Do you remember what happened in 1588? This was the year of the Invincible Armada, when England had to prepare ships and sailors and soldiers to protect herself from the Spanish. What help did London give? She was asked for fifteen ships and five thousand men. "Give us two days," said her citizens, "to consider what we can do"; and in two days they answered, "We will send thirty ships and ten thousand men to serve our country."
London, then, had certainly plenty of ships; and many a sea-captain besides Frobisher sailed down the river past Placentia on his way to some far-off port; for London merchants were eager to trade with all parts of the world; and after the defeat of the Spanish Armada they knew that the wide ocean, east and west, lay open before them. No Spaniard now could forbid English ships to sail on any sea.
Drake had seen for himself and had brought home word of the spices and great wealth of the East Indies. But they were very far off, and the cost of fitting out ships for so long a voyage was very great; great, too, were the dangers these ships would have to face—dangers of sea and storm, of savage people and an unknown land; could any one merchant risk so much? The Lord Mayor called together some London merchants to consider this question, and they answered, "The losses which would ruin one would hardly be felt if borne by many; let us, then, form a company to trade with the East." Thus began the East India Company; its birthday was the very last day of the sixteenth century. It had at first only four ships and less than five hundred men; before it came to an end, two hundred and fifty-eight years later, it was ruling nearly all India.
I have another story to tell you which began nearly twenty years before the East India Company's birthday. In December, 1581, a young man came to Placentia, bringing letters to the Queen from her soldiers in Ireland, where there had been war and great trouble. He was carefully dressed and wore a new plush cloak, for this was, I think, his first visit to Court, and the Queen loved to see everyone about her well and beautifully dressed. Perhaps he had only just arrived; perhaps the Queen had been out in her barge and was coming up from the riverside to her palace; however it may have been, she came to a very muddy place in the road, which is not at all surprising, since in December there is often a great deal of rain. The Queen looked at the puddles and stopped, and the young man sprang forward, swept his plush cloak from his shoulders and spread it over the mud for her to step on that so she might pass on without soiling her shoes. I feel sure you know the young man's name—it was Walter Raleigh. Is it any wonder that he became a great favourite with the Queen? An old story says that soon after this he wrote with a diamond on the glass of a window in the palace:—
"Fain would I climb, yet fear to fall."
And the Queen saw it, and wrote beneath it:—
"If thy heart fail thee, climb not at all."
His heart did not fail him; he became captain of her Guard, and he rose higher and higher in her service.
Raleigh was the first Englishman to think how splendid it would be if some of his countrymen would go to America and make homes for themselves there, and so build up a greater England beyond the seas. He sent out ships to explore, and twice he sent out men to settle in the new land. Some the Indians killed; some found the work of building houses and clearing away the forests far harder than they had expected; and the Indians often attacked them, and food was sometimes so scarce they almost died of hunger. Do you wonder they lost heart and came back to England? Thus it seemed that Raleigh's plan quite failed; but it did not really, for about twenty years later, a company, like the East India Company, was formed, called the Virginia Company. It sent out some settlers who sailed from London in the year 1606, and they did what Raleigh's men had failed to do—built themselves homes, and cleared and tilled the land. Thus began the British Dominions beyond the Seas.