y-six
sail, such vigorous measures were prosecuted, that one hundred and
ninety-one ships were collected, manned by seventeen thousand four
hundred seamen. The merchants of London granted thirty ships and ten
thousand men, and all England was aroused to meet the expected danger.
Never was patriotism more signally evinced, never were more decisive
proofs given of the popularity of a sovereign. Indeed, Elizabeth was
always popular with the nation; and with all her ceremony, and state,
and rudeness to the commons, and with all their apparent servility,
she never violated the laws, or irritated the people by oppressive
exactions. Many acts of the Tudor princes seem to indicate the reign
of despotism in England, but this despotism was never grievous, and
had all the benignity of a paternal government. Capricious and
arbitrary as Elizabeth was, in regard to some unfortunate individuals
who provoked her hatred or her jealousy, still she ever sedulously
guarded the interests of the nation, and listened to the counsel of
patriotic and able ministers. When England was threatened with a
Spanish invasion, there was not a corner of the land which did not
rise to protect a beloved sovereign; nor was there a single spot,
where a landing might be effected, around which an army of twenty
thousand could not be rallied in forty-eight hours.

[Sidenote: Spanish Armada.]

But Philip, nevertheless, expected the complete conquest of England;
and, as his "Invincible Armada" of one hundred and thirty ships, left
the mouth of the Tagus, commanded by Medina Sidonia, and manned by the
noblest troops of Spain, he fancied his hour of triumph was at hand.
But his hopes proved dreams, like most of the ambitious designs of
men. The armada met with nothing but misfortunes, both from battle and
from storms. Only fifty ships returned to Spain. An immense booty was
divided among the English sailors, and Elizabeth sent, in her turn, a
large fleet to Spain, the following year, (1589,) under the command of
Drake, which, after burning a few towns, returned ingloriously to
England, with a loss of ten thousand men. The war was continued with
various success till 1598, when a peace was negotiated. The same year,
died Philip II., and Lord Burleigh, who, for forty years, directed the
councils of Elizabeth, and to whose voice she ever listened, even when
opposed by such favorites as Leicester and Essex. Burleigh was not a
great genius, but was a man admirably adap