When in 1534 the Turkish pirate Barbarossa, by treason and treachery, overcame the kingdom of Tunis, and made himself King of those Barbary Moors, he dethroned the legitimate lord Muley Hacem, who wrote to the Emperor Charles V from Arabia, where he had taken refuge, asking for help against the Turk, and it was then that the Emperor undertook the glorious expedition against Tunis, which formed one of the most brilliant pages of his history. Muley Hacem was restored to his throne, Barbarossa and the Turks expelled ignominiously from Tunis, and the fort of Goletta, the key of the kingdom, remained in the power of Spain as a guarantee against Turks and Berbers, who, whether they were friends or adversaries, were equally barbarians and enemies of the name of Christian.

This Muley Hacem had two sons, Muley Hamida and Muley Hamet; the elder one, Hamida, was jealous because his father made a favourite of the younger son, leaving him the crown, so he took up arms, chased him from the throne and barbarously tore out his eyes. The second son, Muley Hamet, fled in terror to Palermo, and placed himself under the protection of the King of Spain, and Hamida, triumphant, refused to pay the tribute arranged between his father and Charles V, and craved the protection of Selim II, rendering him homage. This brought his punishment, because Aluch Ali, who was then Viceroy of Algiers, invaded the kingdom with his Turks in the name of Selim, and, on the pretext of protecting it, subjected it with an iron hand to his tyranny of petty king and the rapines of a renegade pirate. Such was the state of Tunis when D. John of Austria received his brother's commands to conquer it and place Muley Hamet, still a fugitive at Palermo, on the throne, under the same conditions that the Emperor Charles V enforced when he had reinstated the father, Muley Hacem.

Apart from other interests, this enterprise held for D. John the special enchantment of being like the one his father had so gloriously achieved thirty-nine years before. He knew all about it from having heard Luis Quijada refer to it thousands of times, as he was one of the great heroes of this campaign. D. John therefore desired to follow his father step by step, and left Naples on the 1st of August, 1573, with the greatest part of the fleet and the Italian and Spanish infantry, hoping to collect the rest of the ships, people, victuals and equipment of war in passing Messina, Palermo, Trapani and the island of Favignana. At Messina he joined the Marqués de Santa Cruz with the remainder of the infantry, and, while the galleys were being loaded, drilled the soldiers with continual exercises and man?uvres, subjecting them to the most severe discipline. On one of these occasions, the Royal Standard being hoisted and D. John a witness of the affair from an elevation, a gentleman of Florence dared to pull out his dagger and wound an Italian captain. D. John ordered him to be decapitated, without anyone being surprised at the order or thinking it unduly severe. This happened at Messina on the 19th of August.

They also stopped at Palermo and Trapani, where they had a magnificent welcome. "The Trapanians had made," says the confessor Servia in his diary, "a pier for His Highness, which entered 100 feet into the sea. It had three arches in front and 17 along it. On the centre arch towards the sea were the Royal Arms, on the right those of His Highness, on the left those of the town. The columns and arches were covered with blue, yellow, green and red taffeta. On each column was a little red and yellow taffeta flag. They presented to him a very nice grey horse covered with black velvet with harness of gold." And further on he adds, "On the 30th, after dinner, His Highness went to visit the Annunziata of Trapani. It is a Carmelite convent, outside the city, of great sanctity, and in the evening he confessed in the sacristy, where in other days his father the Emperor Charles V had done so."

At last all the fleet joined at Marsala, eighteen miles from Trapani, in a beautiful harbour which had been long stopped up, and which since that time has been named of Austria, as it was D. John who had it opened and put in order. There were 140 ships of great tonnage, 12 large boats, 25 frigates, 22 feluccas, among which were divided 20,000 infantry, Spaniards, Italians and Germans, without counting numerous volunteers and 750 pioneers, 400 light horse, good artillery, abundant ammunition, sufficient machines and victuals, and many yoke of oxen to drag the cannon. In the Sicilian galley with the Duque de Sesa was the Moorish Prince Muley Hamet, destined to ascend the throne of Tunis.

On the 7th of October, anniversary of the battle of Lepanto, D. John confessed and communicated in a Capuchin convent, in the outskirts of Marsala, and at night left the port of Austria at the head of the whole fleet, making for Africa. On the 8th at sundown they came in sight of Goletta, and it was with great emotion that D. John saw from the castle of his galley those white towers standing out on the grey mountains, which it had cost his father so much blood to conquer. The soldiers could be seen running joyfully about the fortifications, saluting the Royal Standard, and they fired a big salute of artillery and arquebuses, which re-echoed solemnly and lighted up with singular beauty the shades of night which were slowly falling. Very early the next morning D. John was the first to disembark with several gentlemen, among them Juan de Soto, who was a navy contractor without ceasing to be secretary. They had not even had time to reach the first outworks of Goletta, when they spied coming from the direction of Tunis a group of Moors on horseback, who hurried towards them brandishing bunches of oak leaves with white streamers in sign of peace.

D. John made them enter a room that was close by in the front part of the fortifications, and sat to receive them, surrounded by his gentlemen. The Moors seemed half terrified and half curious, and did not dare to pass the threshold without taking off their shoes, throwing their arms on the ground, which were Moorish scimitars, short and wide, daggers and a few lances forty-five palms long. Only three of them came in, ............