A few years earlier, Cecil, the greatest of English statesmen,
thought that if an enemy were at hand to assail the realm
it were a fearful thing to consider, because of its growing
weakness, what the resistance might be. The cause of that
weakness he perceived " in the queen's celibacy, and the
want of a suitable successor, and the lack of foreign alliances ;
in the feebleness which long peace had induced, the weakness
of the frontier, the ignorance of martial knowledge in the
subjects, the lack of meet captains and trained soldiers, the
rebellion which had then recently broken out in Ireland, the
over-much boldness which the mildness of the queen's govern-
ment had encouraged, the want of treasure, the excess of the
ordinary charges, the poverty of the nobility and gentlemen
of service (the wealth being in the meaner sort), the lack of
mariners and munition, and the decay of morals and religion " ;
but the greatest danger he considered to be that which arose
from " the determination of the two monarchies, next neigh-
bours to England, to subvert not only their own subjects, but
also all others refusing the tyranny of Rome, and their earnest
desire to have the Queen of Scots possess this throne of
England ". * One alone of these causes of danger had been
remedied, the lack of mariners : a race of seamen such as no

* Memorial of the state of the realm, quoted by Turner, 513.



LORD HOWARD OF RFFINGHAM 27

former times had equalled, and no after ones have surpassed,
was then training in voyages of discovery and of mercantile
adventure. For the predatory spirit by which the speculators
at home, as well as the adventurers themselves, were influenced,
some provocation had been given ; and when Elizabeth, in
answer to the demand made by the Spanish ambassador for
restitution of the treasure which Drake had brought home
from that voyage which has immortalised his name, told him
that Drake should be forthcoming to answer according to law,
if he were convicted by good evidence of having committed
anything against law or right ; and that the property was
set apart in order that it might be restored to its just
claimants ; she reminded him that a greater sum than Drake
had brought home she had been compelled to expend in
putting down those rebellions which the Spaniards had raised
and encouraged both in Ireland and England : and as to the
complaint which he preferred against the English for sailing
in the Indian Ocean, she answered, she could not persuade
herself that the Bishop of Rome's donation had conferred upon
the kings of Spain any just title to the Indies : she acknow-
ledged no prerogative in that bishop to lay any restriction
upon princes who owed him no obedience ; nor could she
allow that he had any authority to enfeofF, as it were, the
Spaniard in that new world, and invest him with the posses-
sion thereof. Neither was their only other claim to be
admitted, which was no more than that they had touched
here and there upon the coast, built huts there, and given
names to a river or a cape. This donation of that which was
another's, and this imaginary propriety, did not preclude other
princes from trading to those countries, nor from transporting
colonies (without breach of the law of nations) into those
parts which were not inhabited by Spaniards (for prescription
without possession was little worth) ; nor from navigating that
vast ocean, seeing that the sea and air are common to all. A
title to the ocean belonged not to any people or private



28 ENGLISH SEAMEN

persons, forasmuch as neither nature nor public custom
warranted any possession thereof. She observed, also, that
the Spaniards, by their hard dealing with the English, whom
they had, contrary to the law of nations, prohibited from
commerce, had drawn upon themselves the mischiefs which
they now complained of.*

The charge against the Spanish Government, of having
instigated rebellion, was incontestable. Stukely's preparations
had not been secret, and an English fleet had been stationed
on the Irish coast to intercept him ; and that fleet had not
long returned to England, in the belief that all present danger
was past, before a body of Spaniards were landed in Ireland,
in aid of the first Irish rebellion into which the Romish
religion entered as an exciting cause, ... a cause from
whence have arisen the greatest evils that have [afflicted, and
are afflicting, and will long continue to afflict, that unhappy
island. The Spaniards fortified themselves in Kerry ; and
when the lord deputy, Arthur Lord Grey of Wilton, marched
against them, and sent a trumpet " to demand who they were,
what they had to do in Ireland, who sent them, and wherefore
they had built a fort in Queen Elizabeth's dominions, and
withal to command them to depart with speed," they
answered, that they were sent " some from the most holy
father, the Pope, and some from the King of Spain, to whom
the Pope had given Ireland, Queen Elizabeth having, as a
heretic, forfeited her title to it. They would, therefore, hold
what they had gotten, and get more if they could." The con-
fidence which seemed to themselves to justify this language
soon failed them ; they discovered too late the vanity of the
promises which had been held out to them, the condition of
the people with whom they were to act, and the dreadful
character of the war which, in reliance upon their support,
had been begun. They were besieged by land ; the protect-

* Camden, 255.



LORD HOWARD OF EFFINGHAM 29

ing squadron was remanded from England, and cut off their
escape by sea : they were compelled to surrender at discretion,
and were put to the sword ; a measure which grieved Eliza-
beth, and which she disapproved, even when she admitted
that the plea of stern necessity was strongly urged in its
vindication.*

It was easy for Elizabeth to justify the views of her Govern-
ment, and the peaceable course which it had hitherto pur-
sued. Upon general principles, too, the right of her subjects
to explore distant seas and countries might well be asserted
and maintained, but she made no attempt to defend what was
not strictly defensible, and a great part of the money which
Drake had brought home was restored to the Spaniards ; f and
some of the chief persons belonging to the court refused to
accept the money which he offered them, because they con-
sidered it to have been gained by piracy. This is said to have
troubled him greatly, for he no doubt was of opinion that the
conduct of the Spaniards in their American conquests war-
ranted any hostile proceedings against them ; and he had this
to encourage him, that, while statesmen openly condemned
his conduct, or only covertly protected him, " the common
sort of people admired and extolled his actions, as deeming it
no less honourable to have enlarged the bounds of the Eng-
lish name and glory, than of their empire ". J Indeed, how-
ever desirous Elizabeth's ministers were of avoiding a war,
they saw what the people felt, that it must soon be forced
upon them, and that overt acts on the part of Philip would

Camden, 243.

t It was paid to a certain Pedro Sebura, of whom Camden says, that he
" pretended himself an agent for retrieving the gold and silver," though he
had no letters of evidence or commission so to do; and that he " never
repaid it to the right owners, but employed it against the queen, and con-
verted it to the pay of the Spaniards in the Netherlands, as was at length
when it was too late, understood " (p. 255).

Fuller's Church History, sixteenth century, 180-182.



30 ENGLISH SEAMEN

soon follow the covert hostility which had long been carried
on. The Jesuits, who were now the moving spirits in every
conspiracy, were at that time (to use a word current in that
age) completely hispamolised, and this was not because the
founder, and the architect, and the great thaumaturgic saint
of their order were Spaniards, but because the chimerical
hope was entertained of establishing a universal monarchy of
which Spain was to be the temporal and Rome the spiritual
head. The important step of rendering Spain in all spiritual
affairs absolutely subservient to Rome had been effected ; and
they who laboured to extend the Spanish dominion perceived
that the succession of the Scottish line to the throne of
England must be unfavourable to the interests of Spain,
because of Mary's connection with the Guises ; that of her
son would be detrimental to the Romish Church, because he
had been carefully and well educated in the principles of the
Protestant faith, and it was now evident that those principles
were well rooted in his mind. They set up, therefore, a title
of the King of Spain to the English crown, by which, pre-
posterous as it was, not a few of the English Papists were
deluded.* Some of the queen's counsellors proposed to her,
as a counter-project, that she should foment the difference
which then existed between Philip and the Pope concerning
the kingdom of Naples, and assist Gregory not as Pope, but

* This title, Fuller says (180), was " as much admired by their o\vn
party, as slighted by the queen and her loyal subjects. Indeed it is easy
for any indifferent herald so to devise a pedigree, as in some seeming
probability to entitle any prince in Christendom to any principality in
Christendom ; but such will shrink on serious examination. Yea, I believe
Queen Elizabeth might pretend a better title to the kingdoms of Leon
and Castile in Spain, as descended, by the House of York, from Edmond
Earl of Cambridge, and his lady, co-heir to King Pedro, than any claim
that the King of Spain could make out to the kingdom of England. How-
ever, much mischief was done hereby, many Papists paying their good
wishes where they were not due, and defrauding the queen (their true
creditor) of the allegiance belonging unto her."



LORD HOWARD OF EFFINGHAM 31

in his character of temporal prince, with ships ; thus, they
argued, she might bring about a diversion of the Spanish
forces, and prevent an invasion of her own dominions. It
might have been a sufficient objection to any such proposal
that the Papal claim rested upon Papal grounds, and was
not maintainable as a political question. But Elizabeth
saw it at once in the right point of view as a question of
honour and of conscience : she refused to " entertain compli-
ance with the Pope in any capacity, or any conditions, as
dishonourable to herself, and distasteful to the Protestant
princes ; nor would she," says our good Church historian,
" touch pitch in jest, for fear of being defiled in earnest ".*

Part of the system which the hispaniolised faction pursued
was to blacken the character of Elizabeth by every imaginable
calumny, knowing that no calumnies can be too absurd for
itching ears, and hearts that are prepossessed with hatred for
the person whom it is proposed to injure. Not contented with
contending that she was of illegitimate birth, they affirmed
that she was the offspring of an incestuous intercourse between
Henry VIII. and his own daughter ! They arraigned her of
the vilest ingratitude towards Philip, to whose intercession,
they asserted, she had been three times beholden for her life,
when sentence of death had been passed against her for
treason against her sister. They represented the punishment
of convicted traitors, and the preventive measures against
preparatory treason, which for self-preservation her Govern-
ment w r as compelled to pursue, in a religious persecution,
against which the advocates and agents of the Inquisition,
yea, the very men who had kindled the fires in Smithfield,
filled Europe with their complaints. Books were set forth,
wherein it was not contended, but dogmatically taught, that
princes, when excommunicated for heresy, were to be deprived
of kingdom and life. This doctrine received the sanction of

* Fuller's Church History, sixteenth century, 180-182.



32 ENGLISH SEAMEN

the censorial authorities in Romish countries ; and, by a libel
which was secretly printed in England, the ladies of Eliza-
beth's household were exhorted to deal with her as Judith
had dealt with Holofernes.* Bernardino de Mendoza, the
Spanish ambassador in England, was detected in a corre-
spondence with those Papists whose object it was, by foreign
aid, to depose the queen and re-establish the Romish religion.
He was ordered to depart the land, though he had rendered
himself liable to the utmost severity of the law ; and the
queen was still so desirous of continuing at peace with Spain,
that she sent the clerk of her council into that countiy, to
inform the King of Spain for what just cause his minister had
been sent away, and withal to assure him, lest, by having thus
dismissed Mendoza, she " might seem to renounce the ancient
amity that had subsisted between both kingdoms," that all
amicable offices should still be shown by her, if Philip would
send any other minister who should be desirous of preserving
friendship, provided only that a like reception might be
given to her ambassador. But this minister could not obtain
a hearing, f

Meantime the Prince of Orange, who had recovered after
being desperately wounded by one assassin, perished by the
hand of another ; and the war in the Netherlands was
vigorously prosecuted by the Prince of Parma, a general
whose martial genius had then never been equalled in modern
warfare, and, perhaps, has never since been surpassed. Eliza-
beth, in her cautious policy, hesitated at entering into any direct
alliance with the united States, till he had taken Antwerp,
after one of the most memorable sieges in military history.
She then hesitated no longer, lest the war should be brought
home to her own doors ; and concluded a treaty, whereby she
contracted to aid the States with 5000 foot and 1000 horse
during the war, the States engaging to repay the expense thus

* Camden, 295, 307. t Ibid., 296.



LORD HOWARD OF EFFINGHAM 33

incurred, in the course of five years after the conclusion of a
peace. Flushing, Rammakens, and the Briel, were to be
occupied by English troops as caution towns. The contracting
parties were to enter into no league, but on common consent ;
and ships for their mutual defence were to be equipped in
equal numbers by both parties, at their common charge, and
to be commanded by the admiral of England. The Zeelanders,
in honour of this alliance, coined money with the arms of that
province on one side, a lion rising out of the waves, and the
motto Luctor et emergo ; and on the other the arms of the
several cities, with the motto, Authore Deo,favente Regina.*
A declaration was published in the queen's name, " of the
causes which had moved her to give aid to the defence of the
people afflicted and oppressed in the Low Countries " ; for
" although kings and princes sovereign, it was said, were not
bound to render account of their actions to any but to God,
their only sovereign Lord, we are, notwithstanding this our
prerogative, at this time specially moved to publish, not only
unto our own natural loving subjects, but also to all others our
neighbours, what our intention is at this time, and upon what
just and reasonable grounds we are moved to give aid unto
our next neighbours, the natural people of the Low Countries
being, by long wars and persecutions of strange nations there,
lamentably afflicted, and in present danger to be brought
into a perpetual servitude ".

" First," said this declaration, " it is to be understood that
there hath been, time out of mind, even by the natural
situation of those Low Countries and our realm of England,
one directly opposite to the other, and by reason of the ready
crossing of the seas, andjnultitudes of large and commodious
havens respectively on both sides, a continual traffic and com-
merce betwixt the people of England and the natural people
of those countries, and so continued in all ancient times, when



Camden, 324.
3



34 ENGLISH SEAMEN

the several provinces thereof, as Flanders, Holland, and
Zeeland, and other countries to them adjoining, were pos-
sessed by several lords, and not united together as of late
years they have been by inter-marriages, and at length by
concurrence of many and sundry titles, reduced to be under
the government of those lords that succeeded to the Dukedom
of Burgundy : whereby there had been many special confede-
rations, not only betwixt the kings of England and the lords
of the said countries, but also betwixt the very natural subjects
of both, as the prelates, noblemen, citizens, burgesses and
other commonalties of the great cities and port towns of
either country reciprocally, by special obligations and stipula-
tions under their seals interchangeably, for maintenance of
commerce and intercourse of merchants, and also of special
mutual amity to be observed ; and very express provision for
mutual favours, affections, and all other friendly offices to be
used and prosecuted by the people of the one nation towards
the other. By which mutual bonds there hath continued
perpetual union of the people's hearts together ; and so, by
way of continual intercourse, from age to age, the same mutual
love hath been inviolably kept and exercised, as it had been
by the will of nature, and never utterly dissolved, nor yet for
any long time discontinued, howsoever the kings and the lords
of the countries sometimes (though very rarely) have been at
difference, by sinister means of some other princes, their
neighbours, envying the felicity of these two countries. And
so had the same mutual and natural concourse and commerce
been continued in many ages, far above the like example of
any other countries in Christendom, to the honour and strength
of the princes, and to the singular great benefit and enriching
of their people, until of late years the King of Spain had been
(as it is to be thought) counselled by his counsellors of Spain
to appoint Spaniards, foreigners, and strangers of strange
blood, men more exercised in war than in peaceful govern-
ment, and some of them notably delighted in blood, as had



LORD HOWARD OF EFFINGHAM 35

appeared by their actions, to be the chiefest governors of
all his said Low Countries, contrary to the ancient laws and
customs thereof. The Spaniards, having no natural regard to
the maintenance of those people in their ancient manner of
peaceable living, but being exalted to absolute government
by ambition, and for private lucre, have violently broken the
ancient laws and liberties, and, in a tyrannous sort, have
banished, killed, and destroyed, without order of law, many of
the most ancient and principal persons of the natural nobility,
that were most worthy of government. And howsoever, in
the beginning of these cruel persecutions, the pretence
thereof was for maintenance of Romish religion, yet they
spared not to deprive very many Catholics and ecclesiastical
persons of their franchises and privileges ; and of the chiefest
that were executed of the nobility, none was in the whole
country more affected to that religion than was the noble and
valiant Count of Egmond, the very glory of that country,
who neither for his singular victories in the service of the
King of Spain can be forgotten in true histories, nor yet for
the cruelty used for his destruction be but for ever lamented
in the hearts of the people of that country."

The declaration proceeded to show how the horrible
calamities thus brought upon the Low Countries had moved
to compassion even such of their neighbours as had been at
frequent discord with them in former times, insomuch that
the French king thought, very many years ago, to have taken
them under his protection, had not (as the deputies of the
States were answered) the " complots of the house of Guise,
stirred and maintained by money out of Spain, disturbed the
peace of France, and thereby urged the king to forbear from
the resolution he had made, not to aid those oppressed people
of the Low Countries against the Spaniards, but also to have
accepted them as his own subjects. But, in very truth, how-
ever, they were comforted and kept in hope by the French
king, who had oftentimes solicited us, as Queen of England,



36 ENGLISH SEAMEN

both by message and writing, to be careful of their defence ;
yet, in respect that they were more strictly knit in ancient
friendship to this realm than to any other country, we are
sure that they could be pitied of none with more cause of
grief generally than of our subjects, being their most ancient
allies and familiar neighbours ; and that in such manner that
this our realm of England and those countries have been of
long time resembled and termed as man and wife. For these
urgent causes, and many others, we have by many friendly
messages and ambassadors, by many letters and writings, to
the said King of Spain, our brother and ally, declared our
compassion of this so evil and cruel usage of his natural and
loyal people. And furthermore, as a good loving sister to
him, and a natural good neighbour to his Low Countries, we
have often and often again most friendly warned him, that if
he did not by his wisdom and princely clemency, restrain the
tyranny of his governors, and cruelty of his men of war, we
feared that the people should be forced, for safety of their
lives, and for continuance of their native country in the
former state of their liberties, to seek the protection of some
other foreign lord, or rather to yield themselves wholly to the
sovereignty of some mighty prince ; as by the ancient laws,
and by special privileges granted by some of the lords and
dukes to the people, they do pretend and affirm that in such
cases of general injustice, and upon such violent breaking of
their privileges, they are free from their former homage, and
at liberty to make choice of any other prince to be their
head. By some such alteration, as stories testify, Philip, the
Duke of Burgundy, came to his title, from which the King of
Spain's interest is derived. And now, to stay them from
yielding themselves in any like sort to the sovereignty of any
other strange prince, we yielded some years past to the im-
portunate requests of some of the greatest persons of degree
and most obedient subjects to the king, and granted them
prests of money, only to continue them as his subjects, and to



LORD HOWARD OF EFFINGHAM 37

maintain themselves in their just defence against the violence
of the Spaniards, their oppressors ; and during the time of
that our aid thus given, and their stay in their obedience to
the King of Spain, we did freely acquaint the same king with
our actions, and did still continue our friendly advices to him,
to move him to command his governors and men of war not
to use such insolent cruelties against his people as might make
them to despair of his favour, and seek some other lord.

" For we did manifestly see if the nation of Spain should
make a conquest of those countries, as was and yet is ap-
parently intended, and plant themselves there as they have
done in Naples and other countries, adding thereto the late
examples of the hostile enterprise of a power of Spaniards,
sent by the King of Spain and the Pope into our realm of
Ireland, with an intent, confessed by the captains, that their
number was sent to seize upon some strength there, and with
other great forces to pursue a conquest thereof, we did mani-
festly see in what danger our ourself, country and people
might shortly be, if in convenient time we did not speedily
otherwise regard to prevent or stay the same." The queen
then complained, that notwithstanding her often requests and
advices, the king's governors in the Low Countries increased
their cruelties toward his own afflicted people, and his officers
in Spain offered daily greater injuries to the English resorting
thither for traffic : yea, her express messengers with her
letters were not permitted to come to the king's presence,
" a matter very strange, and against the law of nations". She
contrasted the unworthy treatment of her ambassadors in
Spain, with her conduct towards the Spanish ambassadors,
and especially Bernardino de Mendoza, " one," said she,
" whom we did accept and use with great favour a long time,
as was seen in our court, and we think cannot be denied by
himself : but yet of late years (we know not by what direc-
tion), we found him to be a secret great favourer to sundry
our evil-disposed and seditious subjects, not only to such as



38 ENGLISH SEAMEN

lurked in our realm, but also to such as fled the same, being
notoriously condemned as open rebels and traitors, with whom,
by his letters, messages, and secret counsels, he did in the end