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HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.

He resumed the important attempt of attacking the Emperor of the East, andthe spirit with which he engaged in the undertaking sufficiently proved hiszeal for its success.

“ The fleet of Guiscard,” say historians, “ comprised one hundred andtwenty vessels, and as the season was far advanced, the harbour of Brundusiumwas preferred to the open road of Otranto. Alexis, apprehensive of a secondattack, had assiduously laboured to restore the naval forces of the empire, andobtained from the republic of Venice an important succour of thirty-six trans-ports, fourteen gallies, and nine galliots, or ships of extraordinary strength andmagnitude, Their services were liberally paid by the licence or monopoly oftrade, a profitable gift of many shops and houses in the port of Constantinople,and a tribute to St. Mark, the more acceptable, as it was the produce of a taxon their rivals of Amalphi. By the union of the Greeks and Venetians, theAdriatic was covered with an hostile fleet, but their own neglect, or the vigi-lance of Robert, the change of the wind, or the shelter of a mist, opened a freepassage, and the Norman troops were safely disembarked on the coast ofEpirus. With twenty strong and well appointed gallies, their intrepid dukeimmediately sought the enemy, and though more accustomed to fight on horse-back, he trusted his own life, and the lives of his brother, and two sons, to theevent of a naval combat. The dominion of the sea was disputed in threeengagements in sight of the isle of Corfu : in the two former the skill andnumbers of the allies were superior, but in the third the Normans obtained afinal and complete victory. The light brigantines of the Greeks were scat-tered in ignominious flight; the nine castles of the Venetians maintained amore obstinate conflict; seven were sunk, two were taken ; two thousand fivehundred captives implored in vain the mercy of the victor, and the daughter ofAlexis deplores the loss of thirteen thousand of his subjects, or allies.”

Fortune certainly favoured this bold attempt, but the chief merit of it is uni-versally attributed to the gallantry and abilities of the chief. Repulsed as he wasin his first attempt, he sought not to repair his disgrace, as is too often custo-mary, by a rash expenditure of his force, and an extravagant attack frequentlyproductive of still more heavy misfortune, but by most studiously endeavouringto discover the errors in his own conduct, and contriving the most propermeans to remedy them in future. This great man did not long survive hislast victory, and is supposed to have met that premature death which not un-commonly attends persons of his enterprising and ambitious character. As

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