October 10, with which Don John sends his report of the action to Philip II., he expresses his desire "to follow up the good fortune which God has given us, and to see whether Lepanto can be taken, and if not, what other enterprises can be attempted:" it was therefore from no want of activity on his part that nothing more was done by the fleet. king to return to Messina. On the last | ors with becoming modesty, but his early day of that month he stood once more into the Sicilian harbor. The intelligence of the battle was received by Philip on the last day of October, through the Venetian ambassador, a month before the arrival of Don John's report. The king was at vespers in the chapel of "that wilderness of gray walls and scaffold-shrouded towers which was rising on the bleak slopes of the Gaudarrama; " but, says the Monk of the Escorial, "the magnanimous prince neither changed his posture nor showed any emotion, it being a great privilege amongst others of the house of Austria never to lose, happen what may, their serenity of countenance and imperial gravity of demeanor." Vespers being over, a "Te Deum" was sung. In Venice, in Rome, and in Seville, the news of the victory was hailed with frantic exultation. Ninety-nine Venetian versifiers extolled "Del Carlo Quinto il generoso figlio." Nor were the Castilian muses silent. Ercilla devoted to it a canto of the "Aracauna," and the popular ballad of Lepanto is still sung in the streets of Seville. Last in the long catalogue of poets who have sung of Lepanto is our own James VI. of Scotland, who composed a doggerel narrative of the battle as one of "his Majesties poetical exercises at vacant hours," when he was about twelve or thirteen. It was printed in 1591, and translated into French by Du Bartas. fame and amazing success had already raised in his imagination the phantom which was to be the unsatisfied torment of his life. He was haunted by the dream of a crown. Already, indeed, some emissaries of the Christian population of Albania and the Morea tendered to him the sovereignty of what is now the kingdom of Greece. The offer was reported to Philip, who replied that his close alliance with Venice rendered it unacceptable, but that the negotiations should be kept open. Meanwhile the Holy League was still in existence, and its objects were by no means fulfilled. Selim, exasperated to fury by the defeat of his fleet, had lost no time in the armament of fresh galleys, and Aluch Ali, the Algerine, who had escaped from Lepanto, was placed at the head of the navy. Mahomet Sokolli, the politic grand vizier, boasted to Barbaro, that in defeating the Turkish fleet, the allies had "only shaved our beard shorn beard grows all the better for the razor." The winter was spent on both sides in negotiations and in preparations for the next campaign. But on May 1, 1572, the death of Pope Pius V. dealt a heavy blow to the alliance which owed its existence to his energy. He was in truth the last of the Crusaders, and Sir William Stirling Maxwell, with a characteristic mixture of admiration and sarcasm, drops this sentence at his tomb: a So died a man of as noble a nature as was The artists of Italy paid a worthier trib-ever perverted and debased by superstition. ute to the conquerors. Tintoretto, Vicentino, and the son of Tintoretto, adorned the stately palaces and churches of Venice with pictures of the battle; and even Titian, then ninety-four years old, resumed his palette to produce a work still existing in the royal gallery of Madrid. In Rome a fresco of the battle was painted on the vault of the Colonna Palace, and a marble statue of Marc Antonio Colonna was placed in the Capitol. The city of Messina erected a colossal statue of Don John by Andrea Calamesto, which still stands grasping the triple truncheon of the Holy League, and is one of the noblest monuments of the sixteenth century. To Don John himself congratulations, gifts, and honors, flowed in from every side. Even the chilling style of Philip rose to unwonted cordiality in reply to his brother, and the language addressed to him by the minor States of Italy was extravagant. Don John received these hon His honesty, his unselfishness, and his cour age, were the means by which he rose to eminence amongst men who respected, if they rarely possessed, these qualities. Whatever the Church taught he was prepared to do, at whatever cost to himself or others; and in this spirit he accepted the bloody policy of Hebrew priestcraft as a fitting rule for the chief teacher of a religion of love and peace. shrink from the practical application of their Had he lived in times when even theologians cruel dogmas and audacious theories, his conscience would probably have revolted from theories and dogmas which cannot bear the test of practice. The Romans esteemed the stern old man whose indomitable spirit had raised Europe against the infidel, and who had ruled over them with decency and honesty rare at the Vatican. They flocked in great crowds to gaze on his corpse, which they had not a strong railing been interposed be. would have divided amongst them for relics tween the bier and their enthusiasm. And if they felt, in this case they restrained, their natural impulse to tear in pieces the friends and favorites of a dead pope. (Vol. i., pp. 475, 476.) The campaign of the allies in the summer of 1572 offers but little interest in comparison with the heroic exploits of the preceding year. The pope was dead; the Spanish forces were delayed by the reluctance of the king to engage in any further enterprise which might aggrandize or ben-endeavor to bring about peace. efit Venice; Don John chafed in vain in the harbor of Messina; and the Venetians were secretly negotiating a separate peace. The Turks meanwhile had shown greater promptitude and activity. Aluch Ali hovered on the coast of the Morea with a fleet of one hundred and seventy galleys. But the vessels were mostly new and built of green timber; the seamen were all raw recruits; few of the oarsmen had ever handled an oar; and the soldiers, still trembling at the terrible recollections or tales of Lepanto, had to be driven on board with the stick. a "benevolent_neutrality." Charles IX. thought he had more to fear from Spain than from the Moslem. Accordingly, the Bishop of Acqs, a Noailles by birth, had been sent to Constantinople to avert the conflict, and when that was impossible to Don John at length put to sea, early in September, with an armament of one hundred and ninety-four galleys, forty large sailing ships, and eight galeasses. The Turk, warned by the lesson of last year, The de tails of his negotiation are extremely curious, and in the end it was successful.* The bishop supported the peace party in the Divan; he won over the grand vizier to his views; and on March, 7, 1573, peace was concluded between Venice and the Porte, on terms far less favorable to the victorious than to the defeated party. Venice was satisfied with the maritime defeat of her rival, and the peace remained unbroken for seventy years. It was more difficult to justify the perfidious conduct of the republic to her allies, for by the terms of the league each member of the confederation had renounced the right of treating separately with the Turk. It is certain that Venice with one hand with the other an engagement to prosecute the signed a treaty of peace with the Turk and war against him. On March 7 the Venetian envoy to the Sultan affixed his seal to the preliminaries of a treaty at Constantinople; and on the same day the Venetian envoy to the Pope swore, in presence of the pontiff, to observe the military convention at Rome. To this conduct Spanish historians apply the harshest language. In their eyes it is a new instance of old perfidy; a treacherous desertion of generous allies who had sacrificed their own interests to those of Venice; an act of sordid calculation by which a mercantile nation weighed glory against gain. Judged by a high standard of morality, the conduct of Venice is, of course, indefensible. But judged by the loose code which regulated international transactions in the sixteenth century, and which had always regulated Papal and Spanish policy towards the Republic, and with due regard to the previous proceedings and respective positions of the confederates, her conduct does not seem deserving of any very severe repro was in no condition to encounter such a Again the winter was spent in ostensible preparations for war; but whilst Venice was raising troops, and completing the row-gangs of her fleet, her diplomacy, aided by that of France, was in fact dissolving the very bond of the league. The king of France had always been hostile to the league, and the court of France alone of the powers of Europe treated the Porte with what is now called It is, however, more easy to excuse that policy than to explain it. If the Turks had rewarded Venice for leaving the league by granting her peace on advantageous terms, there would have been an obvious temptation to incur the displeasure and future coldness of The despatches of the bishop are published in the "Négociations du Levant" by Charrière, and they throw a singular light on French diplomacy. Charles IX was much more afraid of Spain than he was of the the Turkish fleets to maintain the balance of rower in Turks, and as France had then no navy he looked to the Mediterranean. He therefore thwarted the Holy League to the utmost of his power, and it was the object erates, and by embarrassing Spain to gain a footing for his brother Anjou in Flanders. of France to detach Venice from her Christian confed |