, the Venetian
fleet, and the fleet of Philip II formed of the ships of Spain and Naples.
The main force of the three fleets was made up of galleys. But there were
also six galleasses and some seventy frigates, the former depending
chiefly, the latter entirely, on sail power for propulsion. The frigate
was, in the following century and almost up to our time, what the cruiser
is in the armoured navies of to-day. But in the Mediterranean fleets of the
fifteenth century the _frigata_ represented only an early type, out of
which the frigate of later days was developed. She was a small
sailing-ship, sometimes a mere yacht, armed only with a few light guns. The
frigates were used to convey stores, the swifter among them being often
employed as dispatch boats. Depending entirely on the wind, it was not
always easy for them to accompany a fleet of galleys. Don Juan gave up the
idea of making them part of his fighting fleet. It was still the period of
the oar-driven man-of-war, though the day of sails was close at hand.

The six galleasses represented a new type, a link between the oared ships
of the past and the sailing fleets of the immediate future. They were heavy
three-masted ships, with rounded bows, and their upper works built with an
inward curve, so that the width across the bulwarks amidships was less than
that of the gundeck below. The frames of warships were built on these lines
till after Nelson's days. This "tumble home" of the sides, as it was
called, was adopted to bring the weight of the broadside guns nearer the
centre line of the ship, and so lessen the leverage and strain on her
framework. The guns had first been fired over the bulwarks, but at a very
early date port-holes were adopted for them. The galleass had a high
forecastle and poop, each with its battery of guns, pointing ahead, astern,
and on each side. Other guns were mounted on the broadsides in the waist of
the ship; and to command the main-deck, in case an enemy's boarders got
possession of it, lighter guns were mounted on swivels at the back of the
forecastle and on the forepart of the poop. Compared to the low, crowded
galley, the galleass was a roomy and much more seaworthy ship. She was
generally a slow sailer, but in order to enable her to make some progress,
even in calms or against a head wind, and so work with a fleet of galleys,
she had a rowers' deck, under her main or gundeck, and on each side twelve
or fifteen oars of enormous length, ea