The administration of Northumberland, which lasted till June 1642, when he was dismissed by the king in bitter wrath, is of great importance in the history of England. It contains nearly, if not quite, the most discreditable incident in naval history. In the September of 1639 the Spaniards sent out a great fleet with reinforcements for their garrisons in Flanders. It arrived at the mouth of the Channel on the 7th of the month, and was at once attacked by the Dutch. A running fight took place along the Channel, in which the Dutch, who were constantly reinforced, soon gained the advantage. The Spanish admiral, Don Antonio de Oquendo, the son of the Don Miguel de Oquendo who had served in the Armada, took refuge in the Downs. His Government was acting by arrangement with the king's, and he had reason to believe that he would be helped, or would at least be protected from attack, in English waters. As a matter of fact, King Charles made an effort, which no Englishman can think of without shame, to turn the necessities of the Spaniards into ready money, by alternately offering to let the Dutch destroy them, or to afford them protection, according to which of the courses he happened to think would prove most profitable. Northumberland, in London, could not make out what the king would be at, and said so to Pennington, who was at Dover with a squadron far too weak to inspire any respect in the Dutch. They, again, were encouraged by the great French Minister Richelieu, who was now triumphantly carrying out his anti-Spanish policy, and were commanded by a man for whose courage no risk was too great, the indomitable Martin Harpertz (Herbertson) Tromp. The peddling vacillations of the unlucky English king were all cut short, and his hopes of profit blown to the four winds of heaven, when Tromp on the 11th of October fell upon the Spaniards, and destroyed at least three-fourths of them, with the most absolute and insolent disregard of Pennington's squadron. The great Ship-money Fleet, for the sake of which the poor king had strained his prerogative and had forfeited so much of the confidence of his subjects, had proved totally incapable of defending the honour of England when it was seriously attacked, though no doubt it had been able to extort a few fees from the skippers of Dutch herring busses.