red doublet, whose arm
is round Raleigh's neck, is Lord Sheffield; opposite them stands, by
the side of Sir Richard Grenville, a man as stately even as he, Lord
Sheffield's uncle, the Lord Charles Howard of Effingham, lord high
admiral of England; next to him is his son-in-law, Sir Robert Southwell,
captain of the Elizabeth Jonas: but who is that short, sturdy, plainly
dressed man, who stands with legs a little apart, and hands behind his
back, looking up, with keen gray eyes, into the face of each speaker?
His cap is in his hands, so you can see the bullet head of crisp brown
hair and the wrinkled forehead, as well as the high cheek bones, the
short square face, the broad temples, the thick lips, which are yet firm
as granite. A coarse plebeian stamp of man: yet the whole figure and
attitude are that of boundless determination, self-possession, energy;
and when at last he speaks a few blunt words, all eyes are turned
respectfully upon him;--for his name is Francis Drake.

A burly, grizzled elder, in greasy sea-stained garments, contrasting
oddly with the huge gold chain about his neck, waddles up, as if he had
been born, and had lived ever since, in a gale of wind at sea. The upper
half of his sharp dogged visage seems of brick-red leather, the lower of
badger's fur; and as he claps Drake on the back, and, with a broad Devon
twang, shouts, "be you a coming to drink your wine, Francis Drake, or
be you not?--saving your presence, my lord;" the lord high admiral only
laughs, and bids Drake go and drink his wine; for John Hawkins, admiral
of the port, is the patriarch of Plymouth seamen, if Drake be their
hero, and says and does pretty much what he likes in any company on
earth; not to mention that to-day's prospect of an Armageddon fight has
shaken him altogether out of his usual crabbed reserve, and made him
overflow with loquacious good-humor, even to his rival Drake.

So they push through the crowd, wherein is many another man whom one
would gladly have spoken with face to face on earth. Martin Frobisher
and John Davis are sitting on that bench, smoking tobacco from long
silver pipes; and by them are Fenton and Withrington, who have both
tried to follow Drake's path round the world, and failed, though by no
fault of their own. The man who pledges them better luck next time,
is George Fenner, known to "the seven Portugals," Leicester's pet, and
captain of the galleon which Elizabeth bought of him. That short prim
man i