Twice did the English board, and twice were they driven out with great loss. Downton the rear-admiral was crippled for life, and Cave, who commanded the Earl's ship, was mortally wounded by a shot through both legs. To make the hideous scene worse, fire was thrown about and the Cinque Llagas caught and began to burn.
A Franciscan friar, Antonio, was seen standing with a crucifix in his hand, encouraging the crew to commit themselves to the waves and God's mercy, rather than die in the flames, and a vast number plunged into the sea. It is said that the English boats made no attempt to save these unfortunates, but the English themselves were on fire and were probably busy putting their own ships in order. But the rear-admiral's boat picked up Nuno Velho and some others; Nuno had been Governor of Mozambique and had been only recently shipwrecked and rescued by the Cinque Llagas. There were also on board two Portuguese ladies of high birth, Doña Isabel Pereira and her beautiful daughter, Doña Luiza de Mello. They had been wrecked in the Santo Alberto, and had since travelled through Kaffraria on foot nearly a thousand miles. The young lady was travelling home to take possession of her entailed property at Evora. In the confusion and panic they could get no attention, and fear of something worse than death urged them to fasten themselves together with a Franciscan cord and leap into the sea. Their bodies, so bound together, were at length cast up on the shore of the island of Fayal.
Nuno Velho and Braz Correa, captain of the Nazareth, were taken as prisoners to England, where the Earl treated them hospitably for a whole year. It was perhaps not wholly from kindly and unselfish motives, for in the end Nuno Velho paid three thousand cruzados for the ransom of both.
As for the Cinque Llagas, she burned all day and all night, but "the next morning her powder, being sixty barrels, blew her abroad, so that most of the ship did swim in parts above the water."
Towards the end of June they fell in with another great ship, which they at first took for S. Philip, the admiral of Spain, and were mighty cautious how they approached her guns. But seeing she was a carrack they bestowed on her some shot and summoned her to yield, unless she would undergo the same fate as the Five Wounds. But the Portuguese captain was a brave man and replied: "I acknowledge Don Philip, King of Spain, not the Queen of England. If the Earl of Cumberland has been at the burning of the Cinque Llagas, so have I, D. Luis Continho, been at the defeat and capture of Sir Richard Grenville in the Revenge. Do what you dare, Earl, for your Queen, and I, Luis, will do what I can for my King. My ship is homeward bound from India, laden with riches, and with many jewels on board. Come and take her if ye can."
The fight was renewed, but the English, having already many officers killed and wounded, and by reason of the "murmuring of some disordered and cowardly companions," sailed away for England, having done much harm to the enemy and little good to themselves.
So the Earl returned to England, and at once set about building a ship big enough to lie alongside any of the Spanish vessels; she was 900 tons, the largest ship ever yet built by a British subject. The Queen was so pleased by the Earl's spirit that she, at the launching of the big ship, gave it the name of the Scourge of Malice.
Her first voyage in 1595 was not a success, for as they reached Plymouth a command was received from her Majesty that the Earl should return. So he sent Captain Langton on, who took three Dutch ships that were carrying ammunition and provisions for the King of Spain, and returned to England.
The ninth expedition in 1596, led by the Earl in his new ship, with the Dreadnought of the Royal Navy, was also a failure; for a violent storm split the Earl's mainmast and he had to return home.
In 1597 the Earl obtained letters-patent authorising him to levy sea and land forces, and he began to prepare the largest expedition which had ever been undertaken by a private individual without royal help; it consisted of eighteen sail, and the Earl took the command in person.