THE CAPTURE OF TRIPOLI BY SENAN PASHA.
On Mohammed Pashas being made capudan he went on an expedition against Tripoli (West), which was formerly in the possession of the Tunisian kings, the Beni Hefs: but about A.H. 916 (A.D. 1510) the Spaniards, taking advantage of the supineness of the reigning monarch, Mohammed Ben Hassan, the nineteenth king of that dynasty, who was immersed in pleasure, captured the castles of Vahran, Bajaiah and Tripoli. The last of these places had now been forty-two years in their possession, when his majesty, wishing to reduce it, invited Tourghoudjé Beg, (who formerly had the sanjak of Karli-Eili [Acarnania], but had now on some account gone to Moghreb, where he remained two years,) under whose direction Senan Pasha, A.H. 958 (A.D. 1551) sailed with twenty galleys, and besieged and took the castle. Tourghoudjé Beg had been promised the governorship of it for his life, but Senan Pasha gave it to Khadem Mourad Agha. Tourghoudjé Beg, however, subsequently received it from the emperor in person, and held it till he was murdered it Malta eleven years afterwards.
EXPEDITION OF PIRI REIS TO THE EASTERN OCEAN.
Notwithstanding Soleiman Pasha had, when he reduced Aden, left a garrison in that city, the people joined the Portuguese, the masters of India, turned away their faces from submission, and delivered up the fortress to the infidels. To recover it, Piri Pasha, the capudan of Egypt, (son of the sister of Kemal Reis, and author of the Bahria,[44]) was sent from Suez with a fleet; and leaving the Red Sea, proceeded by the straits of Babelmandel to Aden, against the fortress of which he planted his artillery, and having taken it by storm, left in it a considerable garrison provided with the necessary means of defence. Davoud Pasha, the governor of Egypt, having represented to the sultan the importance of the service rendered by Piri Reis, the latter received in recompense lands to the value of one hundred thousand aspres.
SECOND EXPEDITION OF PIRI PASHA TO THE EASTERN OCEAN.
Piri Pasha, the capudan of Egypt, left Suez A.H. 959 with a fleet of thirty sail, consisting of galleys, bashderdés, golettas, and galleons; and proceeding to Aden by Jedda and Babelmandel, sailed thence towards Ras-al-had, passing Zaffar and Shedjer. On his route he was overtaken near Shedjer by a storm, in which several of his barges were destroyed. With the remains of his fleet he attacked Muscat, a fortress in the Persian Gulf, in the country of Oman, which he took, and made the inhabitants prisoners. He then laid waste the islands of Ormuz and Barkhet. On his arrival at Bassora he heard that the fleet of the vile infidels was advancing towards him; a report which was confirmed by the infidel capudan whom he took at Muscat, and who now advised him to remain no longer in his present situation, on account of the impossibility of escaping by the strait of Ormuz. The pasha, being unable to clear the whole of his fleet, departed before the arrival of the infidels, with three galleys, his private property. One of these he lost near Bahrein, and with the remaining two returned to Egypt. Of the vessels left at Bassora, Kobad Pasha, the governor of that city, offered the command to Ali Beg, a beg of Egypt, and a commander in the army; who, however, refused it, and returned by land to Egypt: and the vessels, thus abandoned, were soon destroyed. The pasha of Egypt, apprised of these events, seized and imprisoned Piri Reis on his arrival at Cairo, and sent information of the circumstance to the Sublime Porte, whence he immediately received an order to put to death the admiral, who was beheaded accordingly in the divan of Cairo. He left immense riches, which were confiscated to the treasury. The inhabitants of Ormuz, from whom he had extorted large sums of money, came to complain of his exactions and crave an indemnity; but no attention was paid to their demands, and the gold was put into gilt vases and sent to Constantinople. Piri Reis composed a work on navigation, in which he has given a description of the Mediterranean. This is the only work of the kind of any authority amongst the Moslems.
EXPEDITION OF MURAD PASHA TO INDIA.
The Sublime Porte now entrusted the command of the fleet to Murad Beg formerly governor of the sanjak of Katif, and ordered him to remain at Bassora, with the vessels already in his command, consisting of five galleys and one goletta. Shortly after, he quitted Bassora, at the head of a fleet of fifteen galleys and two barges, (one of his galleys having sunk,) and directed his course towards Egypt. Near Ormuz he met the infidels’ fleet, which he immediately attacked, and a desperate engagement ensued, in which Soleiman Reis, (the Capudan Reis,) Rajab Reis, with a great number of men, obtained the palm of martyrdom, and many others were wounded. The infidels did considerable damage to the Moslem ships, which, unable to sustain the continual fire of the enemy, escaped by night. One of their vessels, which was left behind, was driven ashore near Lar, and captured by the infidels, part of the crew escaping and the rest being made prisoners. The remainder of the fleet returned to Bassora, whence tidings of the sad event were immediately communicated to the Sublime Porte.
ACCOUNT OF SEIDI ALI, CAPUDAN.
Seidi Ali Ibn Hosein, whose poetical appellation was Katebi, besides being famed for his poetical productions, was celebrated for his works on navigation and astronomy, as well in prose as in verse. He was author of a work called Mohit, (the Ocean,) on the Indian Ocean, and of another called the Merat al Kainat, (the Mirror of Creation,) treating of the science of the astrolabe, of squares, circles, and sines. He was moreover the translator of a work called the Fat’hia. There has never been his equal in the arsenal. He served with the late sultan, Soleiman Khan, at the capture of Rhodes, and afterwards in Moghreb, and other places with Khair-ad-din Pasha, Senan Pasha, and many others. His father and grandfather having held the office of governor of the arsenal ever since the capture of Constantinople, the science of navigation descended to him as a legacy; and it was on this account that Sultan Soleiman Khan, about the end of the year 960 (A. D. 1553), rewarded him with the post of capudan of Egypt, and ordered him to bring to Cairo the vessels which were lying at Bassora.