ing 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 m