Just before his departure Drake nailed upon a “faire great poste” a plate “whereupon were engraven her Majesties name, the day, and yeere of our arrivall there, with the free giving up of the province and people into her Majesties hands, together with her highnesses picture and armes, in a peace of sixe pence of current English money under [beneath] the plate, whereunder was also written the name of our Generall.” And to this record the chronicler adds, to clinch the English claim, “It seemeth that the Spaniards hitherto had never bene in this part of the Countrey, neither did ever discover the land by many degrees to the Southwards of this place.”
While in the “New Albion” port the “Golden Hind” was careened and refitted, so that she finally sailed on the next stage of her voyage in excellent condition. The port was left on the twenty-third of July, the kind natives, who parted with the Englishmen most reluctantly, keeping up fires on the hills as the ship ploughed her way, now westward, perforce with a northwest wind, into the trackless sea.
The next day the Farallones, directly west of San Francisco Bay, were passed, Drake calling them the “Islands of St. James.” After these islands were lost to view they sailed without sight of land for more than two months, or sixty-eight days, when they fell in with “certain islands 8 degrees Northward of the line,” supposed to have been the Pellew Islands. Only a brief stay was made here, and the natives were found so untrustworthy that Drake disgustedly named the group the “Islands of Thieves.” In October they were among the Philippines, and watered off Mindanao. Thence pursuing their way southward, in November they had come to the “Spice Islands.”
At Tenate, where they first anchored, they spent three weeks, the while receiving flattering attentions from the native king, with great show of barbaric splendour. Drake began the exchange of courtesies the morning after his arrival by sending a messenger to the king bearing a velvet cloak as a present to him and also as a token that the Englishmen were here in peace, requiring nothing but traffic. The king responded graciously, and sending Drake a signet, he offered himself and his kingdom to the service of the queen of England. Afterward he made a formal call at the ship. Preceding him there came four great canoes bringing out his men of state and their retinues. The dignitaries were all attired in “white lawne of cloth of Calicut,” and sat in the order of their rank beneath an awning of thin perfumed mats on a frame of reeds. With those in each canoe were “divers young and comely men,” also dressed in white. Guarding them were lines of soldiers, standing, on either side. Without the soldiers were the rowers, sitting in galleries, four score in each gallery, of which there were three rising one above the other and extending out from the canoe’s sides three or four yards. All of the canoes were armed, and most of their passengers carried their weapons, the dignitaries or their young attendants each with sword, target, and dagger, the soldiers bearing lances, calivers, darts, and bows and arrows. Reaching the ship the canoes were rowed around her in order one after another, while the dignitaries “did their homage with great solemnity.” The king followed, accompanied by six “grave and ancient persons,” all of whom “did their obeisance with marveilous humilitie.” The king seemed most delighted with the music of the ship’s band.
The next day a deputation composed of several of the gentlemen in the ship’s company, the vice-king being retained aboard as hostage, received a great entertainment ashore. They were conducted with great honour to the “castle,” where, the chronicler avers, were at least a thousand persons assembled. Sixty “grave personages,” said to be the king’s council, sat in seats of honour. Presently the king entered, walking beneath a rich canopy and guarded by twelve “launces.” He was sumptuously attired in a garment of cloth of gold depending from his waist to the ground. His legs were bare, but on his feet were shoes of cordovan skin. His head was topped with finely wreathed hooped rings of gold. About his neck was a gold chain in great links. On his fingers were six jewels. He took his chair of state, and a page standing at his right began “breathing and gathering the ayre” with a gorgeous fan, “in length two foote, and in breadth one foote, set with 8 saphyres, richly imbroidered, and knit to a staffe 3 foote in length.” At the conclusion of their entertainment Drake’s men were escorted back to their ship by one of the king’s council.
From Ternate, with an abundance of cloves added to their rich cargo, they sailed to the southward of Celebes, and anchored off a small uninhabited island, where they remained twenty-six days refreshing themselves, and meanwhile graving the ship (cleaning the ship’s bottom). Again underway, after sighting Celebes, by contrary winds they became entangled among islands and barely escaped wreck on a rock. They escaped only by lighting the ship of three tons of their precious cloves and several pieces of ordnance, and the sudden coming of a “happy gale” which blew them off. In February they fell in with the fruitful island of “Barateve” (Batjan), where they rested three days enjoying the hospitality of the friendly people and repairing the ship. Thence their course was set for Java major. Here they arrived in March, and also met much courtesy from the natives, with “honourable entertainment” by the rajahs then governing the island. From Java they steered for the Cape of Good Hope. This they passed in June. They found it not at all the dangerous cape that the Portuguese had reported, but a “most stately thing,” and the finest cape they had seen in all their travels. A month later they were at Sierra Leone. Here they stopped long enough to take in fresh provisions. Then setting sail for the last time, they finally arrived at their home port in England on the third of November, 1580, after an absence of three years.
Their arrival with their astonishing freight of riches in gold, silver, pearls, precious stones, silks, spices, and with their amazing tales of adventure, was a momentous event. All England was stirred by the story of the marvellous voyage. At first men of affairs were chary and avoided a recognition of Drake’s achievements, knowing that they must lead to complications with Spain. The queen withheld her approbation while an official inquiry into his conduct was proceeding. In the meantime some critics in high places raised a clamour against him, and termed him the “Master Thief of the Unknown World.” But, with the increasing tension in the relations between the two nations, sentiment changed. On the fourth of April, 1581, five months after his return, the queen visited him in state on the “Golden Hind,” now at Deptford, and at the close of a banquet on the deck of the famous ship, she formally knighted him for his services, and conferred upon him a coat of arms and a crest. At the same time she gave directions for the preservation of the “Golden Hind,” as a monument to his own and England’s glory. So this ship remained for more than a century. Then, having fallen into decay, she was broken up, and from remnants of her frame a chair was made which found a permanent place in the Bodleian Library at Oxford.
Drake made no more voyages of discovery. His subsequent exploits on the sea were all for the harassment of Spain. In 1585 he was admiral, with Martin Frobisher vice-admiral, as we have seen, of a fleet sent to intercept the Spanish galleons from the West Indies, and to “revenge the wrongs” offered England by Spain. In 1587 he sailed a fleet to Lisbon and there burned many ships, which he termed “singeing the King of Spain’s beard.” In 1588 he was the resourceful vice-admiral of the great fleet against the Spanish Armada. In 1589 he commanded the fleet sent to restore Dom Antonio to the throne of Portugal. Lastly, he was with his old leader, Sir John Hawkins, again in the West Indies and on the Spanish Main.
And here, in 1595, he died, on board his own ship, near Nombre de Dios, the object of his first assault in his first voyage of reprisal, a quarter of a century before.