Cassell's History of England, Vol. 2 (of 8) / From the Wars of the Roses to the Great Rebellion

by Anonymous

CHAPTER XV.

REIGN OF ELIZABETH (concluded).

State of Europe on the Death of Mary—Preparations of Philip of Spain—Exploits of English Sailors—Drake Singes the King of Spain's Beard—Preparations against the Armada—Loyalty of the Roman Catholics—Arrival of the Armada in the Channel—Its Disastrous Course and Complete Destruction—Elizabeth at Tilbury—Death of Leicester—Persecution of the Puritans and Catholics—Renewed Expeditions against Spain—Accession of Henry of Navarre to the French Throne—He is helped by Elizabeth—Essex takes Cadiz—His Quarrels with the Cecils—His Second Expedition and Rupture with the Queen—Troubles in Ireland—Essex appointed Lord-Deputy—His Failure—The Essex Rising—Execution of Essex—Mountjoy in Ireland—The Debate on Monopolies—Victory of Mountjoy—Weakness of Elizabeth—Her last illness and Death.

Among all these equivocations Elizabeth displayed her usual ability, and prevented the only thing which she feared—a coalition between Scotland, France, and Spain, to avenge the death of the Scottish queen. James of Scotland was readily checked, being of a pusillanimous character, and fonder of money than of the life and honour of his mother. Henry III. of France, as Elizabeth well knew, was too much beset by difficulties to be formidable. His course was now fast running to a close. Civil war was raging in his kingdom; and we may here anticipate a little to take a view of his end. His feud with the Guises grew to such a pitch, that, to rid himself of them, he determined to assassinate their leaders, the duke and cardinal, the cousins of the late Queen of Scots. For this purpose, near the close of 1588, he assembled a body of assassins in the Castle of Blois, where he privately distributed daggers to forty-five of them. The Duke of Guise was invited to the fatal feast, and murdered at the very door of the king's chamber (December 23). The next day his brother, the cardinal, was also slain. But this infamous action only procured the destruction of Henry himself. The Papists, exasperated by the murder of their chiefs, were infuriated. The Pope excommunicated the king, and the clergy absolved the people from their oath of allegiance; and on August 2, 1589, Henry was assassinated by a fanatic monk of the name of Jacques Clement, whilst besieging his own capital.

But not so readily was Philip of Spain disposed of. He was crafty and powerful, and remembered the conduct of Elizabeth, who, from the very commencement of her reign, while professing friendship and high regard for him, had done all in her power to strip him of the Netherlands. She had supported his insurgent subjects with both money and troops; and at this time her favourite, Leicester, at the head of an army, was enjoying the rule of the revolted territory called the United Provinces, as governor-general. Not only in Europe, but in the new regions of South America, she carried on the same system of invasion and plunder by some of the greatest naval captains of the age—all still without any declaration of war. Besides, Mary had left to him her claim on the English throne, and Philip had accepted it, thereby alienating the King of Scotland. Philip did not hesitate to denounce Elizabeth as a murderer, and excited amongst his subjects a most intense hatred of her, both as a heretic and a woman oppressive and unjust, and stained with kindred and regal blood. In vain did she attempt to mollify his resentment by recalling Leicester from the Netherlands, and alluring a native prince, the Prince of Orange, to take his place. She opened, through Burleigh, negotiations with Spain, and sent a private mission to the Prince of Parma, in the Netherlands. There was a great suspicion in the minds of the Dutch and Flemings that she meant to give up the cause of Protestantism there, and to sell the cautionary towns which she held to Spain. But fortunately for them, Philip was too much incensed to listen to her overtures, and had now made up his mind to the daring project of invading England. News of actual preparations for this purpose on a vast scale convinced Elizabeth that pacification was hopeless, and she resumed her predatory measures against Spain and its colonies.

To obtain a clear idea of the causes which, independent of the continual attempts of Elizabeth to break the yoke of Spain in the Low Countries, had so exasperated Philip, we must refer to the marauding expeditions of Hawkins, Cavendish, and Drake—men whose names have descended to our day as types of all that is enterprising, daring, and successful in the naval heroes of England. They were men who, like most of the prominent persons of that time, had no very nice ideas of international justice or honesty, but had courage which shrank from no attempt, however arduous, and ability to achieve what even now are regarded as little short of miracles. Whilst in Europe they were Royal commanders, in the distant seas of America they were, to all intents and purposes, pirates and buccaneers.

Sir John Hawkins has the gloomy fame of being the originator of the African slave trade (1562). He made three voyages to the African coast, where he bartered his goods for cargoes of negroes, which he carried to the Spanish settlements in America, and sold them for hides, sugar, ginger, and pearls. This traffic, which afterwards increased to such terrific and detestable dimensions, was so extremely profitable that Elizabeth fitted out two ships and sent them under his command. On this his third voyage, however, Hawkins was surprised by the Spanish admiral in the Bay of St. Juan de Ulloa. A desperate engagement took place, and Hawkins's fleet, with all his treasure, was captured or destroyed except two, one of which afterwards went down at sea, the only one returning home being a little bark of fifty tons, called Judith, and commanded by one Francis Drake. Elizabeth, of course, lost her whole venture in the slave trade.

But this Francis Drake, destined to win a great name, could not rest under the defeat in the bay of Ulloa and the loss of his booty. He obtained interest enough to fit out a little fleet, and also made three voyages, like Hawkins, to the Spanish American settlements. In the logic of that age, it was quite right to plunder any people of a particular nation in return for a loss by aggrieved persons of another nation; and Drake felt himself authorised to seize Spanish property wherever he could find it. In his first two voyages he was not eminently successful; but the third, in 1572, made him ample amends. He took and plundered the town of Nombre de Dios, captured about 100 little vessels in the Gulf of Mexico, and made an expedition inland, where, ascending a mountain in Darien, he caught sight of the Pacific, and became inflamed with a desire to sail into that sea and plunder the Spanish settlements there. He captured in March of 1573 a convoy of mules laden with gold and silver, and in October reached England with his plunder.

This success awoke the cupidity of his countrymen. Elizabeth embarked 1,000 crowns in a fresh expedition, which was supported by Walsingham, Hatton, and others of her ministers. In 1577 Drake set out for the Spanish Main with five ships and 160 men. In this voyage he pursued steadily his great idea of adventures in the Pacific, coasted the Brazils, passed the straits of Magellan, and reached Santiago, from which place to Lima he found the coast unprotected, and took the vessels and plundered the towns at will. Among his prizes was a Spanish merchantman of great value, which he captured in the spring of 1579. By this time, however, the Spaniards had sent out a squadron to meet and intercept him at the straits; and Drake, becoming aware of it, took the daring resolution of sailing to the Moluccas, and so home by the Cape of Good Hope. The hardihood of this determination we can scarcely at this day realise, for it implied the circumnavigation of the globe, which had never yet been accomplished, Magellan himself having perished on his voyage at the Philippines. Drake, however, reached Plymouth safely, on the 3rd of November, 1580, after a voyage of three years. The dangers and hardships which he had endured in this unprecedented exploit may be conceived from the fact that only one of his five vessels reached home with him; but that vessel contained a treasure of £800,000.

Elizabeth was in a great strait. The wealth which Drake had brought, and of which she expected an ample share, was too agreeable a thing to allow her to quarrel with the acquirer; but the ravages which he had committed on a Power not openly at war with her, were too flagrant to be acknowledged. For four months, therefore, Drake remained without any public acknowledgment of his services, further than his ship being placed in the dock at Plymouth, as a trophy of his bold circumnavigation of the globe. At length the queen consented to be present at a banquet which Drake gave on board, and she there broke from her duplicity by knighting him on the spot (1581). A tithe of the enormous amount of money was distributed as prize among the officers and men; the Spanish ambassador, who had laid claim to the whole as stolen property, was appeased by a considerable sum; and the huge remainder was shared by the queen, her favourites, and the fortunate commander.