k with a pestilence, till at
last there were hardly men enough left to handle the sails. They fell
too far south for England, and at length had to put into Vigo, where
their probable fate would be a Spanish prison. Happily they found other
English vessels in the roads there. Fresh hands were put on board, and
fresh provisions. With these supplies Hawkins reached Mount's Bay a
month later than the _Judith_, in January 1569.

Drake had told the story, and all England was ringing with it.
Englishmen always think their own countrymen are in the right. The
Spaniards, already in evil odour with the seagoing population, were
accused of abominable treachery. The splendid fight which Hawkins had
made raised him into a national idol, and though he had suffered
financially, his loss was made up in reputation and authority. Every
privateer in the West was eager to serve under the leadership of the
hero of San Juan de Ulloa. He speedily found himself in command of a
large irregular squadron, and even Cecil recognised his consequence. His
chief and constant anxiety was for the comrades whom he had left behind,
and he talked of a new expedition to recover them, or revenge them if
they had been killed; but all things had to wait. They probably found
means of communicating with him, and as long as there was no
Inquisition in Mexico, he may have learnt that there was no immediate
occasion for action.

Elizabeth put a brave face on her disappointment. She knew that she was
surrounded with treason, but she knew also that the boldest course was
the safest. She had taken Alva's money, and was less than ever inclined
to restore it. She had the best of the bargain in the arrest of the
Spanish and English ships and cargoes. Alva would not encourage Philip
to declare war with England till the Netherlands were completely
reduced, and Philip, with his leaden foot (_pie de plomo_), always
preferred patience and intrigue. Time and he and the Pope were three
powers which in the end, he thought, would prove irresistible, and
indeed it seemed, after Hawkins's return, as if Philip would turn out to
be right. The presence of the Queen of Scots in England had set in flame
the Catholic nobles. The wages of Alva's troops had been wrung somehow
out of the wretched Provinces, and his supreme ability and inexorable
resolution were steadily grinding down the revolt. Every port in Holland
and Zealand was in Alva's hands. Elizabeth's throne was undermined by
th