of Venetians had been butchered with a
ferocity which even Christians could not have surpassed; the famous
General Bragadino had been flayed; stuffed, and sent hanging on the
yard-arm of a frigate; to Constantinople, as a present to the Commander
of the Faithful; and the mortgage of Catherine Cornaro, to the exclusion
of her husband's bastards, had been thus definitely cancelled. With such
practical enjoyments, Selim was indifferent to the splendid but shadowy
vision of the Occidental caliphate--yet the revolt of the Moors was only
terminated, after the departure of Don John, by the Duke of Arcos.

The war which the Sultan had avoided in the West, came to seek him in the
East. To lift the Crucifix against the Crescent, at the head of the
powerful but quarrelsome alliance between Venice, Spain, and Rome, Don
John arrived at Naples. He brought with him more than a hundred ships and
twenty-three thousand men, as the Spanish contingent:--Three months long
the hostile fleets had been cruising in the same waters without an
encounter; three more were wasted in barren manoeuvres. Neither Mussulman
nor Christian had much inclination for the conflict, the Turk fearing the
consequences of a defeat, by which gains already secured might be
forfeited; the allies being appalled at the possibility of their own
triumph. Nevertheless, the Ottomans manoeuvred themselves at last into
the gulf of Lepanto, the Christians manoeuvred themselves towards its
mouth as the foe was coming forth again. The conflict thus rendered
inevitable, both Turk and Christian became equally eager for the fray,
equally confident of, victory. Six hundred vessels of war met face to
face. Rarely in history had so gorgeous a scene of martial array been
witnessed. An October sun gilded the thousand beauties of an Ionian
landscape. Athens and Corinth were behind the combatants, the mountains
of Alexander's Macedon rose in the distance; the rock of Sappho and the
heights of Actium, were before their eyes. Since the day when the world
had been lost and won beneath that famous promontory, no such combat as
the one now approaching had been fought upon the waves. The chivalrous
young commander despatched energetic messages to his fellow chieftains,
and now that it was no longer possible to elude the encounter, the
martial ardor of the allies was kindled. The Venetian High-Admiral
replied with words of enthusiasm. Colonna, lieutenant of the league,
answered his chief in the