At length, however, the formalities were completed, and on June 11, 1578, letters to Gilbert passed the seals for planting an English colony in America.[29] This detailed charter of colonization is most interesting, since it contains several provisions which reappear in many later charters. Gilbert was invested with all title to the soil within two hundred leagues of the place of settlement, and large governmental authority was given him. To the crown were reserved only the allegiance of the settlers and one-fifth of all the gold and silver to be found. Yet upon Gilbert's power two notable limitations were imposed: the colonists were to enjoy "all the privileges of free denizens and persons native of England"; and the protection of the nation was withheld from any license granted by Gilbert "to rob or spoil by sea or by land." Sir Humphrey lost no time in assembling a fleet, but it was not till November 19, 1578, that he finally sailed from Plymouth with seven sail and three hundred and eighty-seven men, one of the ships being commanded by Raleigh. The subsequent history of the expedition is only vaguely known. The voyagers got into a fight with a Spanish squadron and a ship was lost.[30] Battered and dispirited as the fleet was, Gilbert had still Drake's buccaneering expedient open to him; but, loyal to the injunctions of the queen's charter, he chose to return, and the expedition broke up at Kinsale, in Ireland.[31] In this unfortunate voyage Gilbert buried the mass of his fortune, but, undismayed, he renewed his enterprise. He was successful in enlisting a large number of gentlemen in the new venture, and two friends who invested heavily--Sir Thomas Gerard, of Lancaster, and Sir George Peckham, of Bucks--he rewarded by enormous grants of land and privileges.[32] Raleigh adventured L2000 and contributed a ship, the _Ark Raleigh_;[33] but probably no man did more in stirring up interest than Richard Hakluyt, the famous naval historian, who about this time published his _Divers Voyages_, which fired the heart and imagination of the nation.[34] In 1579 an exploring ship was sent out under Simon Ferdinando, and the next year another sailed under John Walker. They reached the coast of Maine, and the latter brought back the report of a silver-mine discovered near the Penobscot.[35] [Footnote 1: Cf. Bourne, _Spain in America_, chap. xvi.] [Footnote 2: Cf. Cheyney, _European Background of American History_, chap. v.] [Footnote 3: Prescott, _Hist. of the Reign of Philip II._, III., 443.] [Footnote 4: Ibid., chaps, xi., xii.] [Footnote 5: Maine Hist. Soc., _Collections_, 2d series, II., 59.] [Footnote 6: Hakluyt, _Discourse on Western Planting_.] [Footnote 7: Robertson, _Works_ (ed. 1818), XI., 136.] [Footnote 8: _Nova Britannia_ (Force, _Tracts_, I., No. vi.).] [Footnote 9: Purchas, _Pilgrimes_ (ed. 1625), III., 809; Hakluyt, _Voyages_ (ed. 1809), III., 167-174.] [Footnote 10: Hakluyt, _Voyages_, III., 171; IV., 198.]