Sir John Moore is not the only Englishman with whose name Coruña is closely connected in the minds of the Spaniards. In the year 1589, Sir Francis Drake came with sixty ships, landed English troops at Coruña, and took possession of the convent of Santo Domingo, which was situated on the highest point in the town. He fortified the building, manned it with English soldiers, and built batteries around it, intending to subdue the town; but all his attempts to do so were frustrated by the courage and patriotism of a woman--Maria Pita. Drake was eventually compelled to retire with a loss of fifteen thousand men, but he set fire to the convent before evacuating it, and it was burned to the ground. Ever since that time Coruña has celebrated yearly, in the month of August, a popular festival of a religious character which is called _Fiestas de Maria Pita_. Maria Pita, sometimes called Maria Fernandez de Pita, was a poor woman from the street, who, seizing the sword of a dead soldier, gathered the people of Coruña together and inspired them with courage to resist Drake. In fact, it was she who, sword in hand, led the attack which forced Drake and the troops under General Henry Noris to abandon their position and quit the town. In her honour the chief square in Coruña is called _Plaza de Maria Pita_. Every year the best preacher obtainable is invited to preach a carefully prepared sermon to the people of Coruña in the church of St. George (the largest church in the town) on the subject of Maria Pita’s victory over Sir Francis Drake. There is not a child in the province who has not heard of the courage and dauntless bravery of Maria Pita. She is one of Spain’s heroines. Five years after Drake’s departure, in the reign of Philip II., a new convent was begun upon the site of the one that had been destroyed. It was completed in the reign of Philip III. It is dedicated to the Virgin of the Rosary, the patron saint of the town.[189]