med the _San Valentino_, and was worth, with her cargo, a
million ducats.

The system of striking topmasts appears to have been introduced into the
English Navy in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It is mentioned by Sir
Walter Raleigh as a recent improvement and "a wonderful ease to great
ships, both at sea and in the harbour." Amongst the other novelties
mentioned by the same authority was the use of chain-pumps on board
ship; they lifted twice the amount of water that the old-fashioned pumps
could raise; studding, top-gallant, sprit and topsails were also
introduced, and the weighing of anchors by means of the capstan. He also
alludes to the recent use of long cables, and says that "by it we resist
the malice of the greatest winds that can blow." The early men-of-war,
pierced with portholes, carried their lower guns very near the water. In
some cases there were only fourteen inches from the lower sill of the
portholes to the water-line. This practice led to many accidents;
amongst others may be mentioned the loss of the _Mary Rose_, one of the
largest ships in the Royal Navy in the time of Henry VIII. Sir Walter
Raleigh mentions that, in his time, the practice was introduced of
raising the lower tier of ports. Nevertheless, this improvement did not
become general till the time of the restoration of Charles II. Fig. 45
is a representation of an English ship of war of the time of Queen
Elizabeth, supposed to be of the date 1588. It is copied from the
tapestries of the old House of Lords. It shows clearly the recently
introduced topmasts alluded to by Sir Walter Raleigh. It is certainly a
much more ship-shaped and serviceable craft than the vessels of Henry
VIII. There is also in existence a drawing of a smaller Elizabethan
warship in the Rawlinson MSS. in the Bodleian Library; in essential
particulars, it confirms Fig. 45. Both of these show that the
forecastles and poops had been considerably modified.

[Illustration: FIG. 45.--English man-of-war. About 1588.]

[Illustration: FIG. 46.--Venetian galleass. 1571.]

Another great naval war was waged in the latter half of the sixteenth
century, about sixteen years before the defeat of the Spanish Armada.
The scene was the Adriatic Sea, and the combatants were Venice, with her
allies, Spain and the Papal States, on the one hand, and the Turks on
the other. It culminated in the complete defeat of the latter at Lepanto
in 1571. The site of the battle of Lepanto is very near to