Less favourable pictures of Drake have been penned, and there is no doubt that some of his virtues have been greatly exaggerated. At the present day there is perhaps too great a tendency to reverse the process. Stripped of romance, many of his actions were petty, while those of some of his fellow adventurers merit a harsher name. Hawkins, for instance, was hand-in-glove with Spanish smugglers and a slave trader. Many of the victories of the Elizabethan “Sea-Kings” were really trifling little affairs, magnified into an importance which they never possessed. But, when all is said and done, it is in these men that we find the birth of a sea spirit which still lingers on, despite that other insular spirit previously referred to--the natural tendency of islanders to regard the water itself as a bulwark, instead of the medium on which to meet and defeat the enemy. The Spanish, already considerably incensed by the piratical acts of the English “gentlemen adventurers,” presently found a further cause of grievance in the assistance rendered by Elizabeth to their revolting provinces in the Netherlands. Drake had not returned many years from his famous voyage when it became abundantly clear that the Spaniards no longer intended quietly to suffer from English interference. Spain at that time was regarded as the premier naval power of Europe. Her superiority was more mythical than actual, for reasons which will later on be referred to: however, her commercial oversea activities were very great. The wealth which she wrung from the Indies--though probably infinitely less than its supposed value--was sufficient to enable her to equip considerable naval forces, certainly larger ones numerically than any which England alone was able to bring against them. Knowledge of the fact that Spain was preparing the Armada for an attack on England, led to the sailing of Drake in April, 1587, with a fleet consisting of four large and twenty-six smaller ships, for the hire of which the citizens of London were nominally or actually responsible. His real instructions are not known, but there is little question that, as in all similar expeditions, he started out knowing that his success would be approved of, although in the event of any ill-success or awkward questions, he would be publicly disavowed. Reaching Cadiz, he destroyed 100 store ships which he found there; and then proceeding to the Tagus, offered battle to the Spanish war fleet. The Spanish admiral, however, declined to come out--a fact which of itself altogether discredits the popular idea about the vast all-powerful ships of Spain, and the little English ships, which, in the Armada days, could have done nothing against them but for a convenient tempest. On account of this expedition of Drake’s, the sailing of the Armada was put off for a year. So far as stopping the enterprise was concerned, Drake’s expedition was a failure. Armada preparations still went on.