by a cruel discipline gradually
taught his adversaries how to resist him.

It was idle to repeat the names of great battles won, in the middle
ages, by men who did not make war their chief calling; those battles
proved only that one militia might beat another, and not that a militia
could beat a regular army. As idle was it to declaim about the camp
at Tilbury. We had indeed reason to be proud of the spirit which all
classes of Englishmen, gentlemen and yeomen, peasants and burgesses,
had so signally displayed in the great crisis of 1588. But we had also
reason to be thankful that, with all their spirit, they were not brought
face to face with the Spanish battalions. Somers related an anecdote,
well worthy to be remembered, which had been preserved by tradition
in the noble house of De Vere. One of the most illustrious men of that
house, a captain who had acquired much experience and much fame in the
Netherlands, had, in the crisis of peril, been summoned back to England
by Elizabeth, and rode with her through the endless ranks of shouting
pikemen. She asked him what he thought of the army. "It is," he said, "a
brave army." There was something in his tone or manner which showed
that he meant more than his words expressed. The Queen insisted on his
speaking out. "Madam," he said, "Your Grace's army is brave indeed. I
have not in the world the name of a coward, and yet I am the greatest
coward here. All these fine fellows are praying that the enemy may land,
and that there may be a battle; and I, who know that enemy well, cannot
think of such a battle without dismay." De Vere was doubtless in the
right. The Duke of Parma, indeed, would not have subjected our country;
but it is by no means improbable that, if he had effected a landing,
the island would have been the theatre of a war greatly resembling that
which Hannibal waged in Italy, and that the invaders would not have been
driven out till many cities had been sacked, till many counties had been
wasted, and till multitudes of our stout-hearted rustics and artisans
had perished in the carnage of days not less terrible than those of
Thrasymene and Cannae.

While the pamphlets of Trenchard and Somers were in every hand, the
Parliament met.

The words with which the King opened the session brought the great
question to a speedy issue. "The circumstances," he said, "of affairs
abroad are such, that I think myself obliged to tell you my opinion,
that, for the present, Eng