the passage.

[5] Admiral Jurien de la Graviere in his study of the campaign
of Lepanto remarks that many a fortified strait has owed its
inviolability only to its exaggerated reputation for the
strength of its defences, and adds that in the Greek war of
independence a French sailing corvette, the "Echo," easily
fought its way into the gulf past the batteries, and repassed
them again when coming out a few days later.

Four days were spent in the waters of Corfu, and 4000 troops of the
garrison were embarked. Gil d'Andrada's four galleys had again been sent
away to reconnoitre the enemy. On 30 September the weather was fine and the
wind favourable, so Don Juan led his fleet from Corfu to the Bay of
Gomenizza, thirty miles to the south-east, on the coast of Albania. The
galeasses guarded the entrance of the bay; the galleys were moored inside
it, bow on to the shore, with their guns thus directed towards it. Working
parties were landed under their protection to obtain supplies of wood and
water. On 2 October some Spaniards engaged in the work were surprised and
made prisoners by Turkish irregulars, Albanian horsemen, who carried them
off to the headquarters of Ali Pasha, the Turkish generalissimo, at
Lepanto.

Gil d'Andrada rejoined at Gomenizza with news that the Turkish fleet was
not more than 200 strong; that pestilence had broken out among its
fighting-men, and that many of the galleys were undermanned. This
encouraged Don Juan to attempt an attack upon it as it lay in the gulf.

But Ali Pasha had also received reports that led him to underrate the
strength of the Christian armada, and so induced him to put out to sea in
search of it. Twice he had reconnoitred the allied fleet. Before Don Juan
arrived at Messina, Ulugh Ali had sent one of his corsairs, Kara Khodja, to
cruise in Sicilian waters. The corsair painted every part of his ship a
dead black, and one dark night, under black sails, he slipped into Messina
harbour. The utter daring of his enterprise assisted him. Gliding like a
ghost about the roadstead, unmarked and unchallenged, he counted galleys,
galleasses, and frigates, and brought back an under-estimate of the allied
strength, only because the fleet was not yet all assembled. He repeated his
exploit while the fleet lay in the waters of Corfu. He could not approach
so closely as at Messina, but what he saw led him to believe it was no
stronger than when he first reconnoitred