THE SEA. 



the advice of her astute husband, whose entire policy was opposed to such aggrandisement 

 on the part of a subject, tried to induce the duke to surrender it, offering in exchange 

 the City of Utrera. Ayala* tells us that he utterly refused. His great estates were 

 protected by it, and he made it a kind of central depot for his profitable tunny fisheries. 

 He died in 1492, and the third duke applied to Isabella for a renewal of his grant and 

 privileges. She promised all, but insisted that the Rock and fortress must revert to 

 the Crown. But it was not till nine years afterwards that Isabella succeeded in compelling 

 or inducing the Duke to surrender it formally. Dying in 1504, the queen testified her 

 wishes as follows : " It is my will and desire, insomuch as the city of Gibraltar has 

 been surrendered to the Royal Crown, and been inserted among its titles, that it shall for 

 ever so remain." Two years after her death, Juan de Gusman tried to retake it, and 

 blockaded it for four months, at the end of which time he abandoned the siege, and had 

 to make reparation to those whose property had been injured. This is the only bloodless 

 one among the fourteen sieges. 



In 1540 a dash was made at the town, and even at a part of the fortress, by 

 Corsairs. They plundered the neighbourhood, burned a chapel and hermitage, and dictated 

 terms in the most high-handed way that all the Turkish prisoners should be released, 

 and that their galleys should be allowed to take water at the Gibraltar wells. They 

 were afterwards severely chastised by a Spanish fleet. 



In the wars between the Dutch and Spaniards a naval action occurred, in the year 

 1607, in the port of Gibraltar, which can hardly be omitted in its history. The great 

 Sully has described it graphically when speaking of the efforts of the Dutch to secure 

 the alliance of his master, Henry IV. of France, in their wars against Philip of Spain. 

 He says : " Alvares d'Avila, the Spanish admiral, was ordered to cruise near the Straits of 

 Gibraltar, to hinder the Dutch from entering the Mediterranean, and to deprive them 

 of the trade of the Adriatic. The Dutch, to whom this was a most sensible mortification, 

 gave the command of ten or twelve vessels to one of their ablest seamen, named Heemskerk, 

 with the title of vice-admiral, and ordered him to go and reconnoitre this fleet, and attack 

 it. D'Avila, though nearly twice as strong as his enemy, yet provided a reinforcement 

 of twenty-six great ships, some of which were of a thousand tons burden, and augmented 

 the number of his troops to three thousand five hundred men. With this accession of 

 strength he thought himself so secure of victory that he brought a hundred and fifty 

 gentlemen along with him only to be witnesses of it. However, instead of standing out 

 to sea, as he ought to have done, he posted himself under the town and castle of Gibraltar, 

 that he might not be obliged to fight but when he thought proper. 



" Heemskerk, who had taken none of these precautions, no sooner perceived that his 

 enemy seemed to fear him than he advanced to attack him, and immediately began the most 

 furious battle that was ever fought in the memory of man. It lasted eight whole hours. 

 The Dutch vice-admiral, at the beginning, attacked the vessel in which the Spanish admiral 

 was, grappled with, and was ready to board her. A cannon-ball, which wounded him in the 

 thigh, soon after the fight began, left him only a hour's life, during which, and till within 



i! de Ayala, "Historic de Gibraltar'' 



