Upon Spain, already tottering from inherent weakness, the Armada defeat had the effect of casting down her pride and confidence as leader of the Catholic world. Though it was not until three centuries later that she lost her last colonies, her hold on her vast empire was at once shaken by this blow at her sea control. While she maintained large fleets until after the Napoleonic Wars, she was never again truly formidable as a naval power. But the victory lifted England more than it crushed Spain, inspiring an intenser patriotism, an eagerness for colonial and commercial adventure, an exaltation of spirit manifested in the men of genius who crowned the Elizabethan age. _The Last Years of the War_ The war was not ended; and though Philip was restrained by the rise of Protestant power in France under Henry of Navarre, he was still able to gather his sea forces on almost as grand a scale. In the latter stages of the war the naval expeditions on both sides were either, like the Armada, for the purpose of landing armies on foreign soil, or raids on enemy ports, colonies and commerce. Thus Drake in 1589 set out with a force of 18,000 men, which attacked Corunna, moved thence upon Lisbon, and lost a third or more of its number in a fruitless campaign on land. Both Drake and the aged Hawkins, now his vice admiral, died in the winter of 1595-96 during a last and this time ineffective foray upon the Spanish Main. Drake was buried off Puerto Bello, where legend has it his spirit still awaits England's call-- "Take my drum to England, hang et by the shore, Strike et when your powder's running low. If the Dons sight Devon, I'll leave the port of Heaven, An' drum them up the Channel as we drummed them long ago."[1] [Footnote 1: DRAKE'S DRUM, Sir Henry Newbolt.] We are still far from the period when sea control was thought of as important in itself, apart from land operations, or when fleets were kept in permanent readiness to take the sea. It is owing to this latter fact that we hear of large flotillas dispatched by each side even in the same year, yet not meeting in naval action. Thus in June of 1596 the Essex expedition, with 17 English and 18 Dutch men-of-war and numerous auxiliaries, seized Cadiz and burned shipping to the value of 11,000,000 ducats. There was no naval opposition, though Philip in October of the same year had ready a hundred ships and 16,000 men, which were dispersed with the loss of a quarter of their strength in a gale off Finisterre. Storms also scattered Philip's fleet in the next year; in 1598, Spanish transports landed 5,000 men at Calais; and England's fears were renewed in the year after that by news of over 100 vessels fitting out for the Channel, which, however, merely protected the plate fleet by a cruise to the Azores. As late as 1601, Spain landed 3500 troops in Ireland.