One galley, a new vessel, ran into another which was an old one, and sank
her on the spot, carrying all her luckless crew to the bottom. The
remaining vessels scattered far and wide; Alfonso d'Aragona found refuge in
the Bay of Alghieri, two more of his galleys reached an anchorage in the
Isle of St. Pierre, another sheltered in the Gulf of Oristano; three
galleys were shipwrecked on the coast in this neighbourhood and lost many
of their men; yet another, called the _Florence_, was twice nearly wrecked
on the coast of Barbary, and eventually reached the Bay of Cagliari. A
Genoese captain found himself as far afield as the Island of Pantellaria,
two galleys were never heard of again, and the Grand Commander himself
anchored eventually in the Bay of Palamos on the Spanish coast. Of the
twenty-four galleys which left their anchorage twelve were lost and the
twelve which remained were practically valueless until large sums had been
spent in repairs.
It is small wonder in the light of these events that the seamen who ranged
the Mediterranean in vessels propelled by oars regarded the winter as a
close season and laid up their galleys in harbour. They were seaworthy
enough for ordinary weather, but could not withstand such a tempest as the
one in which Requesens put to sea. The whole story is only a further proof
of the folly of putting supreme command of a sea-going venture in the hands
of a man totally ignorant of the hazards he was called upon to encounter.
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