THE WONDEES OF THE SHOEE. 59 



July days of 1588, when the Spanish Armada 

 ventured slowly past Berry Head, with Elizabeth's 

 gallant pack of Devon captains (for the London 

 fleet had not yet joined) following fast in its wake, 

 and dashing into the midst of the vast line, undis- 

 mayed by size and numbers, while their kin and 

 friends stood watching and praying on the cliffs, 

 spectators of Britain's Salamis. The white line of 

 houses, too, on the other side of the bay, is Brix- 

 ham, famed as the landing-place of William of 

 Orange ; the stone on the pier-head, which marks 

 his first footsteps on British ground, is sacred in the 

 eyes of all true English Whigs ; and close by stands 

 the castle of the settler of Newfoundland, Sir 

 Humphrey Gilbert, Ealeigh's half-brother, most 

 learned of all Elizabeth's admirals in life, most 

 pious and heroic in death. And as for scenery, 

 though it can boast of neither mountain i>eiik nor 

 dark fiord, and would seem tame enough in the eyes 

 of a western Scot or Irishman, yet Torbay surely 

 has a soft beauty of its own. The rounded hills 

 slope gently to the sea, spotted with squares of 



