THE VOYAGERS 



The Queen was not ready to face the great Catholic Q,ueen 

 coalition in open warfare. She was struggling in the ^^ifjic^ifig^ 

 meshes of conspiracy. While Hawkins was selling his 

 negroes in the Indies, Ridolfi was plotting in London; 

 the Queen of Scots had arrived in England, to become 

 a centre of disaffection ; Alva was inaugurating his reign 

 of terror in the Netherlands ; and the Guises were putting 

 in operation their scheme for extirpating the Huguenots 

 in France. The Queen did what she could. She 

 detained the treasure destined for Alva, which, con- 

 veyed in five ships from Spain, had been driven by 

 French pirates into English ports; and she sent money 

 and munitions of war to the Huguenots. This policy 

 of hers gave a broad hint to her subjects. There was 

 to be no war ; but short of war, acts of hostility and 

 reprisal were the order of the day. When the efforts 

 of the King of Spain and Pope Pius V to stir up 

 rebellion against Elizabeth became known to the mari- 

 time people of England, ' incredible it is,' says Camden 

 again, 'with how great alacrity they put to sea, and 

 how readily they exercised piracy against the Spaniards.' 



Hawkins was to take no further part, for the present, 

 in these forays. He was needed for defence at home. 

 But, as the Portuguese chronicler justly remarks, 'there 

 was a certain Englishman, called Francis Drake.' At ^rancU 

 San Juan de Ulloa Drake had learned his lesson. The 

 Spaniards were never to be trusted ; extreme measures, 

 such as Hawkins had shrunk from, were in the end 

 the safest; a well-furnished English ship could go any- 

 where in the Spanish seas. For the next twenty years 

 he put the lesson into practice, waxing bolder and bolder 

 by success. When precautions were taken against the 



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