The need for Philip's neutrality was not what it had been, and so Hawkins was allowed to sail, and was again permitted to hire the queen's ships. That his expedition was of the nature of an act of hostility to Spain was a matter of public notoriety. The Spanish ambassador protested against it as against other acts of piracy, but to no kind of purpose. So little was Hawkins restrained, that he was allowed to combine with some of the "Beggars of the Sea" for the purpose of plundering some Spanish ships which took refuge in Plymouth Sound while he was lying there with his squadron. In high hopes, and with the sense that, however the queen might refuse to justify his actions in form, she would certainly afford him effectual protection, Hawkins sailed on his third voyage, which ended so disastrously, in October 1567. The earlier part of the voyage was spent in the usual round of kidnapping on the coast of Africa and smuggling in the Spanish ports of the West Indies and the Main. When only a remnant of his cargo of slaves remained, Hawkins departed from his previous course and steered for the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico to the little island of St. Juan de Ulloa, which forms the harbour of La Vera Cruz, then, and now, the port of Mexico. He excused himself for sailing into this harbour by his customary fiction, alleging that his ships had been injured by bad weather, and must be refitted before he could venture to return to Europe. But this story can hardly have been told with the slightest expectation that it would be believed. Indeed, Hawkins was so thoroughly well aware that the Spaniards would see through his very transparent defence, that on his way across the Gulf of Mexico he captured a Spanish vessel, and held her crew and passengers as hostages. This was an act of undeniable piracy, and would have been so considered at any period of the world's history. In truth, it can only have been for form's sake that Hawkins put himself to the trouble of repeating his stock invention. It had come to this, that if the Spaniards were to make good their claim to keep the English from trading with their American possessions, they must show themselves strong enough to do it. For the present, Hawkins believed that the strength was on his side, and, but for an event which he cannot be blamed for not foreseeing, he might very well have turned out to be in the right.