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 manoeu