"When the Emperor's sister, the spouse of Spain, with a fleet of one hundred and thirty sail, stoutly and proudly passed the narrow seas, your Lordship, accompanied by ten ships only of her Majesty's Royal Navy, environed their fleet in most strange and warlike sort, enforced them to stoop gallant and to vail their bonnets for the Queen of England, and made them perfectly to understand that old speech of the Prince of Poets, Virgil,
'Non illi imperium pelagi sævumque tridentem,
Sed tibi sorte datum."
('It was not to him that fate had given the Empire of the deep and the fell trident, but to thee.')
"Yet after they had acknowledged their duty, your Lordship, on her Majesty's behalf, conducted her safely through our English Channel, and performed all good offices of honour and humanity to that foreign Princess."
No doubt this proud demand for homage to the flag of England went far to secure for Lord Charles the post of Lord High Admiral in 1585. For relations between Spain and England were growing ever more strained, and war conducted at first by private adventurers was bound to issue in a national contest. The Queen began to prepare for this by purchasing arms and powder abroad. She had many pieces of great ordnance of brass and iron cast, and luckily a rich vein of stone was found in Cumberland, near Keswick, which helped much in the works for making brass. How patriotic our forefathers were can be seen by the cheerful way in which both nobles and peasants helped in providing weapons.
In every nobleman's house complete armouries were provided, private individuals built ships-of-war, and poor men flocked to the ports to offer their services. When Spain insolently warned off all the English from trading with America, when she instigated revolt in Ireland, and hired assassins to murder Elizabeth, patriotism was awakened from a long sleep. The near approach of danger had evoked the nation's dormant spirit and indomitable courage.
When the Prince of Orange had been assassinated and the Prince of Parma had taken Antwerp, Elizabeth hesitated no longer to conclude a treaty with the Netherlands against their Spanish oppressors, and issued a long statement of the reasons for so doing. Other Christian princes admired such manly fortitude in a woman. The King of Sweden said she had taken the crown from her head and adventured it upon the chance of war.
There was no need in those days to compel the men to bear arms and defend their country. Englishmen were not then devoted to sports and games, but hastened from north to south to offer their maligned Queen bands of horse and foot. Amongst the first was Lord Montague, a Roman Catholic peer, with two hundred horsemen led by his own sons, and with them a young child, very comely, seated on his pony, the eldest son to his lordship's heir; so there were grandfather, father, and son at one time on horseback before the Queen, ready to do her service.
There were many Roman Catholics who remained loyal, and not least among them was Lord Charles Howard, who had been for many months looking after the welfare of the fleet, seeing all was in good order, and now and then issuing out to check or pursue pirates.
"The Queen," we are told by Fuller, "had a great persuasion of his fortunate conduct, and knew him to be of a moderate and noble courage, skilful in sea matters, wary and provident, valiant and courageous, industrious and active, and of great authority and esteem among sailors."