Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4) - Frederick Whymper - Страница 27
CHAPTER XV.
The History of Ships and Shipping Interests.
ОглавлениеThe First Attempts to Float—Hollowed Logs and Rafts—The Ark and its Dimensions—Skin Floats and Basket-boats—Maritime Commerce of Antiquity—Phœnician Enterprise—Did they Round the Cape?—The Ships of Tyre—Carthage—Hanno’s Voyage to the West Coast of Africa—Egyptian Galleys—The Great Ships of the Ptolemies—Hiero’s Floating Palace—The Romans—Their Repugnance to Seafaring Pursuits—Sea Battles with the Carthaginians—Cicero’s Opinions on Commerce—Constantinople and its Commerce—Venice—Britain—The First Invasion under Julius Cæsar—Benefits Accruing—The Danish Pirates—The London of the Period—The Father of the British Navy—Alfred and his Victories—Canute’s Fleet—The Norman Invasion—The Crusades—Richard Cœur de Lion’s Fleet—The Cinque Ports and their Privileges—Foundation of a Maritime Code—Letters of Marque—Opening of the Coal Trade—Chaucer’s Description of the Sailors of his Time—A Glorious Period—The Victories at Harfleur—Henry V.’s Fleet of 1,500 Vessels—The Channel Marauders—The King-Maker Pirate—Sir Andrew Wood’s Victory—Action with Scotch Pirates—The Great Michael and the Great Harry—Queen Elizabeth’s Astuteness—The Nation never so well Provided—“The Most Fortunate and Invincible Armada”—Its Size and Strength—Elizabeth’s Appeal to the Country—A Noble Response—Effingham’s Appointment—The Armada’s First Disaster—Refitted, and Resails from Corunna—Chased in the Rear—A Series of Contretemps—English Volunteer Ships in Numbers—The Fire-ships at Calais—The Final Action—Flight of the Armada—Fate of Shipwrecked Spanish in Ireland—Total Loss to Spain—Rejoicings and Thanksgivings in England.
It will not now be out of place to take a rapid survey of the progress of naval architecture, from log and coracle to wooden walls and ironclads, noting rapidly the progressive steps which led to the present epoch.
It is only from the Scriptures, and from fragmentary allusions in the writings of profane historians and poets, that we can derive any knowledge of the vessels employed by the ancients. Doubtless our first parents noticed branches of trees or fragments of wood floating upon the surface of that “river” which “went out of Eden to water the garden;” and from this to the use of logs singly, or combined in rafts, or hollowed into canoes, would be an easy transition. The first boat was probably a mere toy model; and, likely enough, great was the surprise when it was discovered that its sides, though thin, would support a considerable weight in the water. The first specimen of naval architecture of which we have any description is unquestionably the ark, built by Noah. If the cubit be taken as eighteen inches, she was 450 feet long, 75 in breadth, and 45 in depth, whilst her tonnage, according to the present system of admeasurement, would be about 15,000 tons. It is more than probable that this huge vessel was, after all, little more than a raft, or barge, with a stupenduous house reared over it, for it was constructed merely for the purpose of floating, and needed no means of propulsion. She may have been, comparatively speaking, slightly built in her lofty upper works, her carrying capacity being thereby largely increased. Soon after the Flood, if not, indeed, before it, other means of flotation must have suggested themselves, such as the inflated skins of animals; these may be seen on the ancient monuments of Assyria, discovered by Layard, where there are many representations of people crossing rivers by this means. Next came wicker-work baskets of rushes or reeds, smeared with mud or pitch, similar to the ark in which Moses was found. Mr. Layard found such boats in use on the Tigris; they were constructed of twisted reeds made water-tight by bitumen, and were often large enough for four or five persons. Pliny says, in his time, “Even now in British waters, vessels of vine-twigs sewn round with leather are used.” The words in italics might be used were Pliny writing to-day. Basket-work coracles, covered with leather or prepared flannel, are still found in a few parts of Wales, where they are used for fording streams, or for fishing. Wooden canoes or boats, whether hollowed from one log or constructed of many parts, came next. The paintings and sculptures of Upper and Lower Egypt show regularly formed boats, made of sawn planks of timber, carrying a number of rowers, and having sails. The Egyptians were averse to seafaring pursuits, having extensive overland commerce with their neighbours.
The Phœnicians were, past all cavil, the most distinguished navigators of the ancient world, their capital, Tyre, being for centuries the centre of commerce, the “mart of nations.” Strange to say, this country, whose inhabitants were the rulers of the sea in those times, was a mere strip of land, whose average breadth never exceeded twelve miles, while its length was only 225 miles from Aradus in the north to Joppa in the south. Forced by the unproductiveness of the territory, and blessed with one or two excellent harbours, and an abundant supply of wood from the mountains of Lebanon, the Phœnicians soon possessed a numerous fleet, which not only monopolised the trade of the Mediterranean, but navigated Solomon’s fleets to the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, establishing colonies wherever they went. Herodotus states that a Phœnician fleet, which was fitted out by Necho, King of Egypt, even circumnavigated Africa, and gives details which seem to place it within the category of the very greatest voyages. Starting from the Red Sea, they are stated to have passed Ophir, generally supposed to mean part of the east coast of Africa, to have rounded the continent, and, entering the Mediterranean by the Pillars of Hercules, our old friends the Rocks of Gibraltar and Ceuta, to have reached Egypt in the third year of their voyage. Solomon, too, dispatched a fleet of ships from the Red Sea to fetch gold from Ophir. Diodorus gives at great length an account of the fleet said to be built by this people for the great Queen Semiramis, with which she invaded India. Semiramis was long believed by many to be a mythical personage; but Sir Henry Rawlinson’s interpretations of the Assyrian inscriptions have placed the existence of this queen beyond all doubt. In the Assyrian hall of the British Museum are two statues of the god Nebo, each of which bears a cuneiform inscription saying that they were made for Queen Semiramis by a sculptor of Nineveh. The commerce of Phœnicia must have been at its height when Nebuchadnezzar made his attack on Tyre. Ezekiel gives a description of her power about the year B.C. 588, when ruin was hovering around her. “Tyre,” says the prophet, “was a merchant of the people for many isles.” He states that her ship-boards were made of fir-trees of Senir; her masts of cedars from Lebanon; her oars of the oaks of Bashan; and the benches of her galleys of ivory, brought out of the isles of Chittim.
To the Tyrians also is due the colonisation of other countries, which, following the example of the mother-country, soon rivalled her in wealth and enterprise. The principal of these was Carthage, which in its turn founded colonies of her own, one of the first of which was Gades (Cadiz). From that port Hanno made his celebrated voyage to the west coast of Africa, starting with sixty ships or galleys, of fifty oars each. He is said to have founded six trading-posts or colonies. About the same time Hamilco went on a voyage of discovery to the north-western shores of Europe, where, according to a poem of Festus Avienus,129 he formed settlements in Britain and Ireland, and found tin and lead, and people who used boats of skin or leather. Aristotle tells us that the Carthaginians were the first to increase the size of their galleys from three to four banks of oars.
Under the dynasty of the Ptolemies the maritime commerce of Egypt rapidly improved. The first of these kings caused the erection of the celebrated Pharos or lighthouse at Alexandria, in the upper storey of which were windows looking seaward, and inside which fires were lighted by night to guide mariners to the harbour. Upon its front was inscribed, “King Ptolemy to God the Saviour, for the benefit of sailors.” His successor, Ptolemy Philadelphus, attempted to cut a canal a hundred cubits in width between Arsinoe, on the Red Sea, not far from Suez, to the eastern branch of the Nile. Enormous vessels were constructed at this time and during the succeeding reigns. Ptolemy, the son of Lagos, is said to have owned five hundred galleys and two thousand smaller vessels. Lucian speaks of a vessel that he saw in Egypt that was one hundred and twenty cubits long. Another, constructed by Ptolemy Philopator, is described by Calixenus, an Alexandrian historian, as two hundred and eighty cubits, say 420 feet, in length. She is said to have had four rudders, two heads, and two sterns, and to have been manned by 4,000 sailors (meaning principally oarsmen) and 3,000 fighting-men. Calixenus also describes another built during the dynasty of the Ptolemies, called the Thalamegus, or “carrier of the bed-chamber.” This leviathan was 300 feet in length, and fitted up with every conceivable kind of luxury and magnificence—with colonnades, marble staircases, and gardens; from all which it is easy to infer that she was not intended for sea-going purposes, but was probably an immense barge, forming a kind of summer palace, moored on the Nile. Plutarch in speaking of her says that she was a mere matter of curiosity, for she differed very little from an immovable building, and was calculated mainly for show, as she could not be put in motion without great difficulty and danger.
But the most prodigious vessel on the records of the ancients was built by order of Hiero, the second Tyrant of Syracuse, under the superintendence of Archimedes, about 230 years before Christ, the description of which would fill a small volume. Athenæus has left a description of this vast floating fabric. There was, he states, as much timber employed in her as would have served for the construction of fifty galleys. It had all the varieties of apartments and conveniences necessary to a palace—such as banqueting-rooms, baths, a library, a temple of Venus, gardens, fish-ponds, mills, and a spacious gymnasium. The inlaying of the floors of the middle apartment represented in various colours the stories of Homer’s “Iliad;” there were everywhere the most beautiful paintings, and every embellishment and ornament that art could furnish were bestowed on the ceilings, windows, and every part. The inside of the temple was inlaid with cypress-wood, the statues were of ivory, and the floor was studded with precious stones. This vessel had twenty benches of oars, and was encompassed by an iron rampart or battery; it had also eight towers with walls and bulwarks, which were furnished with machines of war, one of which was capable of throwing a stone of 300 pounds weight, or a dart of twelve cubits long, to the distance of half a mile. To launch her, Archimedes invented a screw of great power. She had four wooden and eight iron anchors; her mainmast, composed of a single tree, was procured after much trouble from distant inland mountains. Hiero finding that he had no harbours in Sicily capable of containing her, and learning that there was famine in Egypt, sent her loaded with corn to Alexandria. She bore an inscription of which the following is part:—“Hiero, the son of Hierocles, the Dorian, who wields the sceptre of Sicily, sends this vessel bearing in her the fruits of the earth. Do thou, O Neptune, preserve in safety this ship over the blue waves.”
FLEET OF ROMAN GALLEYS.
Among the Grecian states Corinth stood high in naval matters. Her people were expert ship-builders, and claimed the invention of the trireme, or galley with three tiers of oars. Athens, with its three ports, also carried on for a long period a large trade with Egypt, Palestine, and the countries bordering the Black Sea. The Romans had little inclination at first for seamanship, but were forced into it by their rivals of Carthage. It was as late as B.C. 261 before they determined to build a war-fleet, and had not a Carthaginian galley, grounded on the coast of Italy, been seized by them, they would not have understood the proper construction of one. Previously they had nothing much above large boats rudely built of planks. The noble Romans affected to despise commerce at this period, and trusted to the Greek and other traders to supply their wants. Quintus Claudius introduced a law, which passed, that no senator or father of one should own a vessel of a greater capacity than just sufficient to carry the produce of their own lands to market. Hear the enlightened Cicero on the subject of commerce. He observes that, “Trade is mean if it has only a small profit for its object; but it is otherwise if it has large dealings, bringing many sorts of merchandise from foreign parts, and distributing them to the public without deceit; and if after a reasonable profit such merchants are contented with the riches they have acquired, and purchasing land with them retire into the country, and apply themselves to agriculture, I cannot perceive wherein is the dishonour of that function.” Mariners were not esteemed by the Romans until after the great battle of Actium, which threw the monopoly of the lucrative Indian trade into their hands. Claudius, A.D. 41, deepened the Tiber, and built the port of Ostia; and about fifty years later Trajan constructed the ports of Civita Vecchia and Ancona, where commerce flourished. The Roman fleets were often a source of trouble to them. Carausius, who was really a Dutch soldier of fortune, about the year 280, seized upon the fleet he commanded, and crossed from Gessoriacum (Boulogne) to Britain, where he proclaimed himself emperor. He held the reins of government for seven years, and was at length murdered by his lieutenant. He was really the first to create a British manned fleet. In the reign of Diocletian, the Veneti, on the coast of Gaul, threw off the Roman yoke, and claimed tribute from all who appeared in their seas. The same emperor founded Constantinople, erected later, under Constantine, into the seat of government. This city seemed to be destined by nature as a great commercial centre; caravans placed it in direct communication with the East, and it was really the entrepôt of the world till its capture by the Venetians, in 1204. That independent republic had been then in a flourishing condition for over two hundred years, and for more than as many after, its people were the greatest traders of the world. It was at Venice in 1202 that some of the leading pilgrims assembled to negotiate for a fleet to be used in the fourth crusade. The crusaders agreed to pay the Venetians before sailing eighty-four thousand marks of silver, and to share with them all the booty taken by land or sea. The republic undertook to supply flat-bottomed vessels enough to convey four thousand five hundred knights, and twenty thousand soldiers, provisions for nine months, and a fleet of galleys.
“Surrounded by the silver streak,” our hardy forefathers often crossed to Ireland and France, prior to the first invasion of Britain by Julius Cæsar, B.C. 55, when he sailed from Boulogne with eighty vessels and 8,000 men, and with eighteen transports to carry 800 horses for the cavalry. In the second invasion he employed a fleet of 600 boats and twenty-five war-galleys, having with him five legions of infantry and 2,000 cavalry, a formidable army for the poor islanders to contend against. But their intercourse with the Romans speedily brought about commercial relations of importance. The pearl fisheries were then most profitable, while the “native” oyster was greatly esteemed by the Roman epicures, of whom Juvenal speaks in his fourth satire. He says they
“Could at one bite the oyster’s taste decide,
And say if at Circean rocks, or in
The Lucrine Lake, or on the coast of Richborough,
In Britain they were bred.”
British oysters were exported to Rome, as American oysters are now-a-days to England. Martial also mentions another trade in one of his epigrams, that of basket-making—
“Work of barbaric art, a basket, I
From painted Britain came; but the Roman city
Now calls the painted Briton’s art their own.”
The smaller description of boats, other than galleys, employed by the Romans for transporting their troops and supplies, were the kiulæ, called by the Saxons ceol or ciol, which name has come down to us in the form of keel, and is still applied to a description of barge used in the north of England. Thus
“Weel may the keel row,”
says the song, and on the “coaly Tyne,” a small barge carrying twenty-one tons four hundredweight is said to carry a “keel” of coals. The Romans must also have possessed large transport vessels, for within seventy or eighty years after they had gained a secure footing in this country, they received a reinforcement of 5,000 men in seventeen ships, or about 300 men, besides stores, to each vessel.
Bede places the final departure of the Romans from Britain in A.D. 409, or just before the siege of Rome by Attila. Our ancestors were now rather worse off than before, for they were left a prey to the Vikings—those bold, hardy, unscrupulous Scandinavian seamen of the north, who began to make piratical visits for the sake of plunder to the coasts of Scotland and England. They found their way to the Mediterranean, and were known and feared in every port from Iceland to Constantinople. Their galleys were propelled mainly by means of oars, but they had also small square sails to get help from a stern wind, and as they often sailed straight across the stormy northern seas, it is probable that they had made considerable progress in the rigging and handling of their ships. A plank-built boat was discovered a few years since in Denmark, which the antiquaries assign to the fifth century. It is a row-boat, measuring seventy-seven feet from stem to stern, and proportionately broad in the middle. The construction shows that there was an abundance of material and skilled labour. It is alike at bow and stern, and the thirty rowlocks are reversible, so as to permit the boat to be navigated with either end forward. The vessel is built of heavy planks overlapping each other from the gunwale to the keel, and cut thick at the point of juncture, so that they may be mortised into the cross-beams and gunwale, instead of being merely nailed. Very similar boats, light, swift, and strong, are still used in the Shetlands and Norway.
Little is known of the state of England from the departure of the Romans to the eighth century. The doubtful and traditionary landing of Hengist and Horsa with 1,500 men, “in three long ships,” is hardly worth discussing here. The Venerable Bede, who wrote about A.D. 750, speaks of London as “the mart of many nations, resorting to it by sea and land;” and he continues that “King Ethelbert built the church of St. Paul in the city of London, where he and his successors should have their episcopal see.” But the history of this period generally is in a hopeless fog. Still we know that London was now a thriving port. Cæsar, in his “Commentaries” distinctly states that his reason for attempting the conquest of England was on account of the vast supplies which his Gaulish enemies received from us, in the way of trade. The exports were principally cattle, hides, corn, dogs, and slaves, the latter an important item. Strabo observes that “our internal parts at that time were on a level with the African slave coasts.” “Britons never shall be slaves” could not therefore have been said in those days. London, long prior to the invasion of England by the Romans, was an existing city, and vessels paid dues at Billingsgate long before the establishment of any custom-house. Pennant tells us, in his famous work on London, “As early as 979, all the reign of Ethelred, a small vessel was to pay ad Bilynggesgate one halfpenny as a toll; a greater, bearing sails, one penny; a keel or hulk (ceol vel hulcus), fourpence; a ship laden with wood, one piece for toll; and a boat with fish, one halfpenny; or a larger, one penny. We had even now trade with France for its wines, for mention is made of ships from Rouen, who came here and landed them, and freed them from toll—i.e., paid their duties. What they amounted to I cannot learn.”
The Danes, having once a foot-hold, were never thoroughly expelled till the Norman conquest, and as a maritime race excelled all the nations of the north of Europe. They had two principal classes of vessels, the Drakers and Holkers, the former named from carrying a dragon on the bows, and bearing the Danish flag of the raven. The holker was at first a small boat, hollowed out of the trunk of a tree, but the word “hulk,” evidently derived from it, was used afterwards for vessels of larger dimensions. They had also another vessel called a Snekkar (serpent), strangely so named, for it was rather a short, stumpy kind of boat, not unlike the Dutch galliots of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Their piratical expeditions soon increased, and Wales and the island of Anglesey were frequently pillaged by them, while in Ireland they possessed the ports of Dublin, Waterford, and Cork, a Danish king reigning in the two first cities. But a king was to arise who would change all this—Alfred the Great and Good, the “Father of the British Navy.”
On the accession of Alfred the Great to the throne, he found England so over-run by the Danes, that he had, as every school-boy knows, to conceal himself with a few faithful followers in the forests. In his retirement he busied himself in devising schemes for ridding his country of the pirate marauders; and without much deliberation he saw that he must first have a maritime force of his own, and meet the enemies of England on the sea, which they considered their own especial element. He set himself busily to study the models of the Danish ships, and, aided by his hardy followers, stirred up a spirit of maritime ambition, which had not existed to any great extent before. At the end of four years of unremitting labour in the prosecution of his schemes, he possessed the nucleus of a fleet in six galleys, which were double the length of any possessed by his adversaries, and which carried sixty oars, and possessed ample space for the fighting men on board. With this fleet he put to sea, taking the command in person, and routed a marauding expedition of the Danes, then about to make a descent on the coast. The force was larger than his own; but he succeeded in capturing one and in driving off the rest. In the course of the next year or two he captured or sunk eighteen of the enemy’s galleys, and they found at last that they could not have it all their own way on the sea. About this time the cares of government occupied necessarily much of his time: his astute policy was to win over a number of the more friendly Danes to his cause, by giving them grants of land, and obliging them in return to assist in driving off aggressors. He was nearly the first native of England who made any efforts to extend the study of geography. According to the Saxon chronicler, Florence of Worcester, A.D. 897, he consulted Ohther, a learned Norwegian, and other authorities, from whom he obtained much information respecting the northern seas. Ohther had not only coasted along the shores of Norway, but had rounded the North Cape—it was a feat in those days, gentle reader, but now Cook’s tourists do it—and had reached the bay in which Archangel is situated. The ancient geographer gave Alfred vivid descriptions of the gigantic whales, and of the innumerable seals he had observed, not forgetting the terrible mäelstrom, the dangers of which he did not under-rate, and which it was generally believed in those days was caused by a horribly vicious old sea-dragon, who sucked the vessels under. He compared the natives to the Scythians of old, and was rather severe on them, as they brewed no ale, the poor drinking honey-mead in its stead, and the rich a liquor distilled from goats’ milk. Alfred not merely sent vessels to the north on voyages of discovery, but opened communication with the Mediterranean, his galleys penetrating to the extreme east of the Levant, whereby he was enabled to carry on a direct trade with India. William of Malmesbury mentions the silks, shawls, incense, spices, and aromatic gums which Alfred received from the Malabar coast in return for presents sent to the Nestorian Christians. Alfred constantly and steadily encouraged the science of navigation, and certainly earned the right of the proud title he has borne since of “Father of the British Navy.”
APPROACH OF THE DANISH FLEET.
Time passes and we come to Canute. On his accession to the throne as the son of a Danish conqueror, he practically put an end to the incursions and attacks of the northern pirates. The influence of his name was so great that he found it unnecessary to maintain more than forty ships at sea, and the number was subsequently reduced. So far from entertaining any fear of revolt from the English, or of any raid on his shores, he made frequent voyages to the Continent as well as to the north. He once proceeded as far as Rome, where he met the Emperor Conrad. II., from whom he obtained for all his subjects, whether merchants or pilgrims, complete exemption from the heavy tolls usually exacted on their former visits to that city. Canute was a cosmopolitan. By his conquest of Norway, not merely did he represent the English whom he had subjugated, and who had become attached to him, but the Danes, their constant and inveterate foes and rivals. He thus united under one sovereignty the principal maritime nations of the north.
And still the writer exerts the privilege conceded to all who wield the pen, of passing quickly over the pages of history. “The stories,” says a writer130 who made maritime subjects a peculiar study, “as to the number of vessels under the order of the Conqueror on his memorable expedition are very conflicting. Some writers have asserted that the total number amounted to no less than 3,000, of which six or seven hundred were of a superior order, the remainder consisting of boats temporarily built, and of the most fragile description. Others place the whole fleet at not more than 800 vessels of all sizes, and this number is more likely to be nearest the truth. There are now no means of ascertaining their size, but their form may be conjectured from the representation of these vessels on the rolls of the famous Bayeux tapestry. It is said that when William meditated his descent on England he ordered ‘large ships’ to be constructed for that purpose at his seaports, collecting, wherever these could be found, smaller vessels or boats, to accompany them. But even the largest must have been of little value, as the whole fleet were by his orders burned and destroyed, as soon as he landed with his army, so as to cut off all retreat, and to save the expense of their maintenance.” This would indicate that the sailors had to fight ashore, and may possibly have been intended to spur on his army to victory. Freeman states, in his “History of the Norman Conquest,” that he finds the largest number of ships in the Conqueror’s expedition, as compiled from the most reliable authorities, was 3,000, but some accounts put it as low as 693. Most of the ships were presents from the prelates or great barons. William FitzOsborn gave 60, the Count de Mortaine, 120; the Bishop of Bayeux, 100; and the finest of all, that in which William himself embarked, was presented to him by his own duchess, Matilda, and named the Mora. Norman writers of the time state that the vessels were not much to boast of, as they were all collected between the beginning of January and the end of August, 1066. Lindsay, who thoroughly investigated the subject, says that “The Norman merchant vessels or transports were in length about three times their breadth, and were sometimes propelled by oars, but generally by sails; their galleys appear to have been of two sorts—the larger, occasionally called galleons, carrying in some instances sixty men, well armed with iron armour, besides their oars. The smaller galleys, which are not specially described, doubtless resembled ships’ launches in size, but of a form enabling them to be propelled at a considerable rate of speed.” Boats covered with leather were even employed on the perilous Channel voyage.
SHIPS OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR. (From the Bayeux Tapestry.)
The Conqueror soon added to the security of the country by the establishment of the Cinque Ports, which, as their title denotes, were at first five, but were afterwards increased in number so as to include the following seaports:—Dover, Sandwich, Hythe, and Romsey, in Kent; and Rye, Winchelsea, Hastings, and Seaford, in Sussex. On their first establishment they were to provide fifty-two ships, with twenty-four men on each, for fifteen days each year, in case of emergency. In return they had many privileges, a part of which are enjoyed by them to-day. Their freemen were styled barons; each of the ports returned two members of Parliament. An officer was appointed over them, who was “Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports,” and also Constable of Dover Castle.
“For more than a hundred years after the Conquest,” says the writer just quoted, “England’s ships had rarely ventured beyond the Bay of Biscay on the one hand, and the entrance to the Baltic on the other; and there is no special record of long voyages by English ships until the time of the Crusades; which, whatever they might have done for the cause of the Cross, undoubtedly gave the first impetus to the shipping of the country. The number of rich and powerful princes and nobles who embarked their fortunes in these extraordinary expeditions offered the chance of lucrative employment to any nation which could supply the requisite amount of tonnage, and English shipowners very naturally made great exertions to reap a share of the gains.” One of the first English noblemen who fitted out an expedition to the Holy Land was the Earl of Essex; and twelve years afterwards, Richard Cœur de Lion, on ascending the throne, made vast levies on the people for the same object, joining Philip II. and other princes for the purpose of raising the Cross above the Crescent. Towards the close of 1189 two fleets had been collected, one at Dover, to convey Richard and his followers (among whom were the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Salisbury, and the Lord Chief Justice of England) across the Channel, and a second and still larger fleet at Dartmouth, composed of numbers of vessels from Aquitaine, Brittany, Normandy, and Poitou, for the conveyance of the great bulk of the Crusaders, to join Richard at Marseilles, whither he had gone overland with the French king and his other allies. The Dartmouth fleet, under the command of Richard de Camville and Robert de Sabloil, set sail about the end of April, 1190. It had a disastrous voyage, but at length reached Lisbon, where the Crusaders behaved so badly, and committed so many outrages, that 700 were locked up. After some delay, they sailed up the Mediterranean, reaching Marseilles, where they had to stop some time to repair their unseaworthy ships, and then followed the king to the Straits of Messina, where the fleets combined. It was not till seven months later that the fleet got under weigh for the Holy Land. It numbered 100 ships of larger kind, and fourteen smaller vessels called “busses.” Each of the former carried, besides her crew of fifteen sailors, forty soldiers, forty horses, and provisions for a twelvemonth. Vinisauf, who makes the fleet much larger, mentions that it proceeded in the following order:—three large ships formed the van; the second line consisted of thirteen vessels, the lines expanding to the seventh, which consisted of sixty vessels, and immediately preceded the king and his ships. On their way they fell in with a very large ship belonging to the Saracens, manned by 1,500 men, and after a desperate engagement took her. Richard ordered that all but 200 of those not killed in the action should be thrown overboard, and thus 1,300 infidels were sacrificed at one blow. Off Etna, Sicily, they experienced a terrific gale, and the crew got “sea-sick and frightened;” and off the island of Cyprus they were assailed by another storm, in which three ships were lost, and the Vice-Chancellor of England was drowned, his body being washed ashore with the Great Seal of England hanging round his neck. Richard did not return to England till after the capture of Acre, and the truce with Saladin; he landed at Sandwich, as nearly as may be, four years from the date of his start. As this is neither a history of England, nor of the Crusades, excepting only as either are connected with the sea, we must pass on to a subject of some importance, which was the direct result of experience gained at this period.
CRUSADERS AND SARACENS.
The foundation of a maritime code, by an ordinance of Richard Cœur de Lion, a most important step in the history of merchant shipping, was due to the knowledge acquired by English pilgrims, traders, and seamen at the time of the Crusades. The first code was founded on a similar set of rules then existing in France, known as the Rôles d’Oleron, and some of the articles show how loose had been the conditions of the sailor’s life previously. The first article gave a master power to pledge the tackle of a ship, if in want of provisions for the crew, but forbad the sale of the hull without the owner’s permission. The captain’s position, as lord paramount on board, was defined; no one, not even part-owners or super-cargoes, must interfere; he was expected to understand thoroughly the art of navigation. The second article declared that if a vessel was held in port through failure of wind or stress of weather, the ship’s company should be guided as to the best course to adopt by the opinion of the majority. Two succeeding articles related to wrecks and salvage. The fifth article provided that no sailor in port should leave the vessel without the master’s consent; if he did so, and any harm resulted to the ship or cargo, he should be punished with a year’s imprisonment, on bread and water. He might also be flogged. If he deserted altogether and was retaken, he might be branded on the face with a red-hot iron, although allowance was made for such as ran away from their ships through ill-usage. Sailors could also be compensated for unjust discharge without cause. Succeeding clauses refer to the moral conduct of the sailor, forbidding drunkenness, fighting, &c. Article 12 provided that if any mariner should give the lie to another at a table where there was wine and bread, he should be fined four deniers; and the master himself offending in the same way should be liable to a double fine. If any sailor should impudently contradict the mate, he might be fined eight deniers; and if the master struck him with his fist or open hand he was required to bear the stroke, but if struck more than once he was entitled to defend himself. If the sailor committed the first assault he was to be fined 100 sous, or else his hand was to be chopped off. The master was required by another rule not to give his crew cause for mutiny, nor call them names, nor wrong them, nor “keep anything from them that is theirs, but to use them well, and pay them honestly what is their due.” Another clause provided that the sailor might always have the option of going on shares or wages, and the master was to put the matter fairly before them. The 17th clause related to food. The hardy sailors of Brittany were to have only one meal a day from the kitchen, while the lucky ones of Normandy were to have two. When the ship arrived at a wine country the master was bound to provide the crew with wine. Sailors were elsewhere forbidden to take “royal” fish, such as the sturgeon, salmon, turbot, and sea-barbel, or to take on their own account fish which yield oil. These are a part only of the clauses; many others referring to matters connected with rigging, masts, anchorages, pilotage, and other technical points. In bad pilotage the navigator who brought mishap on the ship was liable to lose his head. The general tenor of the first code is excellent, and the rules were laid down with an evident spirit of fairness alike to the owner and sailor.
The subject of “Letters of Marque” might occupy an entire volume, and will recur again in these pages; They were in reality nothing more than privileges granted for purposes of retaliation-legalised piracy. They were first issued by Edward I., and the very first related to an outrage committed by Portuguese on an English subject. A merchant of Bayonne, at the time a port belonging to England, in Gascony, had shipped a cargo of fruit from Malaga, which, on its voyage along the coast of Portugal, was seized and carried into Lisbon by an armed cruiser belonging to that country, then at peace with England. The King of Portugal, who had received one-tenth part of the cargo, declined to restore the ship or lading, whereupon the owner and his heirs received a licence, to remain in force five years, to seize the property of the Portuguese, and especially that of the inhabitants of Lisbon, to the extent of the loss sustained, the expenses of recovery being allowed. How far the merchant of Bayonne recouped himself, history sayeth not.
A little later a most important mercantile trade came into existence—that in coal. From archæological remains and discoveries it is certain that the Romans excavated coal during their reign on this island; but it was not till the reign of Edward III. that the first opening of the great Newcastle coal-fields took place, although as early as 1253 there was a lane at the back of Newgate called “Sea-coal Lane.” As in many other instances, even in our own days, the value of the discovery seems to have been more appreciated by foreigners than by the people of this country, and for a considerable time after it had been found, the combustion of coal was considered to be so unhealthy that a royal edict forbad its use in the city of London, while the queen resided there, in case it might prove “pernicious to her health.” At the same time, while England laid her veto on the use of that very article which has since made her, or helped to make her, the most famous commercial nation of the world, France sent her ships laden with corn to Newcastle, carrying back coal in return, her merchants being the first to supply this new great article of commerce to foreign countries. In the reign of Henry V. the trade had become of such importance that a special Act was passed providing for the admeasurement of ships and barges employed in the coal trade.
King John stoutly claimed for England the sovereignty of the sea—he was not always so firm and decided—and decreed that all foreign ships, the masters of which should refuse to strike their colours to the British flag, should be seized and deemed good and lawful prizes. This monarch is stated to have fitted out no less than 500 ships, under the Earl of Salisbury, in the year 1213, against a fleet of ships three times that number, organised by Philip of France, for the invasion of England. After a stubborn battle, the English were successful, taking 300 sail, and driving more than 100 ashore, Philip being under the necessity of destroying the remainder to prevent them falling into the hands of their enemies. Some notion may be gained of the kinds of ships of which these fleets were composed, by the account that is narrated of an action fought in the following reign with the French, who, with eighty “stout ships,” threatened the coast of Kent. This fleet being discovered by Hubert de Burgh, governor of Dover Castle, he put to sea with half the number of English vessels, and having got to the windward of the enemy, and run down many of the smaller ships, he closed with the rest, and threw on board them a quantity of quick-lime—a novel expedient in warfare—which so blinded the crews that their vessels were either captured or sunk. The dominion of the sea was bravely maintained by our Edwards and Henrys in many glorious sea-fights. The temper of the times is strongly exemplified by the following circumstance. In the reign of Edward I. an English sailor was killed in a Norman port, in consequence of which war was declared by England against France, and the two nations agreed to decide the dispute on a certain day, with the whole of their respective naval forces. The spot of battle was to be the middle of the Channel, marked out by anchoring there an empty ship. This strange duel of nations actually took place, for the two fleets met on April 14th, 1293, when the English obtained the victory, and carried off in triumph 250 vessels from the enemy. In an action off the harbour of Sluys with the French fleet, Edward III. is said to have slain 30,000 of the enemy, and to have taken 200 large ships, “in one of which only, there were 400 dead bodies.” The same monarch, at the siege of Calais, is stated to have blockaded that port with 730 sail, having on board 14,956 mariners. The size of the vessels employed must have been rapidly enlarging.
DUEL BETWEEN FRENCH AND ENGLISH SHIPS.
Chaucer gives us a graphic description of the British sailor of the fourteenth century in his Prologue to the “Canterbury Tales,” It runs as follows:—
“A schipman was ther, wonyng fer by Weste:
For ought I woot, he was of Dertemouthe,
He rood upon a rouncy, as he couthe,
In a goun of faldying to the kne.
A dagger hangyng on a laas hadde he
Aboute his nekke under his arm adoun.
The hoote somer had maad his hew al broun;
And certainly he was a good felawe.
Ful many a draught of wyn had he drawe
From Burdeux-ward, whil that the chapman sleep.
Of nyce conscience took he no keep.
If that he foughte, and hadde the heigher hand,
By water he sent hem hoom to every land.
But of his craft to rikne wel the tydes,
His stremes and his dangers him bisides,
His herbergh and his mane his lode menage,
Ther was non such from Hulle to Cartage.
Hardy he was, and wys to undertake;
With many a tempest hadde his berd ben schake.
He knew well alle the havens, as thei were,
From Scotland to the Cape of Fynestere,
And every cryk in Bretayne and in Spayne,
His barge y-cleped was the Magdelayne.”
In the reign of Henry V., the most glorious period up to that time of the British Navy, the French lost nearly all their navy to us at various times; among other victories, Henry Page, Admiral of the Cinque Ports, captured 120 merchantmen forming the Rochelle fleet, and all richly laden. Towards the close of this reign, about the year 1416, England formally claimed the dominion of the sea, and a Parliamentary document recorded the fact. “It was never absolute,” says Sir Walter Raleigh, “until the time of Henry VIII.” That great voyager and statesman adds that, “Whoever commands the sea, commands the trade of the world; whosoever commands the trade, commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself.”
A curious poem is included in the first volume of Hakluyt’s famous collection of voyages, bearing reference to the navy of Henry. It is entitled, “The English Policie, exhorting all England to keep the Sea,” &c. It was written apparently about the year 1435. It is a long poem, and the following is an extract merely:—
“And if I should conclude all by the King,
Henrie the Fift, what was his purposing,
Whan at Hampton he made the great dromons,
Which passed other great ships of the Commons;
The Trinitie, the Grace de Dieu, the Holy Ghost,
And other moe, which as nowe be lost.
What hope ye was the king’s great intente
Of thoo shippes, and what in mind be meant:
It is not ellis, but that he cast to bee
Lord round about environ of the see.
And if he had to this time lived here,
He had been Prince named withouten pere:
His great ships should have been put in preefes,
Unto the ende that he ment of in chiefes.
For doubt it not but that he would have bee
Lord and Master about the rand see:
And kept it sure, to stoppe our ennemies hence,
And wonne us good, and wisely brought it thence,
That our passage should be without danger,
And his license on see to move and sterre.”
When the king had determined, in 1415, to land an army in France, he hired ships from Holland, Zeeland, and Friesland, his own naval means not being sufficient for the transport; among his other preparations, “requisite for so high an enterprise,” boats covered with leather, for the passage of rivers, are mentioned. His fleet consisted of 1,000 sail, and it left Southampton on Sunday, the 11th of August, of the above-mentioned year. When the ships had passed the Isle of Wight, “swans were seen swimming in the midst of the fleet, which was hailed as a happy auspice.” Henry anchored on the following Tuesday at the mouth of the Seine, about three miles from Harfleur. A council of the captains was summoned, and an order issued that no one, under pain of death, should land before the king, but that all should be in readiness to go ashore the next morning. This was done, and the bulk of the army, stated to have comprised 24,000 archers, and 6,000 men of arms, was landed in small vessels, boats, and skiffs, taking up a position on the hill nearest to Harfleur. The moment Henry landed he fell on his knees and implored the Divine aid and protection to lead him on to victory, then conferring knighthood on many of his followers. At the entrance of the port a chain had been stretched between two large, well-armed towers, while it was farther protected by stakes and trunks of trees to prevent the vessels from approaching. During the siege, which lasted thirty-six days, the fleet blockaded the port, and at its conclusion Henry, flushed with a victory, which is said to have cost the English only 1,600 and the enemy 10,000 lives, determined to march his army through France to Calais. It was on this march that he won the glorious battle of Agincourt. On the 16th of November he embarked for Dover, reaching that port the same day. Here a magnificent ovation awaited him. The burgesses rushed into the sea and bore him ashore on their shoulders; the whole population was intoxicated with delight. One chronicler states that the passage across had been extremely boisterous, and that the French noblemen suffered so much from sea-sickness that they considered the trip worse than the very battles themselves in which they had been taken prisoners! When Henry arrived near London, a great concourse of people met him at Blackheath, and he, “as one remembering from whom all victories are sent,” would not allow his helmet to be carried before him, whereon the people might have seen the blows and dents that he had received; “neither would he suffer any ditties to be made and sung by minstrels of his glorious victory, for that he would have the praise and thanks altogether given to God.”
REVERSE OF THE SEAL OF SANDWICH.
Next year the French attempted to retake Harfleur. Henry sent a fleet of 400 sail to the rescue, under his brother John, Duke of Bedford, the upshot being that almost the whole French fleet, to the number of 500 ships, hulks, carracks, and small vessels were taken or sunk. The English vessels remained becalmed in the roadstead for three weeks afterwards. Southey, who has collated all the best authorities in his admirable naval work,131 says:—“The bodies which had been thrown overboard in the action, or sunk in the enemies’ ships, rose and floated about them in great numbers; and the English may have deemed it a relief from the contemplation of that ghastly sight, to be kept upon the alert by some galleys, which taking advantage of the calm, ventured as near them as they dare by day and night, and endeavoured to burn the ships with wildfire.” He adds that the first mention of wildfire he had found is by Hardyng, one of the earliest of our poets, in the following passage referring to this event:—
“With oars many about us did they wind,
With wildfire oft assayled us day and night,
To brenne our ships in that they could or might.”
Next year we read of Henry preparing to again attack France. The enemy had increased their naval force by hiring a number of Genoese and other Italian vessels. The king sent a preliminary force against them under his kinsman, the Earl of Huntingdon, who, near the mouth of the Seine, succeeded in sinking three and capturing three of the great Genoese carracks, taking the Admiral Jacques, the Bastard of Bourbon, “and as much money as would have been half a year’s pay for the whole fleet.” These prizes were brought to Southampton, “from whence the king shortly set forth with a fleet of 1,500 ships, the sails of his own vessel being of purple silk, richly embroidered with gold.” The remainder of Henry’s brief reign—for he died the same year—is but the history of a series of successes over his enemies.
It must never be forgotten that the navies of our early history were not permanently organised, but drawn from all sources. A noble, a city or port, voluntarily or otherwise, contributed according to the exigencies of the occasion. As we shall see, it is to Henry VIII. that we owe the establishment of a Royal Navy as a permanent institution. In 1546 King Henry’s vessels are classified according to their “quality,” thus: “ships,” “galleases,” “pynaces,” “roe-barges.” A list bearing date in 1612 exhibits the classes as follows:—“Shipps royal,” measuring downwards from 1,200 to 800 tons; “middling shipps,” from 800 to 600 tons; “small shipps,” 350 tons; and pinnaces, from 200 to 80 tons. According to the old definition, a ship was defined to be a “large hollow building, made to pass over the seas with sails,” without reference to size or quality. Before the days of the Great Harry, few, if any, English ships had more than one mast or one sail; that ship had three masts, and the Henri Grace de Dieu, which supplanted her, four. The galleas was probably a long, low, and sharp-built vessel, propelled by oars as well as by sails; the latter probably not fixed to the mast or any standing yard, but hoisted from the deck when required to be used, as in the lugger or felucca of modern days. The pinnace was a smaller description of galleas, while the row-barge is sufficiently explained by its title.
The history of the period following the reign of Henry V. has much to do with shipping interests of all kinds. The constant wars and turbulent times gave great opportunity for piracy in the Channel and on the high seas. Thus we read of Hannequin Leeuw, an outlaw from Ghent, who had so prospered in piratical enterprises that he got together a squadron of eight or ten vessels, well armed and stored. He not only infested the coast of Flanders, and Holland, and the English Channel, but scoured the coasts of Spain as far as Gibraltar, making impartial war on any or all nations, and styling himself the “Friend of God, and the enemy of all mankind.” This pirate escaped the vengeance of man, but at length was punished by the elements: the greater part of his people perished in a storm, and Hannequin Leeuw disappeared from the scene. Shortly afterwards we find the Hollanders and Zeelanders uniting their forces against the Easterling pirates, then infesting the seas, and taking twenty of their ships. “This action,” says Southey, “was more important in its consequences than in itself; it made the two provinces sensible, for the first time, of their maritime strength, and gave a new impulse to that spirit of maritime adventure which they had recently begun to manifest.” Previously a voyage to Spain had been regarded as so perilous, that “whoever undertook it settled his worldly and his spiritual affairs as if preparing for death, before he set forth,” while now they opened up a brisk trade with that country and Portugal. Till now they had been compelled to bear the insults and injuries of the Easterlings without combined attempt at defence; now they retaliated, captured one of their admirals on the coast of Norway, and hoisted a besom at the mast-head in token that they had swept the seas clean from their pirate enemies.
And now, in turn, some of them became pirates themselves, more particularly Hendrick van Borselen, Lord of Veere, who assembled all the outlaws he could gather, and committed such depredations, that he was enabled to add greatly to his possessions in Walcheren, by the purchase of confiscated estates. He received others as grants from his own duke, who feared him, and thought it prudent at any cost to retain, at least in nominal obedience, one who might render himself so obnoxious an enemy. “This did not prevent the admiral—for he held that rank under the duke—from infesting the coast of Flanders, carrying off cattle from Cadsant, and selling them publicly in Zeeland. His excuse was that the terrible character of his men compelled him to act as he did; and the duke admitted the exculpation, being fain to overlook outrages which he could neither prevent nor punish.” A statute of the reign of Henry VI. sets forth the robberies committed upon the poor merchants of this realm, not merely on the sea, but even in the rivers and ports of Britain, and how not merely they lost their goods, but their persons also were taken and imprisoned. Nor was this all, for “the king’s poor subjects dwelling nigh the sea-coasts were taken out of their own houses, with their chattels and children, and carried by the enemies where it pleased them.” In consequence, the Commons begged that an armament might be provided and maintained on the sea, which was conceded, and for a time piracy on English subjects was partially quashed.
Meantime, we had pirates of our own. Warwick, the king-maker, was unscrupulous in all points, and cared nothing for the lawfulness of the captures which he could make on the high seas. For example, when he left England for the purpose of securing Calais (then belonging to England) and the fleet for the House of York, he having fourteen well-appointed vessels, fell in with a fleet of Spaniards and Genoese. “There was a very sore and long continued battle fought betwixt them,” lasting almost two days. The English lost a hundred men; one account speaks of the Spanish and Genoese loss at 1,000 men killed, and another of six-and-twenty vessels sunk or put to flight. It is certain that three of the largest vessels were taken into Calais, laden with wine, oil, iron, wax, cloth of gold, and other riches, in all amounting in value to no less than £10,000. The earl was a favourite with the sailors, probably for the license he gave them; when the Duke of Somerset was appointed by the king’s party to the command of Calais, from which he was effectually shut out by Warwick, they carried off some of his ships and deserted with them to the latter. Not long after, when reinforcements were lying at Sandwich waiting to cross the Channel to Somerset’s aid, March and Warwick borrowed £18,000 from merchants, and dispatched John Dynham on a piratical expedition. He landed at Sandwich, surprised the town, took Lord Rivers and his son in their beds, robbed houses, took the principal ships of the king’s navy, and carried them off, well furnished as they were with ordnance and artillery. For a time Warwick carried all before him, but not a few of his actions were most unmitigated specimens of piracy, on nations little concerned with the Houses of York and Lancaster, their quarrels or wars.
But as this is not intended to be even a sketch of the history of England, let us pass to the commencement of the reign of Henry VII., when the “great minishment and decay of the navy, and the idleness of the mariners,” were represented to his first Parliament, and led to certain enactments in regard to the use of foreign bottoms. The wines of Southern France were forbidden to be imported hither in any but English, Irish, or Welsh ships, manned by English, Irish, or Welsh sailors. This Act was repeated in the fourth year of Henry’s reign, and made to include other articles, while it was then forbidden to freight an alien ship from or to England with “any manner of merchandise,” if sufficient freight were to be had in English vessels, on pain of forfeiture, one-half to the king, the other to the seizers. “Henry,” says Lord Bacon, “being a king that loved wealth, and treasure, he could not endure to have trade sick, nor any obstruction to continue in the gate-vein which disperseth that blood.” How well he loved riches is proved by the fact that when a speedy and not altogether creditable peace was established between England and France, and the indemnity had been paid by the latter, the money went into the king’s private coffers; those who had impoverished themselves in his service, or had contributed to the general outfit by the forced “benevolence,” were left out in the cold. From Calais Henry wrote letters to the Lord Mayor and aldermen (“which was a courtesy,” says Lord Bacon, “that he sometimes used), half bragging what great sums he had obtained for the peace, as knowing well that it was ever good news in London that the king’s coffers were full; better news it would have been if their benevolence had been but a loan.”
SIR ANDREW WOOD’S VICTORY.
Scotch historians tell us that Sir Andrew Wood, of Largo, Scotland, had with his two vessels, the Flower and Yellow Carvel, captured five chosen vessels of the royal navy, which had infested the Firth of Forth, and had taken many prizes from the Scotch previously, during this reign. Henry VII. was greatly mortified by this defeat, and offered to put any means at the disposal of the officer who would undertake this service, and great rewards if Wood were brought to him alive or dead. All hesitated, such was the renown of Wood, and his strength in men and artillery, and maritime and military skill. At length, Sir Stephen Bull, a man of distinguished prowess, offered himself, and three ships were placed under his command, with which he sailed for the Forth, and anchored behind the Isle of May, waiting Wood’s return from a foreign voyage. Some fishermen were captured and detained, in order that they should point out Sir Andrew’s ships when they arrived. “It was early in the morning when the action began; the Scots, by their skilful manœuvring, obtained the weather-gage, and the battle continued in sight of innumerable spectators who thronged the coast, till darkness suspended it. It was renewed at day-break; the ships grappled; and both parties were so intent upon the struggle, that the tide carried them into the mouth of the Tay, into such shoal water that the English, seeing no means of extricating themselves, surrendered. Sir Andrew brought his prizes to Dundee; the wounded were carefully attended there; and James, with royal magnanimity is said to have sent both prisoners and ships to Henry, praising the courage which they had displayed, and saying that the contest was for honour, not for booty.”
Few naval incidents occurred under the reign of Henry VII., but it belongs, nevertheless, to the most important age of maritime discovery. Henry had really assented to the propositions of Columbus after Portugal had refused them; had not the latter’s brother, Bartholomew, been captured by pirates on his way to England, and detained as a slave at the oar, the Spaniards would not have had the honour of discovering the New World. This, and the grand discoveries of Cabot (directly encouraged by Henry), who reached Newfoundland and Florida; the various expeditions down the African coast instituted by Dom John; the discovery of the Cape and new route to India by Diaz and Vasco de Gama; the discovery of the Pacific by Balboa, and Cape Horn and the Straits by Magellan, will be detailed in another section of this work. They belong to this and immediately succeeding reigns, and mark the grandest epoch in the history of geographical discovery.
“The use of fire-arms,” says Southey, “without which the conquests of the Spaniards in the New World must have been impossible, changed the character of naval war sooner than it did the system of naval tactics, though they were employed earlier by land than by sea.” It is doubtful when cannon was first employed at sea; one authority132 says that it was by the Venetians against the Genoese, before 1330. Their use necessitated very material alterations in the structure of war-ships. The first port-holes are believed to have been contrived by a ship-builder at Brest, named Descharges, and their introduction took place in 1499. They were “circular holes, cut through the sides of the vessel, and so small as scarcely to admit of the guns being traversed in the smallest degree, or fired otherwise than straightforward.” Hitherto there had been no distinctions between the vessels used in commerce and in the king’s service; the former being constantly employed for the latter; but now we find the addition of another tier, and a general enlargement of the war-vessels. Still, when any emergency required, merchant vessels, not merely English, but Genoese, Venetian, and from the Hanse Towns, were constantly hired for warfare. So during peace the king’s ships were sometimes employed in trade, or freighted to merchants. Henry was very desirous of increasing and maintaining commercial relations with other countries. In the commission to one of his ambassadors, he says, “The earth being the common mother of all mankind, what can be more pleasant or more humane than to communicate a portion of all her productions to all her children by commerce?” Many special commercial treaties were made by him, and one concluded with the Archduke Philip after a dispute with him, which had put a stop to the trade with the Low Countries, was called the great commercial treaty (intercursus magnus). “It was framed with the greatest care to render the intercourse between the two countries permanent, and profitable to both.”
The first incident in the naval history of the next reign, that of Henry VIII., grew out of an event which had occurred long before. A Portuguese squadron had, in the year 1476, seized a Scottish ship, laden with a rich cargo, and commanded by John Barton. Letters of marque were granted him, which he had not, apparently, used to any great advantage, for they were renewed to his three sons thirty years afterwards. The Bartons were not content with repaying themselves for their loss, but found the Portuguese captures so profitable that they became confirmed pirates, “and when they felt their own strength, they seem, with little scruple, to have considered ships of any nation as their fair prize.” Complaints were lodged before Henry, but were almost ignored, “till the Earl of Surrey, then Treasurer and Marshal of England, declared at the council board, that while he had an estate that could furnish out a ship, or a son that was capable of commanding one, the narrow seas should not be so infested.” Two ships, commanded by his two sons, Sir Thomas and Sir Edward Howard, were made ready, with the king’s knowledge and consent. The two brothers put to sea, but were separated by stress of weather; the same happened to the two pirate ships—the Lion, under Sir Andrew Barton’s own command, and the Jenny Perwin, or Bark of Scotland. The strength of one of them is thus described in an old ballad, by a merchant, one of Sir Andrew’s victims, who is supposed to relate his tale to Sir Thomas Howard:—
“He is brass within, and steel without,
With beams on his top-castle strong;
And thirty pieces of ordnance
He carries on each side along;
And he hath a pinnace dearly dight,
St. Andrew’s Cross it is his guide;
His pinnace beareth nine score men,
And fifteen cannons on each side.
* * * * *
Were ye twenty ships, and he but one,
I swear by Kirk, and bower and hall,
He would overcome them every one
If once his beams they do down fall.”
But it was not so to be. Sir Thomas Howard, as he lay in the Downs, descried the former making for Scotland, and immediately gave chase, “and there was a sore battle. The Englishmen were fierce, and the Scots defended themselves manfully, and ever Andrew blew his whistle to encourage his men. Yet, for all that, Lord Howard and his men, by clean force, entered the main deck. There the English entered on all sides, and the Scots fought sore on the hatches; but, in conclusion, Andrew was taken, being so sore wounded that he died there, and then the remnant of the Scots were taken, with their ship.” Meantime Sir Edward Howard had encountered the other piratical ship, and though the Scots defended themselves like “hardy and well-stomached men,” succeeded in boarding it. The prizes were taken to Blackwall, and the prisoners, 150 in number, being all left alive, “so bloody had the action been,” were tried at Whitehall, before the Bishop of Winchester and a council. The bishop reminded them that “though there was peace between England and Scotland, they, contrary to that, as thieves and pirates, had robbed the king’s subjects within his streams, wherefore they had deserved to die by the law, and to be hanged at the low-water mark. Then, said the Scots, ‘We acknowledge our offence, and ask mercy, and not the law,’ and a priest, who was also a prisoner, said, ‘My lord, we appeal from the king’s justice to his mercy.’ Then the bishop asked if he were authorised by them to say thus, and they all cried, ‘Yea, yea!’ ‘Well, then,’ said the bishop, ‘you shall find the king’s mercy above his justice; for, where you were dead by the law, yet by his mercy he will revive you. You shall depart out of this realm within twenty days, on pain of death if ye be found after the twentieth day; and pray for the king.’ ” James subsequently required restitution from Henry, who answered “with brotherly salutation” that “it became not a prince to charge his confederate with breach of peace for doing justice upon a pirate and thief.” But there is no doubt that it was regarded as a national affair in Scotland, and helped to precipitate the war which speedily ensued.
THE DEFEAT OF SIR ANDREW BARTON.
Some of the edicts of the period seem strange enough to modern ears. The Scotch Parliament had passed an Act forbidding any ship freighted with staple goods to put to sea during the three winter months, under a penalty of five pounds. In 1493, a generation after the Act was passed, another provided that all burghs and towns should provide ships and busses, the least to be of twenty tons, fitted according to the means of the said places, provided with mariners, nets, and all necessary gear for taking “great fish and small.” The officers in every burgh were to make all the “stark idle men” within their bounds go on board these vessels, and serve them there for their wages, or, in case of refusal, banish them from their burgh. This was done with the idea of training a maritime force, but seems to have produced little effect. James IV. built a ship, however, which was, according to Scottish writers, larger and more powerfully armed than any then built in England or France. She was called the Great Michael, and “was of so great stature that she wasted all the oak forests of Fife, Falkland only excepted.” Southey reminds us that the Scots, like the Irish of the time, were constantly in feud with each other, and consequently destroyed their forests, to prevent the danger of ambuscades, and also to cut off the means of escape. Timber for this ship was brought from Norway, and though all the shipwrights in Scotland and many others from foreign countries were busily employed upon her, she took a year and a day to complete. The vessel is described as twelve score feet in length, and thirty-six in breadth of beam, within the walls, which were ten feet each thick, so that no cannon-ball could go through them. She had 300 mariners on board, six score gunners, and 1,000 men-of-war, including officers, “captains, skippers, and quarter-masters.” Sir Andrew Wood and Robert Barton were two of the chief officers. “This great ship cumbered Scotland to get her to sea. From the time that she was afloat, and her masts and sails complete, with anchors offering thereto, she was counted to the king to be thirty thousand pounds expense, by her artillery, which was very costly.” The Great Michael never did enough to have a single exploit recorded, nor was she unfortunate enough to meet a tragic ending.
In 1511 war was declared against France, and Henry caused many new ships to be made, repairing and rigging the old. After an action on the coast of Brittany, where both claimed the advantage, and where two of the largest vessels—the Cordelier, with 900 Frenchmen, and the Regent, with 700 Englishmen, were burned—nearly all on board perishing, Henry advised “a great ship to be made, such as was never before seen in England,” and which was named the Henri Grace de Dieu, or popularly the Great Harry.133 There are many ancient representations of this vessel, which is said to have cost £11,000, and to have taken 400 men four whole days to work from Erith, where she was built, to Barking Creek. “The masts,” says a well-known authority, “were five in number,” but he goes on clearly to show that the fifth was simply the bowsprit; they were in one piece, as had been the usual mode in all previous times, although soon to be altered by the introduction of several joints or top-masts, which could be lowered in time of need. The rigging was simple to the last degree, but there was a considerable amount of ornamentation on the hull, and small flags were disposed almost at random on different parts of the deck and gunwale, and one at the head of each mast. The standard of England was hoisted on the principal mast; enormous pendants, or streamers, were added, though ornaments which must have been often inconvenient. The Great Harry was of 1,000 tons, and in—so far as the writer can discover—the only skirmish she was concerned in the Channel, for it could not be dignified by the name of an engagement, carried 700 men. She was burned at Woolwich, at the opening of Mary’s reign, through the carelessness of the sailors.
OLD DEPTFORD DOCKYARD.
In the reign of Henry VIII. a navy office was first formed, and regular arsenals were established at Portsmouth, Woolwich, and Deptford. The change in maritime warfare consequent on the use of gunpowder rendered ships of a new construction necessary, and more was done for the improvement of the navy in this reign than in any former one. Italian shipwrights, then the most expert, were engaged, and at the conclusion of Henry’s reign the Royal Navy consisted of seventy-one vessels, thirty of which were ships of respectable burden, aggregating 10,550 tons. Five years later, it had dwindled to less than one-half. Six years after Henry’s death, England lost Calais, a fort and town which had cost Edward III., in the height of his power, an obstinate siege of eleven months. But on Elizabeth’s accession to the throne, the star of England was once more in the ascendant.
Elizabeth commenced her reign by providing in all points for war, that she “might the more quietly enjoy peace.” Arms and weapons were imported from Germany, at considerable cost, but in such quantities that the land had never before been so amply stored with “all kinds of convenient armour and weapons.” And she, also, was the first to cause the manufacture of gunpowder in England, that she “might not both pray and pay for it too to her neighbours.” She allowed the free exportation of herrings and all other sea-fish in English bottoms, and a partial exemption from impressment was granted to all fishermen; while to encourage their work, Wednesday and Saturday were made “fish-days;” this, it was stated, “was meant politicly, not for any superstition to be maintained in the choice of meats.” The navy became her great care, so much that “foreigners named her the restorer of the glory of shipping, and the Queen of the North Sea.” She raised the pay of sailors. “The wealthier inhabitants of the sea-coast,” says Camden, “in imitation of their princess, built ships of war, striving who should exceed, insomuch that the Queen’s Navy, joined with her subjects’ shipping, was, in short time, so puissant that it was able to bring forth 20,000 fighting men for sea service.”
The greatest and most glorious event of her reign was, without cavil, the defeat of the Spanish Armada, at one time deemed and called “The Invincible.” With the political complications which preceded the invasion, we have nought to do: it was largely a religious war, inasmuch as Popish machinations were at the bottom of all. When the contest became inevitable, the Spanish Government threw off dissimulation, and showed “a disdainful disregard of secrecy as to its intentions, or rather a proud manifestation of them, which,” says Southey, “if they had been successful, might have been called magnanimous.” Philip had determined on putting forth his might, and accounts which were ostentatiously published in advance termed it “The most fortunate and invincible Armada.” The fleet consisted of 130 ships and twenty caravels, having on board nearly 20,000 soldiers, 8,450 marines, 2,088 galley-slaves, with 2,630 great pieces of brass artillery. The names of all the saints appeared in the nomenclature of the ships, “while,” says Southey, “holier appellations, which ought never to be thus applied, were strangely associated with the Great Griffin and the Sea Dog, the Cat and the White Falcon.” Every noble house in Spain was represented, and there were 180 friars and Jesuits, with Cardinal Allen at their head, a prelate who had not long before published at Antwerp a gross libel on Elizabeth, calling her “heretic, rebel, and usurper, an incestuous bastard, the bane of Christendom, and firebrand of all mischief.” These priests were to bring England back to the true Church the moment they landed. The galleons being above sixty in number were, “exceeding great, fair, and strong, and built high above the water, like castles, easy to be fought withal, but not so easy to board as the English and the Netherland ships; their upper decks were musket-proof, and beneath they were four or five feet thick, so that no bullet could pass them. Their masts were bound about with oakum, or pieces of fazeled ropes, and armed against all shot. The galleases were goodly great vessels, furnished with chambers, chapels, towers, pulpits, and such-like; they rowed like galleys, with exceeding great oars, each having 300 slaves, and were able to do much harm with their great ordnance.” Most severe discipline was to be preserved; blasphemy and oaths were to be punished rigidly; gaming, as provocative of these, and quarrelling, were forbidden; no one might wear a dagger; religious exercises, including the use of a special litany, in which all archangels, angels, and saints, were invoked to assist with their prayers against the English heretics and enemies of the faith, were enjoined. “No man,” says Southey, “ever set forth upon a bad cause with better will, nor under a stronger delusion of perverted faith.” The gunners were instructed to have half butts filled with water and vinegar, wet clothes, old sails, &c., ready to extinguish fire, and what seems strange now-a-days, in addition to the regular artillery, every ship was to carry two boats’-loads of large stones, to throw on the enemy’s decks, forecastles, &c., during an encounter.
Meantime Elizabeth and her ministers were fully aware of the danger, and the appeals made to the Lords, and through the lord-lieutenants of counties were answered nobly. The first to present himself before the queen was a Roman Catholic peer, the Viscount Montague, who brought 200 horsemen led by his own sons, and professed the resolution that “though he was very sickly, and in age, to live and die in defence of the queen and of his country, against all invaders, whether it were Pope, king, or potentate whatsoever.” The city of London, when 5,000 men and fifteen ships were required, prayed the queen to accept twice the number. “In a very short time all her whole realm, and every corner, were furnished with armed men, on horseback and on foot; and those continually trained, exercised, and put into bands in warlike manner, as in no age ever was before in this realm. There was no sparing of money to provide horse, armour, weapons, powder, and all necessaries.” Thousands volunteered their services personally without wages; others money for armour and weapons, and wages for soldiers. The country was never in better condition for defence.
Some urged the queen to place no reliance on maritime defence, but to receive the enemy only on shore. Elizabeth thought otherwise, and determined that the enemy should reap no more advantage on the sea than on land. She gave the command of the whole fleet to Charles Lord Howard of Effingham; Drake being vice-admiral, and Hawkins and Frobisher—all grand names in naval history—being in the western division. Lord Henry Seymour was to lie off the coast of Flanders with forty ships, Dutch and English, and prevent the Prince of Parma from forming a junction with the Armada. The whole number of ships collected for the defence of the country was 191, and the number of seamen 17,472. There was one ship in the fleet (the Triumph) of 1,100 tons, one of 1,000, one of 900, and two of 800 tons each, but the larger part of the vessels were very small, and the aggregate tonnage amounted to only about half that of the Armada. For the land defence over 100,000 men were called out, regimented, and armed, but only half of them were trained. This was exclusive of the Border and Yorkshire forces.
The Armada left the Tagus in the latter end of May, 1588, for Corunna, there to embark the remainder of the forces and stores. On the 30th of the same month, the Lord Admiral and Sir Francis Drake sailed from Plymouth. A serious storm was encountered, which dismasted some and dispersed others of the enemy’s fleet, and occasioned the loss of four Portuguese galleys. One David Gwynne, a Welshman, who had been a galley-slave for eleven years, took the opportunity this storm afforded, and regained his liberty. He made himself master of one galley, captured a second, and was joined by a third, in which the wretched slaves were encouraged to rise by his example, and successfully carried the three into a French port. After this disastrous commencement, the Armada put back to Corunna, and was pursued thither by Effingham; but as he approached the coast of Spain, the wind changed, and as he was afraid the enemy might effect the passage to the Channel unperceived, he returned to its entrance, whence the ships were withdrawn, some to the coast of Ireland, and the larger part to Plymouth, where the men were allowed to come ashore, and the officers made merry with revels, dancing, and bowling. The enemy was so long in making an appearance, that even Elizabeth was persuaded the invasion would not occur that year; and with this idea, Secretary Walsingham wrote to the admiral to send back four of his largest ships. “Happily for England, and most honourably for himself, the Lord Effingham, though he had relaxed his vigilance, saw how perilous it was to act as if all were safe. He humbly entreated that nothing might be lightly credited in so weighty a matter, and that he might retain these ships, though it should be at his own cost. This was no empty show of disinterested zeal; for if the services of those ships had not been called for, there can be little doubt, that in the rigid parsimony of Elizabeth’s government, he would have been called upon to pay the costs.”
THE FIRST SHOT AGAINST THE ARMADA.
The Armada, now completely refitted, sailed from Corunna on July 12th, and when off the Lizard were sighted by a pirate, one Thomas Fleming, who hastened to Plymouth with the news, and not merely obtained pardon for his offences, but was awarded a pension for life. At that time the wind “blew stiffly into the harbour,” but all hands were got on board, and the ships were warped out, the Lord Admiral encouraging the men, and hauling at the ropes himself. By the following day thirty of the smaller vessels were out, and next day the Armada was descried “with lofty turrets like castles, in front like a half-moon; the wings thereof speading out about the length of seven miles, sailing very slowly though with full sails; the wind,” says Camden, “being as it were weary with wafting them, and the ocean groaning under their weight.” The Spaniards gave up the idea of attacking Plymouth, and the English let them pass, that they might chase them in the rear. Next day the Lord Admiral sent the Defiance pinnace forward, and opened the attack by discharging her ordnance, and later his own ship, the Ark Royal, “thundered thick and furiously” into the Spanish vice-admiral’s ship, and soon after, Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher, gave the Admiral Recalde a very thorough peppering. That officer’s ship was rendered nearly unserviceable, and he was obliged to crowd on sail to catch up with the others, who showed little disposition for fighting. After a smart action in which he had injured the enemy much, and suffered little hurt himself, Effingham gave over, because forty of his ships had not yet come up from Plymouth. During the night the Spaniards lost one of their ships, which was set on fire, it was believed, by a Flemish gunner, whose wife and self had been ill-treated by the officer of the troops on board. The fire was quenched, after all her upper works had been consumed; but when the Spaniards left the hulk, they abandoned fifty of their countrymen, “miserably hurt.” This night was remarkable for a series of disasters and contretemps. A galleon, under the command of one Valdez, ran foul of another ship, broke her foremast, and was left behind. Effingham, supposing that the men had been taken out, without tarrying to take possession of the prize, passed on with two other vessels, that he might not lose sight of the enemy. “He thought that he was following Drake’s ship, which ought to have carried the lanthorn that night; it proved to be a Spanish light, and in the morning he found himself in the midst of the enemy’s fleet;” but he managed to get away unobserved, or at all events unpursued. Drake, meantime, was mistakably following in the dark and stormy night a phantom enemy, in the shape of five Easterling vessels. Meantime, the English fleet not seeing the expected light on Drake’s ship, lay-to during the night. Drake, next morning, had the good fortune to fall in with Valdez, who, after a brief parley, surrendered, and the prize was sent into Plymouth. Drake and his men divided 55,000 golden ducats among them, as part of the spoil on board. The hulk of the galleon was taken to Weymouth, and although burned almost to the water’s edge, the gunpowder in the hold remained intact and had not taken fire. The next day there was considerable manœuvring and skirmishing, but with no very memorable loss on either side. A great Venetian ship and some smaller ones were taken from the enemy, while on our side Captain Cook died with honour in the midst of the Spanish ships, in a little vessel of his own. Both sides were wary; Effingham did not think good to grapple with them, because they had an army in the fleet, while he had none; our army awaited their landing. The Spaniards meant as much as possible to avoid fighting, and hold on till they could effect a junction with the Prince of Parma. Next morning there was little wind, and only the four great galleases were engaged, these having the advantage on account of their oars, while the English were becalmed; the latter, however, did considerable execution with chain-shot, cutting asunder their tacklings and cordage. But they were now constrained to send ashore for gunpowder, with which they were either badly supplied, or had expended too freely. Off the Isle of Wight, the English battered the Spanish admiral with their great ordnance, and shot away his mainmast; but other ships came to his assistance, beat them off, and set upon the English admiral, who only escaped by favour of a breeze which sprung up at the right moment. Camden relates how the English shot away the lantern from one of the Spanish ships, and the beak-head from a second, and that Frobisher escaped by the skin of his teeth from a situation of great danger. Still this was little more than skirmishing. “The Spaniards say that from that time they gave over what they call the pursuit of their enemy; and they dispatched a fresh messenger to the Prince of Parma, urging him to effect his junction with them as soon as possible, and withal to send them some great shot, for they had expended theirs with more prodigality than effect.” On the other hand the English determined to wait till they could attack the enemy in the Straits of Dover, where they expected to be joined by the squadrons under Lord Seymour and Sir William Winter. Meantime Effingham’s forces were being considerably increased by volunteers; “For the gentlemen of England hired ships from all parts at their own charge, and with one accord came flocking thither as to a set field.” Among the volunteers were Sir Walter Raleigh, the Earls of Oxford, Northumberland, and Cumberland. On the evening of the 27th the Spaniards came to anchor off Calais, and the English ships, now 140 in number, “all of them ships fit for fight, good sailors, nimble and tight for tacking about which way they would, anchored within cannon-shot.” A squadron of about thirty ships belonging to the States, acting in conjunction with the Admiral of Zeeland and his squadron, effectually blockaded Dunkirk, and the poor Prince of Parma, with his pressed men constantly deserting, his flat-bottomed boats leaky, and his provisions not ready, could do nothing.
The Spanish ships were almost invulnerable to the shot and ordnance of the day, and “their height was such that our bravest seamen were against any attempt at boarding them.” These facts were well understood by Elizabeth’s ministers, and the Lord Admiral was instructed to convert eight of his worst vessels into fire-ships. The orders arrived so à propos of the occasion, and were so swiftly executed, that within thirty hours after the enemy had cast anchor off Calais, the ships were unloaded and dismantled, filled with combustibles and all their ordnance charged, and their sides being smeared with pitch, rosin, and wildfire, were sent, in the dead of the night, with wind and tide, against the Spanish fleet. When the Spaniards saw the whole sea glittering and shining with the reflection of the flames, the guns exploding as the fire reached them, and a heavy canopy of dense smoke overhead obscuring the heavens, they remembered those terrible fire-ships which had been used so effectively in the Scheldt, and the cry resounded through the fleet, “The fire of Antwerp!” Some of the Spanish captains let their hawsers slip, some cut their cables, and in terror and confusion put to sea; “happiest they who could first be gone, though few or none could tell which course to take.” In the midst of all this fearful excitement one of the largest of the galleases, commanded by D. Hugo de Moncada, ran foul of another ship, lost her rudder, floated about at the mercy of the tide, and at length ran upon Calais sands. Here she was assailed by the English small craft, who battered her with their guns, but dared not attempt boarding till the admiral sent a hundred men in his boats, under Sir Amias Preston. The Spaniards fought bravely, but at length Moncada was shot through the head, and the galleas was carried by boarding. Most of the Spanish soldiers, 400 in number, jumped overboard and were drowned; the 300 galley-slaves were freed from their fetters. The vessel had 50,000 ducats on board, “a booty,” says Speed, “well fitting the English soldiers’ affections.” The English were about to set the galleas on fire, but the governor of Calais prevented this by firing upon the captors, and the ship became his prize.
THE FIRE-SHIPS ATTACKING THE ARMADA.
The Duke of Medina Sidonia, admiral of the Spanish Armada, had ordered the whole fleet to weigh anchor and stand out to sea when he perceived the approaching fire-ships; his vessels were to return to their former stations when the danger should be over. When he fired a signal for the others to follow his example, few of them heard it, “because they were scattered all about, and driven by fear, some of them in the wide sea, and driven among the shoals of Flanders.” When they had once more congregated, they ranged themselves in order off Gravelines, where the final action was fought. Drake and Fenner were the first to assail them, followed by many brave captains, and lastly the admiral came up with Lord Thomas Howard and Lord Sheffield. There were scarcely two or three and twenty among their ships which matched ninety of the Spanish vessels in size, but the smaller vessels were more easily handled and manœuvred. “Wherefore,” says Hakluyt, “using their prerogative of nimble steerage, whereby they could turn and wield themselves with the wind which way they listed, they came oftentimes very near upon the Spaniards, and charged them so sore, that now and then they were but a pike’s length asunder; and so continually giving them one broadside after another, they discharged all their shot, both great and small, upon them, spending a whole day, from morning till night, in that violent kind of conflict.” During this action many of the Spanish vessels were pierced through and through between wind and water; one was sunk, and it was learnt that one of her officers, having proposed to strike, was put to death by another; the brother of the slain man instantly avenged his death, and then the ship went down. Others are believed to have sunk, and many were terribly shattered. One, which leaked so fast that fifty men were employed at the pumps, tried to run aground on the Flemish coast, where her captain had to strike to a Dutch commander. Our ships at last desisted from the contest, from sheer want of ammunition; and the Armada made an effort to reach the Straits. Here a great engagement was expected, but the fighting was over, and that which the hand of man barely commenced the hand of God completed. The Spaniards “were now experimentally convinced that the English excelled them in naval strength. Several of their largest ships had been lost, others were greatly damaged; there was no port to which they could repair; and to force their way through the victorious English fleet, then in sight, and amounting to 140 sail, was plainly and confessedly impossible.” They resolved upon returning to Spain by a northern route, and “having gotten more sea room for their huge-bodied bulks, spread their mainsails, and made away as fast as wind and water would give them leave.” Effingham, leaving Seymour to blockade the Prince of Parma’s force, followed what our chroniclers now termed the Vincible Armada, and pursued them to Scotland, where they did not attempt to land, but made for Norway, “where the English,” says Drake, “thought it best to leave them to those boisterous and uncouth northern seas.”
Meantime, it was still expected ashore that the Prince of Parma might effect a landing, and it was at this time that Elizabeth, who declared her intention to be present wherever the battle might be fought, rode through the soldiers’ ranks at Tilbury, and made her now historical speech. “Incredible it is,” says Camden, “how much she encouraged the hearts of her captains and soldiers by her presence and her words.” When a false report was brought that the prince had landed, the news was immediately published throughout the camp, “and assuredly,” says Southey, “if the enemy had set foot upon our shores they would have sped no better than they had done at sea, such was the spirit of the nation.” Some time elapsed before the fate of the Armada was known. It was affirmed on the Continent that the greater part of the English fleet had been taken, and a large proportion sunk, the poor remainder having been driven into the Thames “all rent and torn.” It was believed at Rome that Elizabeth was taken and England conquered! Meantime, the wretched Armada was being blown hither and thither by contending winds. The mules and horses had to be thrown overboard lest the water should fail. When they had reached a northern latitude, some 200 miles from the Scottish isles, the duke ordered them each to take the best course they could for Spain, and he himself with some five-and-twenty of his best provided ships reached it in safety. The others made for Cape Clear, hoping to water there, but a terrible storm arose, in which it is believed more than thirty of the vessels perished off the coast of Ireland. About 200 of the poor Spaniards were driven from their hiding-places and beheaded, through the inhumanity of Sir William Fitzwilliam. “Terrified at this, the other Spaniards, sick and starved as they were, committed themselves to the sea in their shattered vessels, and very many of them were swallowed up by the waves.” Two of their ships were wrecked on the coasts of Norway. Some few got into the English seas; two were taken by cruisers off Rochelle. About 700 men were cast ashore in Scotland, were humanely treated, and subsequently sent, by request of the Prince of Parma, to the Netherlands. Of the whole Armada only fifty-three vessels returned to Spain; eighty-one were lost. The enormous number of 14,000 men, of whom only 2,000 were prisoners, were missing. By far the larger proportion were lost by shipwreck.
QUEEN ELIZABETH ON HER WAY TO ST. PAUL’S.
“Philip’s behaviour,” says Southey, “when the whole of this great calamity was known, should always be recorded to his honour. He received it as a dispensation of Providence, and gave, and commanded to be given, throughout Spain, thanks to God and the saints that it was no greater.” In England, a solemn thanksgiving was celebrated at St. Paul’s, where the Spanish ensigns which had been taken were displayed, and the same flags were shown on London Bridge the following day, it being Southwark Fair. Many of the arms and instruments of torture taken are still to be seen in the Tower. Another great thanksgiving-day was celebrated on the anniversary of the queen’s accession, and one of great solemnity, two days later, throughout the realm. On the Sunday following, the queen went “as in public, but Christian triumph,” to St. Paul’s, in a chariot “made in the form of a throne with four pillars,” and drawn by four white horses; alighting from which at the west door, she knelt and “audibly praised God, acknowledging Him her only Defender, who had thus delivered the land from the rage of the enemy.” Her Privy Council, the nobility, the French ambassador, the judges, and the heralds, accompanied her. The streets were hung with blue cloth and flags, “the several companies, in their liveries, being drawn up both sides of the way, with their banners in becoming and gallant order.” Thus ended this most serious attempt at the invasion of England.