d of Doria on this memorable
occasion. He had only to wait; the longer he waited the more secure he
would be of success, the more certain would he be of the complete undoing
of his enemy. But even yet the admiral did not know the man to whom he was
opposed; in all the years in which he had done battle against Dragut, he
had never gauged the limitless resource and calculated audacity of this
lineal successor of Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa. While the admiral had been
sending his despatches, and idly watching that which he considered to be
the futile construction of earthworks on the shore at the Bocca de Cantara,
his enemy was preparing for him that surprise which was shortly afterwards
to make of him the laughing-stock of the whole of Europe. Dragut was in a
trap, and he was quite aware of the fact; by way of the Bocca de Cantara
escape was impossible, and neither a tame surrender nor complete
annihilation was by any means to the taste of the pirate leader. Had Doria
gone in and attacked at once, the fate of the corsair had been sealed; the
policy of delay adopted by the Christian admiral was his salvation.

A man less able, less determined, than Dragut, might well have despaired;
but he brought to bear on the problem with which he was confronted all the
subtlety of his nature, all the resourcefulness of the born seaman that he
was. His mind had been made up from the very beginning: the earthworks at
the Bocca de Cantara, the movements of troops, the furious cannonading, had
all been nothing but a blind to hide the real design which he had in view.
In addition to his fighting men he had at his command some two thousand
islanders, stout Mohammedans to a man, ready and willing to assist him in
his design of cheating the Christians of their prey. Day and night, with
ceaseless silent toil, had garrison and islanders been at work on the
scheme which the leader had devised. From the head of the harbour Dragut
had caused a road to be made right across the island to the sea on the
opposite side: on this road he caused planks to be laid, bolted to sleepers
and then thickly greased. The vessels of the day were of course
comparatively speaking light, and capable of being manhandled, supposing
that you had sufficient hands. At dead of night Dragut assembled his
forces, and before morning every galley, galeasse, and brigantine had been
dragged across the island and launched in the sea on the opposite side.
There was then nothing left to do