Then Andrea Doria stepped into his boat and was rowed across the shining water to visit the Emperor, who received him, we are told, “with great honour and many tokens of love.”

On May 12th arrived Don Alvaro de Bazan, General of the Galleys of Spain.  This magnificent caballero made an entrance in much the same state and circumstance as did Doria, and during the remainder of the stay of the armada in Barcelona there was much banqueting and feasting and drinking of healths to the Emperor and confusion to the Moslem foe.  It was once again as it had been in those days in which Ferdinand and Isabella had descended upon the doomed city of Granada, and had built, in full sight of its defenders, the town which they called Santa Fe (or the Holy Faith) as an earnest that they would never leave until that symbol of their faith had triumphed.  To witness this victory the best blood of Europe had flocked, and now, forty-three years later, when the audacious Moslem had raised his head once more, the descendant of the warriors who had followed “Los Reyes Catolicos” rallied to that standard which Carlos Quinto, their grandson, had set up on the shores of Catalonia.  Sandoval devotes pages of his work to the names, styles, and titles of the noble caballeros who joined the army for the destruction of Barbarossa.

On May 16th Charles embarked in the Galera Capitana of Andrea Doria, accompanied by many grandees and caballeros of the Court, as well as illustrious foreigners like Prince Luis of Portugal, and held a review of the armada.  There was much expenditure of powder in salutes to the Emperor, and all vied with one another in shouting themselves hoarse in honour of the great monarch who deigned to lead in person the hosts of Christendom against the infidel, who had defied his might and dared to offer him battle.  On May 28th the Emperor travelled some leagues inland, starting before dawn, to visit the Monastery of Nuestra Senora de Monferrato, in which was kept a singularly holy image of the Virgin.  Here he confessed and received the sacrament, and then returned to Barcelona.

[Illustration:  THE EMPEROR CHARLES V.]

On May 30th he embarked in the Royal Galley, the Galera Bastarda, which had been prepared for him by Andrea Doria, his Captain-General of the Galleys.  This vessel seems to have somewhat resembled the barge of Cleopatra in the magnificence of its appointments, as its interior was gilded, and it was fitted up with all the luxury that could be devised at this period.  Silken carpets and golden drinking-vessels, stores of the most delicate food and of the rarest wines, were embarked to mitigate, as far as possible, the inevitable hardships of a sea-passage, and there were not lacking instruments of music wherewith to beguile the Caeesar with concord of sweet sounds.  Perhaps that which strikes the modern seaman most in this recital of all the useless matters with which the vessels of the great were burdened at this period is the extraordinary number of flags and banners with which they went to sea.