aming in till the English fleet
numbered 140 sail. Here Camden alludes to Ralegh by name. So does a
correspondent of Mendoza, describing him as 'a gentleman of the Queen's
Privy Chamber.' He must have been at the decisive struggle before
Calais; 'Never was seen by any man living such a battery.' He was
present at the desperate stand of the Spaniards opposite Gravelines. He
helped to hunt the enemy into the northern seas. In a passage,
attributed by Strype to Drake, of his _Report of the Truth of the Fight
about the Isles of the Azores_, he writes: 'The navy of 140 sail, was by
thirty of the Queen's ships of war and a few merchantmen, beaten and
shuffled together, even from the Lizard Point, in Cornwall, to Portland,
where they shamefully left Don Pedro de Valdez with his mighty ship;
from Portland to Calais, where they lost Hugo de Moncada, with the
galleys of which he was captain; and from Calais, driven with squibs
from their anchors, were chased out of the sight of England round about
Scotland and Ireland; where, for the sympathy of their barbarous
religion, hoping to find succour and assistance, a great part of them
were crushed against the rocks; and those others who landed, being very
many in number, were, notwithstanding, broken, slain, and taken, and so
sent from village to village, coupled with halters, to be shipped into
England; where her Majesty, of her princely and "invincible"
disposition, disdaining to put them to death, and scorning either to
retain or entertain them, they were all sent back again to their own
country, to witness and recount the worthy achievements of their
"invincible navy".'

[Sidenote: _Retaliation on Spain._]

Ralegh had much to do with the preliminary arrangements for the repulse
of the Armada. He advised on the manner in which the victory might be
improved. Several of the noble Spanish prisoners were committed to his
charge. A plan was formed, which the completeness of the Spanish
overthrow rendered unnecessary, for the despatch of Sir Richard
Grenville and him to Ireland for the suppression of any armed body of
Spanish fugitives. His part in the actual Channel fighting had been that
simply of one among many gallant captains. When next the State made a
naval demonstration he continued to play a secondary character. In
April, 1589, an expedition, under Drake and Norris, of six Queen's
men-of-war and 120 volunteer sail, started to restore Don Antonio to the
throne of Portugal. It w