In 1379 Pisani was forced by the Venetian Senate, against his own judgment, to fight a far superior Genoese fleet, under Luciano Doria, off Pola, in the Adriatic. The Venetian fleet was almost annihilated, and Pisani, on his return, was loaded with chains, and thrown into a dungeon. The Genoese, after burning several Venetian towns upon the Adriatic, appeared off Venice, entered the lagoon, took Chioggia, and filled the Venetians with consternation and terror. The people flocked to the Piazza San Marco, in thousands, and demanded that Pisani be restored to the command of the fleet. The authorities were at their wits’ ends, and consented, while Pisani, with true patriotism, condoned his wrongs and ill treatment, and applied himself at once to the work of organization. After unheard of exertions he succeeded in discomfiting the enemy, and Venice was saved. Pisani afterwards made a cruise in command of the fleet on the Asiatic coast, but, worn out by hard service and his former ill treatment, he died soon after his return, to the common sorrow and remorse of all Venetians. The Turks took Constantinople in 1453, and the contests between them and the Venetians continued with even greater bitterness; and after the capture of Cyprus by the Moslems, and the fitting out by the Sultan Selim of an immense and powerful fleet, it became evident to the western world that some supreme effort should be put forth to curb the advance of the Turkish power. * * * * * Let us now glance at the state of affairs about the time of Lepanto. The latter part of the 16th century was a stirring and eventful period in the world’s history. Charles V had resigned his empire to that sullen bigot, his son, Philip II. About the same time Moscow was being burned by the Tartars; the Russians having been the abject subjects of the Tartars but a few years before. Prussia, so powerful to-day, was then a small hereditary duchy, Lutheran in religion, and still a fief of Poland. The Poles were then a much more powerful nation than the Russians. The States of the north, Sweden and Denmark, were very strong, and made their influence felt in all Europe. Tycho Brahe, the subject of the latter, was then a young man. Portugal, from her brilliant maritime discoveries, had extended relations with Japan, China, India and Brazil; and had rendered Lisbon the market of the world, usurping the place of Antwerp. Her decline was, however, soon to follow. Soon after Lepanto, Holland, driven to despairing effort by the tyranny of Philip, revolted, and William of Orange became Stadtholder. He was succeeded by Maurice, whose efforts to secure independence were so ably seconded by Elizabeth of England, as to draw down upon the latter nation the vengeance of Philip, shown later in the despatch of his grand Armada, but a very few years after the event of Lepanto.