Barbarossa's
men were unprepared, and a number of them were slain. Driven into a bastion
of the walls, a party of the corsairs were desperately defending
themselves, when one Baetio, a Spanish renegado, discovered that a cannon
behind them pointing seawards was loaded. He succeeded, with the assistance
of others, in slewing it round and discharged it at close quarters into the
packed masses of the enemy. This caused a frightful demoralisation to set
in; the corsairs rallied and soon swept all before them. The massacre
turned from the one side to the other, and it is said that no less than
three thousand of the unfortunate townspeople were slain. Barbarossa only
called off his men when they were wearied out by the slaughter.
Kheyr-ed-Din now graciously accepted the submission of the townsfolk; that
is to say, such of them as were left, and took charge of the entire kingdom
as governor for the Sultan of Turkey. He sent out ambassadors to the
neighbouring Arab and Berber chieftains of the hinterland, repaired
fortifications, appointed magistrates--all ostensibly in the name of that
phantom prince whom the Tunisians were destined never to see, and who never
returned to his native country.
King of Algiers, _de facto_ King of Tunis, Admiralissimo to Soliman the
Magnificent, his name a portent in Christendom, his fame reaching from
Spartel to Tunis, and from the shores of France to the foothills of the
Atlas, Kheyr-ed-Din Barbarossa was at the height of his power.
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