234 THE OCEAN RIVER 



danger. An expedition from the French islands took Chagres 

 on the Isthmus of Panama; and a larger fleet, organized by 

 the powerful merchant Ango of far-away Dieppe, under the 

 leadership of Verrazano, captured the returning Spanish 

 treasure fleet. This forced Spain to organize the convoy system 

 from American ports. The galleons of forty to fifty guns 

 sailed every January to Porto Bello and Cartagena; and the 

 Flota, also well armed, sailed for Vera Cruz early in the sum- 

 mer to avoid the hurricane season. Money began to pour back 

 to Spain and enhance her power. But the raids kept on. Fran- 

 cois Le Clerc raided Porto Rico with ten vessels in 1554, and 

 a year later Jacques de Sores pillaged Santiago de Cuba and 

 Havana. 



This news of good pickings in the Caribbean finally aroused 

 the English to come in on the game with a show of force, 

 though at first quietly feeling their way. The slave trader John 

 Hawkins made his first voyage in 1563. John Davis wrote of 

 him thus: 'The first Enghshman that gave any attempt on 

 the coast of the West Indies being part of America was Sir 

 John Hawkins ... a man of excellent capacity, great govern- 

 ment and perfect resolution. For before he made the attempt 

 it was a matter doubtful and reported the extreme limit of 

 danger to sail upon the coast ... for the most part of us rather 

 joy at home like epicures to sit and carpe at other men's haz- 

 zards, ourselves not daring to give any attempt." This need 

 not have worried Davis for long. During the next four years 

 Hawkins made additional voyages trading and selling slaves, 

 and on his final and sadly unsuccessful attempt on Vera Cruz 

 in 1568 he introduced a young lieutenant, Francis Drake, 

 into his future career as scourge of the Spanish. Hawkins was 

 the prospector for the great age of Elizabethan sea raids. The 

 Queen herself, though always careful to repudiate any con- 

 nection, took shares in his voyages. After 1570 the attack by 

 the English, French, and Dutch on the Caribbean empire of 



