Throwing the Spaniards off the scent by steering crooked courses Drake at last landed at what is now Drake's Bay, near the modern San Francisco, where the Indians, who had never even heard of any craft bigger than canoes, were lost in wonder at the _Golden Hind_ and none the less at the big fair-haired strangers, whom they took for gods. Drake, as always, was very kind to them, gave them rich presents, promised them the protection of his Queen, whose coins he showed them, and, pointing to the sky while his men were praying, tried to make them understand that the one true God was there and not on earth. They then crowned him with a head-dress of eagle's feathers, while he made them a speech, saying that he would call their country New Albion. California thus became the counterpart of Cape Breton, over which John Cabot had raised St. George's Cross eighty-two years before. Leaving the Indians in tears at his departure Drake crossed the Pacific to the Moluccas, where a vile Portuguese, with the suitable name of Lopez de Mosquito, had just killed the Sultan, who was then his guest, chopped up the body, and thrown the pieces into the sea, to show his contempt for the natives. Drake would have gladly helped the Sultan's son, Baber, if he had only had a few more men. But having no more than fifty-six left he could not risk war with the Portuguese among their own possessions. He did, however, make a treaty with Baber which was the foundation of all the English Far-Eastern trade. And here, as everywhere, he won the hearty good-will of the natives. After a narrow escape from being wrecked on an unknown reef, and other escapes from dangers which alone would fill a story book, the gallant _Golden Hind_ sailed into Plymouth Sound with ballast of silver and cargo of gold. "Is Her Majesty alive and well?" asked Drake of a fishing smack. "Ay, ay, that she is, my Master." So Drake wrote off to her at once and came to anchor beside what is now Drake's Island. He wished to know how things were going at Court before he went to London. The Queen wrote back to say she wished to see him, and that she would "view" some of the wonderful things he had brought back from foreign parts. Straight on this hint he went to town with jewels enough to soften any woman's heart. The Spanish ambassador was beside himself with rage; but in London "the people were swarming daily in the streets to behold their Captain Drake and vowing hatred to all that misliked him." To crown everything, the _Golden Hind_ came round to London, where she was the wonder of the day, and when the Queen herself went aboard to a state banquet at which she knighted the hero of the sea: "I bid thee rise, Sir Francis Drake!" CHAPTER X THE SPANISH ARMADA (1588) By 1580, the year of Drake's return, Spain and England were fast moving toward the war that had been bound to come ever since the Old World had found the riches of the New.