The leaguer of Candia was pushed during several months by the Turks, animated by the courage and example of their general, with the same fanatic zeal which they had displayed before Canea and Retimo; but the besieged, whose tenure of Crete depended on this last stronghold, held out with equal pertinacity: and their efforts were aided by the presence of a large body of Maltese auxiliaries, as well as by the succours which the naval superiority of the Venetians enabled them continually to introduce by sea. In one sortie, a detachment of the garrison penetrated even to the tent of the serdar, who owed his safety to his personal prowess; while the outworks of the town were ruined by the constant explosion of mines, and the Ottoman standards were planted on the bastion of Martinengo, and on several of the redoubts which covered the interior defences. But in spite of their repeated assaults, the besiegers failed to make any impression on the body of the place; and the serdar was compelled to withdraw his diminished army into winter-quarters. The anarchy at Constantinople which followed the deposition of Ibrahim, combined with the blockade of the Dardanelles by the Venetians, prevented any reinforcements from reaching the seat of war--yet the siege was renewed in the ensuing summer, and carried on with such vigour, that the garrison, weakened by the loss of half its numbers, including the valiant governor, Colloredo, was reduced to the last extremity; when the arrival of the Maltese squadron, under Balbiani, baulked the Turks of their expected prize; and the janissaries, breaking out into furious mutiny, compelled Delhi-Hussein once more to abandon the hopeless enterprise. All the remainder of the island, however, had now peaceably submitted to the Ottoman rule, and had been organized into sandjaks and districts; so that the garrison of Candia were rather the occupants of a solitary post in a hostile country, than defenders of the soil against the invasion; and the Turkish commanders, ill supplied from Constantinople, during the troubled minority of Mohammed, with siege equipage and munitions of war, contented themselves with blockading the town by the erection of redoubts, and guarding the open country with their cavalry. While the war thus languished in Crete, the events of the maritime contest continued to justify the proverbial saying of the Turks, that "Allah had given the land to the true believers; but the sea to the infidels!" Not only was the blockade of the Dardanelles so strictly kept up, that it was only in winter, when the Venetian fleet was unable to remain on its station, that the Turks could convey reinforcements to their brethren who were waging the _holy war_ in Crete, but repeated and disastrous defeats were sustained by the Ottoman navy, whenever it attempted to dispute the sovereignty of the sea with the Lion of St Mark. In July 1651, a formidable armament with supplies and troops for Crete was