“Well,” says Drake, pulling out his purse, “we’ll walk down now and see about these young hotheads. As I live, they are setting to tow the ships out already!—breaking the men’s backs overnight to make them fight the lustier in the morning! Well, well, they haven’t sailed round the world, John Hawkins.” And John Hawkins, with a hearty “bye-bye” to the bystanders, waddles off with the remark, “We’re going to blow the Dons up now in earnest.” “Night sank upon the dusky beach and o’er the purple sea; Such night in England ne’er has been, nor e’er again shall be! From Eddystone to Berwick bounds, from Lynn to Milford Bay, That time of slumber was as bright and busy as the day.” Meanwhile the lordly fleet of Spain, swelling in white clouds of sail to the heavens, speeds on towards the shores of our threatened land. Why, you ask, is the Spaniard bent on invading England? Who does not know something of the exploits of the sea-dogs—how they harried King Philip’s territories in America, and how no treasure ship put out from the ports save in fear and trembling? Philip, the most powerful monarch of Europe, and the champion of the Pope, had been hard hit by Drake and his fellows. He saw clearly that unless England were crushed he could not retain his empire in the New World. Further, his Flemish subjects were in desperate revolt against him, and English troops had now joined them. How he hated England! She should bite the dust, and he would stake the whole strength of his kingdom, the wealth of the two Indies, the flower of Spanish chivalry on the enterprise. It was a Crusade—nothing less. The Pope had excommunicated the heretic Elizabeth, and the martyred Queen of Scots had bequeathed England to him on the scaffold. Holy Church would fight for him, and victory was already assured. So every dockyard in Spain rang with the hammers of shipwrights, and all Latin Christendom sent him volunteers. The sea was covered with vessels freighted with arms and provisions streaming to the mouth of the Tagus. Cadiz harbour was thronged with transports, provision ships, powder vessels—a hundred sail of them—many of a thousand tons and over, loading with stores for the Armada.