the only plan
which promised success; the Osmanli must use their brain as well as their
courage if that tattered flag, rescued from the water, and nailed to the
stump of the mast of the galleon, was ever to be torn down. There was
something daunting in the very aspect of the solid bulk of the huge
Venetian, something weird in the manner in which her crew never showed,
save only the steadfast figure of her captain immovable as a statue of
bronze, where he stood on her shot-torn poop.

This Homeric conflict was a triumph of discipline and gunnery on the part
of the Venetians; alert, accurate, and cool, the gunners of the galleon
threw away none of their ammunition: inspired by the heroic spirit of their
captain, great was the honour which they did on this stricken field to the
noble traditions of their forbears and the service to which they belonged.

The first attack had been most brilliantly repulsed, but this was only
preliminary to a conflict which was to last all through the day; the Moslem
galleys withdrew out of gunshot and re-formed; then a squadron of twenty
advanced, delivered their fire, and retired; their place was then taken by
a second squadron, which went through the same performance, and then came
on a third. In this manner the attack, which began one hour after noon, and
which was continued until sunset, was conducted. The galleon had thirteen
men killed, and forty wounded; no doubt the slaughter would have been much
greater had it not been for the enormous thickness of her sides and for the
fact that the guns carried by the galleys were necessarily light.
Notwithstanding, the galleon suffered terribly, she was a mass of wreckage;
twice fire had broken out on board of her, she was cumbered by fallen
masts, battered almost out of recognition, but still Condalmiero and her
gallant crew fought on imperturbably with no thought of surrender. Covered
with blood, wounded in the face and the right leg by flying splinters, her
captain preserved his magnificent coolness, and his decimated crew
responded nobly to his call. At eventide the fire from the galleon was
almost as deadly as it had been at the first onslaught, and many galleys of
the Turks were only saved from sinking by the activity and bravery of their
carpenters, who, slung over their sides in "boatswains' chairs," drove home
huge plugs of wood with their mallets into the shot-holes made by the
Venetian guns.

At the hour when the sun dipped below the