Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 28, 2025
"The Frenchies know what their sea-wolves have done," George thought grimly, "and so they can afford to let things slide and save themselves. No good sending out a boat and trying to pick up their man under the nose of the enemy, for the poor fellow's gone where neither friends nor foes can get him. The episode is closed. And all the Bella Cuba wanted was to put the prison boat out of the running.
Of all the high officers in command on that memorable day there was only one who displayed real generalship and a proper appreciation of the tactical necessities of the situation; that officer was Ali Basha, the leader of the Sea-wolves.
In the sixteenth century the Sea-wolves had this at least to recommend them, that they feared neither King nor Kaiser, albeit these great ones of the earth were bent on their destruction. Villains as they were, they were none the less men to be feared, men in whom dwelt wonderful capabilities of leadership.
That which it demonstrated, as far as the Sea-wolves were concerned, was that they still remained the most competent seamen and sea-fighters in the Mediterranean, and that the legend of the invincibility of the Ottomans at sea rested on what had been accomplished during a long period of years by these insatiable pirates and magnificent warriors.
Gonçalvez resolved to signalize his voyage by a feat that should gratify his master more than the capture of sea-wolves; and he accordingly planned and executed successfully an expedition for capturing some Azeneghi Moors, in order, as he told his companions, to take home "some of the language of that country."
The despotism of the leaders among the sea-wolves was not theirs by right divine, as men considered it to be in the case of the Padishah; none the less in its practical application it was but little inferior to that wielded by the Sultan.
It was not only that fighting was their particular trade; that, of course, might be said also of any man who trailed a pike or carried an arquebus and marched in the ranks of Spain, France, Genoa, or Venice. In the case of the sea-wolves it was the perpetual practice in the art of war, as it was then understood, that caused them to be the men that they were.
So it is that, whatever other opinion we may hold of Dragut, we cannot deny that in this captain of the Sea-wolves were blended rare qualities, which caused him to shine as a capable administrator, a fine seaman, but above all as a supreme leader of men. Dragut died with arms in his hands fighting those whom he considered to be his bitterest enemies.
For the moment it amused them to see the shells plunging and hissing in the sea about us; for the moment the desire to be quit of us made them forget how it stood with them and what must come after. But the reckoning would be sure. Let a capful of wind come scudding across that glassy sea, and all the riches in the world would not buy Edmond Czerny's life of these sea-wolves who sought it.
He afterwards arrived at Seal Bay in Patagonia, where he traded with the natives, and killed a great number of penguins and sea-wolves for the nourishment of his crew. "Some of the Patagonians who were seen on the 13th May a little below Seal Bay," says the original narrative, "wore on the head a kind of horn, and nearly all had many beautiful birds' feathers by way of hats.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking