ally by these bigoted, these ambitious, and these interested
motives, the protector equipped two considerable squadrons; and while he
was making those preparations, the neighboring states, ignorant of his
intentions, remained in suspense, and looked with anxious expectation
on what side the storm should discharge itself. One of these squadrons,
consisting of thirty capital ships, was sent into the Mediterranean
under Blake, whose fame was now spread over Europe. No English fleet,
except during the crusades, had ever before sailed in those seas; and
from one extremity to the other there was no naval force, Christian or
Mahometan, able to resist them. The Roman pontiff, whose weakness and
whose pride equally provoked attacks, dreaded invasion from a power
which professed the most inveterate enmity against him, and which so
little regulated its movements by the usual motives of interest and
prudence. Blake, casting anchor before Leghorn, demanded and obtained
from the duke of Tuscany reparation for some losses which the English
commerce had formerly sustained from him. He next sailed to Algiers, and
compelled the dey to make peace, and to restrain his piratical subjects
from further violences on the English. He presented himself before
Tunis; and having there made the same demands, the dey of that republic
bade him look to the castles of Porto-Farino and Goletta, and do his
utmost. Blake needed not to be roused by such a bravado: he drew
his ships close up to the castles, and tore them in pieces with his
artillery. He sent a numerous detachment of sailors in their long
boats into the harbor, and burned every ship which lay there. This bold
action, which its very temerity perhaps rendered safe, was executed with
little loss, and filled all that part of the world with the renown of
English valor.

The other squadron was not equally successful. It was commanded by Pen,
and carried on board four thousand men under the command of
Venables. About five thousand more joined them from Barbadoes and
St. Christopher's. Both these officers were inclined to the king's
service;[*] and it is pretended that Cromwell was obliged to hurry the
soldiers on board, in order to prevent the execution of a conspiracy
which had been formed among them in favor of the exiled family.[**] The
ill success of this enterprise may justly be ascribed as much to the
injudicious schemes of the protector who planned it, as to the bad
execution of the officers