THE APOTHEOSIS OF THE CORSAIR KING
If Charles V. made no such outward manifestation of his joy as did the
Persian monarch, he possibly was no less pleased than Xerxes; this he
showed by his acts, and the value that he attached to the services of
Doria was instanced in the directions which he gave. He ordered the
Governors of all his possessions in Italy to do nothing without first
consulting the admiral; to lend him prompt aid, whether he demanded
it in his own name or in that of the Republic of Genoa. He made him
Admiralissimo of his navy, with power to act as he liked without even
consulting him, as his Emperor. It will be seen that Charles had in him
sufficient greatness to trust whole-heartedly when he trusted at all;
the faith which he reposed in the Genoese seaman was amply justified
by events, and no action of his during the whole of his singularly
dramatic reign was ever to result so entirely to his profit. When in
after-life Charles had received from the Pope the Imperial Crown, and
when, on his return, he put into Aigues-Mortes in Doria’s galley, he
there met with Francis, who, in a burst to confidence, advised the
Cæsar never to part with his admiral.
On that stage, which was the blue waters of the tideless sea, we
shall, from this time forward, watch the fortunes of those two great
sea-captains, Andrea Doria and Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa. With them the
ebb and flow of conquest and defeat alternated. Great as was the one,
it cannot be said that he was greater than the other; but when the
supreme arbitrament was within the grasp of both, as it was at the
naval battle of Prevesa, neither the Christian admiral nor the Moslem
corsair would reach out his hand and grasp the nettle of his fate.
Hesitation at this moment, when, in the fulness of time, the rivals
stood face to face with arms in their hands, was the last thing that
would have been expected of such dauntless warriors, such born leaders
of men! and the battle of Prevesa presents a psychological problem
of the most baffling and perplexing description. We are, however,
anticipating events which will fall into their proper sequence as we
proceed.
Kheyr-ed-Din, now firmly established in Algiers, devoted his energies
to the undoing of his Christian foes by the systematic plunder of their
merchant-vessels. At this period he, personally, seems to have remained
ashore, and sent his young and aspiring captains to sea to increase his
wealth by plunder, his consequence by the hordes of slaves which they
swept into the awful bagnios of Algiers; and Sandoval, that quaint and
delightful historian, is moved to indignation and complains with much
acrimony of “las malas obras que este corsario hizo a la Christiandad”
(the evil deeds done to Christianity by this corsair). These were on
so considerable a scale at this time that he had to devote to them far
more space than he considered consonant with the dignity of history.
But if all were going on well on the coast of Africa for the Crescent,
such was far from being the case in the northern waters of the
Mediterranean; for Andrea Doria, serving His Most Catholic Majesty at
sea, had defeated the Turks at Patras and again in the Dardanelles,
which unpleasant fact caused no little annoyance to Soliman the
Magnificent. On land the Sultan was sweeping all before him; at sea
this pestilent Genoese was dragging into servitude all the best
mariners who sailed beneath the banner of the Prophet. There was
wrath and there was fear at Constantinople, and the captains of the
galleys which sailed from the Golden Horn felt that their heads and
their bodies might at any moment part company—the Grand Turk was in
an ill humour, which might at any moment call for the appeasement of
sacrifice; so it was that men trembled.
It was at this time, in 1533, that Soliman bethought himself of
Kheyr-ed-Din. There was no better seaman, there was no fiercer fighter,
there was no man whose name was so renowned throughout the length and
breadth of the Mediterranean, than was that of the corsair king who was
vassal to the Sublime Porte. Soliman was confronted with a new, and, to
him, an almost mysterious thing, for the onward conquering step of the
Moslem hosts was being checked by that sea-power so little understanded
of the Turk, and the imperious will of the Sultan seemed powerless to
prevent the disasters conjured from the deep.
[Illustration: SOLIMAN THE MAGNIFICENT.]
Soliman the Magnificent, who was not inaptly described by this title,
for he was successful as both warrior and statesman, meditated both
long and anxiously on the new development of affairs before he made up
his mind to the step of calling to his assistance the corsair king. But
he possessed that truest attribute of greatness in a ruler, the faculty
of discerning the right man for any particular post. Brave and reckless
fighters he possessed in super-abundance, but somehow—somehow—none of
these fiery warriors had that habit of the sea which enabled them to
make head against such a past-master in the craft of the seaman as
Andrea Doria. The Genoese was chasing the Turkish galleys from off the
face of the waters. Constantinople itself was a sea-surrounded city; it
was necessary that a check should be administered to the arms of the
Christians on this element. It is easy to imagine the preoccupations
of the Turkish monarch. The despot rules by force, but he also holds
his power by the address with which it is wielded, and he can by no
means afford to disregard his personal popularity if he is to make the
best use of his fighting men in such a turbulent epoch as was the first
half of the sixteenth century. Soliman had the wit to know that he had
no mariner who was in any way comparable to Doria; he was also aware
that Kheyr-ed-Din had risen from nothing to his present position by his
sheer ability as a seaman. It would appear, therefore, a very natural
thing that he should invite the co-operation of the King of Algiers,
but that with which he had to reckon was the furious jealousy that such
an appointment must inevitably arouse among his own subjects.
It says much for the steadfast moral courage of the man that he
eventually decided to take the risk; it says even more for the absolute
correctness of his judgment that he never afterwards repented of the
step which he then took.
Once the mind of the Grand Turk was made up he hesitated no longer. The
Capitan de Rodas, one of his personal guard, was sent to Barbarossa to
request him to come to Constantinople and take command of the Ottoman
fleet. There were no conditions attached; the honour was supreme.
Barbarossa loaded the messenger with rich gifts, and overwhelmed him
with honours. For Kheyr-ed-Din this was in a sense the apotheosis of
his career. The Grand Turk, the head of the Mohammedan religion, had
not only recognised his kingship, but had conferred on him an honour
unprecedented, unlooked for, and one of the highest value to a man of
such an insatiable ambition. Into the cool and crafty brain of this
prince among schemers instantly sprang the thought that now at last his
kingdom was secure, that in future the whole of the Barbary coast would
own no other lord than he.
Preparations for the voyage were immediately begun, and, as an earnest
of the new importance which he derived from the advances of Soliman,
the corsair actually sent presents to the King of France and proffered
him his aid against his enemies. To such a pass as this had one of the
most powerful monarchs in Christendom been reduced by the defection of
Andrea Doria. Algiers he left in the keeping of his son Hassan, and
in charge of Hassan his kinsman Celebi Rabadan and a captain of the
name of Agi. In the middle of August, 1533, Barbarossa left Algiers,
his fleet consisting of seven galleys and eleven fustas. Sailing
northward, he fell in with a fleet which he at first feared was that
of Doria, but which, fortunately for him, was that of a corsair named
Delizuff from Los Gelues. Courtesies were interchanged between the two
leaders, and Barbarossa succeeded in persuading Delizuff to accompany
him to Sicily, where it was possible they might fall in with Doria, and
with their combined forces inflict defeat upon the Christian admiral.
Delizuff was nothing loath to join forces with so noted a commander as
Kheyr-ed-Din, as he had no desire to tackle Doria single-handed, and at
the same time wished to extend the sphere of his plunderings, which had
been cruelly restricted recently by the wholesome fear instilled into
the Sea-wolves by the new admiral of Charles V.
Accordingly, reinforced by the fifteen fustas and one galley of
Delizuff, the Algerian fleet once more proceeded on its voyage.
Although bound for Constantinople at the request of Soliman, at a time
when it would have been thought that delay was not only dangerous but
impolitic, and although the corsair was endeavouring to merge the
pirate in the king who dealt on terms of equality with those whom
he now regarded as his brother monarchs, still the old instinct of
robbery was too strong to be resisted; the lust of gain and the call
of adventure were still inherent in the man whose famous beard was now
far more white than red. Advancing age had not tamed the spirit nor
weakened the frame of this leader among the Moslems.
Sailing through the Straits of Bonifacio, they touched Monte Cristo,
a small island where they found a slave who had formerly belonged to
Delizuff. This man was base enough to betray his own native island
of Biba into the hands of the corsairs, who sacked it thoroughly and
carried off its inhabitants; they also captured thirteen large ships
going to Sicily for wheat, and burnt them, making slaves of their
crews. In the fight with these vessels Delizuff was killed. Shortly
after this, some disagreement arising between the crews of the ships
of Barbarossa and the men in Delizuff’s fleet, the Algerian commander
seized a man out of one of Delizuff’s galleys and had him summarily
shot. The death of Delizuff naturally caused some confusion in his
command, and the high-handed proceeding of Kheyr-ed-Din caused great
resentment, not unmixed with fear, as the terror inspired by the
Barbarossas was a very real sentiment. Under their command no man knew
when or at how short notice his life might not be required of him;
but the glamour of success was ever around them, and they never, in
consequence, lacked for followers. But the taking out and shooting of
one of their comrades was too much for the pirates from the islands of
Los Gelues, from whence Delizuff was in the habit of “operating.” In
the words of Sandoval, “they were not used to such tyranny and cruel
usage.” In consequence they concerted among themselves and one dark
night sailed off, leaving Kheyr-ed-Din to continue his voyage with
his original following.
That warrior, nothing disconcerted, pursued his way to the island of
Zante, where he fell in with a Turkish “flota,” under the command
of the Bashas Zay and Himeral. To these officers of the Grand Turk
Barbarossa used most injurious language, bitterly reproaching them with
not having sought out and destroyed Andrea Doria, which he declared
they ought to and should have done. This is yet another instance of
the extraordinary character of the man. These persons were the highest
officers in the fleet of the Ottoman Empire; it was more than possible
that they would be placed under the command of Barbarossa as soon as
his new position as Admiralissimo was adjusted at Constantinople; and
yet, in spite of these facts, the corsair had taken the very first
opportunity which presented itself grossly to insult these men. It is
true, as we shall see, that his injurious words came home to roost in
the future; but arrogant, conquering, contemptuous, Barbarossa seems to
have shouldered his way through life, fearing none and feared by all.
The fact of his known cruelty accounts for much of the dread which he
inspired, but it was something far more than this which caused the son
of the Albanian renegado to ride roughshod as he did over all with whom
he was brought into contact. Men felt, in dealing with Barbarossa,
that here was a rock against which they might dash themselves in vain.
In all his enterprises he spared not himself. He asked no man to do
that which he was not prepared to do, but if any failed him there
was no mercy for that man; and, although in deference to modern
susceptibility no mention is made of the tortures he so frequently
caused to be inflicted on his victims, they were none the less a daily
spectacle to those who lived under his rule. He possessed, it is true,
the rough geniality of the fighting man, a certain “Hail fellow, well
met!” manner in greeting old comrades, and yet none of these men there
were who did not tremble in an agony of fear when the bushy brows were
bent, when the famous red beard bristled in one of his uncontrollable
furies. The real secret of his success must have been that, no matter
how uncontrollable did his passions appear to be, the man was always
really master of himself. Further, he possessed a marvellous insight as
to where his own interests lay. He used as his tools the bodies and the
minds of the men who were subject to him, and he carried his designs to
an assured success by the aid of that penetrating, far-seeing mental
power with which, above all else, he must have been gifted. He could
drive men, he could lead them, he could invariably persuade when all
else failed him. In this we have had an instance when he was chased
from Algiers by the combined efforts of Venalcadi and Hassan, whom he
had flogged; for no sooner did he meet with other corsairs than he
persuaded them to take up his quarrel—which, it must be understood, was
none of theirs—and to replace him on that precarious throne from which
he had been so rudely thrust. We have already said that he was a man
who never knew when he was beaten, and in the years which we have yet
to chronicle this characteristic appears again and again; for age
had no effect apparently, either mentally or physically, on this man of
iron who had by this time reached the age of seventy-seven.
Leaving the high officers of his future master, the Grand Turk,
smarting under the opprobrium which he had heaped upon their heads,
Barbarossa fared onward with his fleet to Salonica, capturing a
Venetian galley on the voyage: from thence he made his way to the
Dardanelles, where he anchored and remained several days, to make ready
his fleet for the spectacular entry which he intended to make into
Constantinople.
The city on the Golden Horn was all agog for the arrival of Barbarossa;
no matter what private opinions the inhabitants might have had
concerning him, of which we shall hear more presently, they were none
the less all curious to a degree to catch sight of this man, so famous
in his evil supremacy on that distant shore of Northern Africa.
Kheyr-ed-Din, among his other qualities, possessed in the highest
degree that of a successful stage-manager; no pageant which he
undertook was ever likely to fail from the want of the striking and
the dramatic. It was now his business to impress the citizens of
Constantinople with an idea of his greatness, and none knew better
than he that it is the outward and visible sign which counts among
the orientals, more perhaps than the inward and spiritual grace: he
may also possibly have felt that he did not possess the latter to any
overwhelming extent.
Even before he left Algiers this entry to the chief city of the
Ottoman Empire had been in the mind of Barbarossa, who had caused to
be embarked a quantity of flags and pennons for the decoration of
his grim war-galleys when they should stream into the Golden Horn.
There were also bands of music, which, it is to be presumed, utilised
the delay in the Dardanelles to attain to something like “a concord of
sweet sounds,” as the incidents of the voyage from Algiers, so far,
had hardly been conducive to much time to spare for band-practice. The
galleys were scrubbed and gaily painted; round the ship of Kheyr-ed-Din
ran a broad streak of gold on the outer planking to denote the presence
of a King of Algiers, and at last all was ready. The fleet weighed
anchor, and, with banners flying and bands playing, entered the
harbour. The shores were black with spectators; even the Sultan himself
deigned to look forth on the coming of the man from whom he expected
such great things.
Ceremonial was the order of the day. Soliman the Magnificent was too
wise a man not to know what was being said in his capital that day;
it was his part to accustom the minds of men to the fact that he,
Soliman, had chosen Barbarossa to command his fleet, and that there
could be no looking back. The decree had been signed, the invitation
had been sent, the man had arrived, there could be no possible retreat
from the situation. The anchors splashed into the placid waters close
to the shore, and the ships were soon so surrounded by boats as to be
almost unapproachable; then came official persons from the Sultan with
greetings to the famous seaman; also came Bashas and officers (“con
carga de guerra,” says Sandoval), to offer a welcome and to stare
in undisguised curiosity at the man chosen by their sovereign to
make head against the famous Andrea Doria. This preliminary courtesy
completed, there came the next act in the drama, which consisted in the
immemorial custom of the East in the offering of gifts from Barbarossa
to the Sultan, from the vassal to his suzerain. The Janissaries,
splendid in scarlet and gold, tall above the ordinary stature of man,
bristling with weapons inlaid in gold and silver, cleared the common
vulgar from the streets approaching the palace of the Sultan; they
formed the spearhead of the procession clearing a way for the King
of Algiers, who, mounted on a splendid bay stallion, the gift of the
Sultan on his arrival, headed the captives who bore the gifts. Of these
the exact number is not stated, but the procession was headed by two
hundred women and girls, each of whom carried in her hand a gift of
gold or silver; one hundred camels were loaded with silks and golden
ornaments, and other “curious riches” (“con otras mil cosas de que hizo
ostentacion”), says Sandoval. There were also lions and other animals,
brocades and rich garments.
All of this reads no doubt somewhat too like the tales in the “Arabian
Nights”; but we have to remember that, if you have led a long and
eminently successful life as a robber, you have necessarily accumulated
a store of riches. In the case of Barbarossa he had begun in extreme
youth, and was now an old man; he had been quite in the wholesale way
as a thief, and now desired to pay a good price for that which he
coveted, namely, the post of Admiralissimo to the Grand Turk. It may
be objected that he had already been offered and had already accepted
the post; this is quite true, but there were certain conventions to
be fulfilled on the side of the recipient of the bounty of the Sultan
quite understood on both sides, although no word had passed on the
subject. In those days the man who desired the favour of an Eastern
potentate never dreamed of approaching him empty-handed, and the more
liberal that he was in the matter of gifts the greater was the favour
with which he was regarded. Therefore the principle acted upon by
Kheyr-ed-Din on this occasion was both wise and politic; that is to
say, he placed certain of his riches in a perfectly sound investment,
certain to yield him an admirable percentage, not only in added
personal prestige, but also in the placing under his command of such a
force as he had never before commanded, with unlimited opportunities
of preying on the detested Christian on a far larger scale than it had
ever been his good fortune to do before.
The Sultan Soliman was not called “the Magnificent” without just cause;
his life was splendid in its social prodigality, as it was in war and
in statesmanship; yet even he was somewhat astonished at the amazing
richness of the gifts which were laid at his feet by a man whom he knew
to be, in spite of the kingly title which he had assumed, merely a
rover of the sea. Therefore, in spite of himself, he was impressed. To
him, it is true, in his splendour and magnificence, the intrinsic value
of that which was brought to him by Barbarossa mattered but little; but
the fact that the corsair was in a position to do so opened the eyes
of the Sultan to the manner of man with whom he had to deal. Hitherto
he had but known of him by hearsay, as the one Moslem seaman who
was likely to be capable of making a stand against the terrible Doria,
who had now become the plague of the Sultan’s existence. He now knew
that the man who disposed of such incredible riches must be, no matter
what his moral character, a man who stood a head and shoulders over any
commander in the Ottoman fleet sailing out of the Golden Horn.
Both materially and psychologically this man somewhat bewildered the
despot: and his _alter ego_, the Grand Vizier, happening to be away on a
mission to Aleppo, Soliman had no one with whom to confer in a strictly
confidential manner; for, after the manner of autocrats, he had but
few familiars, in fact it may be said none at all save the statesman
mentioned. His reception of the corsair lacked, however, nothing in
cordiality. He inquired after the incidents of the voyage, interested
himself graciously in all that he was told concerning Africa and the
conflicting claims of Christian and Moslem in that region, and was
generally courteous to his distinguished visitor. He placed at his
disposal a palace and attendants on a scale commensurate with the state
of a reigning sovereign, and sent his most distinguished generals to
confer with Kheyr-ed-Din. The latter, for the first time in his life,
was thoroughly out of his element. His had been the life of the seaman
and the soldier to begin with, and of later years that of a rude and
unquestioned despot on a savage coast, surrounded by myrmidons to whom
his voice had been as the voice of a god. Never had it been his lot
before to dwell within the limits of such a comparative civilisation
as that which obtained in Constantinople at this date; never before
had it been necessary for him to restrain that naturally fiery and
impetuous temper of his and to speak all men fairly.
The strain must have been great, the effort enormous, and he knew,
as he was bound to know, that his coming had unloosed jealousies and
heart-searchings innumerable, with which he could not deal in the usual
drastic fashion common to him. The winter was coming on, which was,
as we have before remarked, very much of a close season both for the
pirate and the honest merchant seaman. In consequence there was not
very much chance against the foes of Soliman for the present. When that
opportunity offered he promised himself that the courtiers and the
soldiers of the Grand Turk would very soon discover that the fame of
Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa was no empty matter, and that there existed no
seaman in all the Ottoman dominions with whom they could compare the
“African pirate,” as he had reason to believe that he was scornfully
called behind his back.
A weaker man would have been daunted by his surroundings, by the
manifestly unfriendly atmosphere in which he lived, and by the dread
that perhaps, after all, Soliman might go back upon his word. There
were no lack of counsellors, he knew very well, who would advise the
Sultan to his undoing, if that monarch gave them the opportunity;
and, as time passed, so his anxiety grew. Soliman also could not have
felt particularly comfortable at this juncture, with a sullen spirit
possessing his men “con carga de guerra,” bitterly resenting the
step which he had taken, and the appointment which he had made. For
the present, however, he made no sign, treating Kheyr-ed-Din with
distinguished courtesy, but making no reference to the future. Soliman
was revolving the problem in his acute mind, doubtless weighing the
unpopularity of the step which he had taken against the services likely
to be rendered to him by his strange guest. And thus several weeks
passed at Constantinople, probably amongst the most trying of all those
in the unusually prolonged life of Kheyr-ed-Din.