rations, they left no stone unturned to
get his orders modified. They tampered with his men, they whispered
slanders in his mistress' ear, they frightened her with threats from
abroad, they tempted her with offers of peace from Parma on the old
disgraceful terms. For Walsingham, who, through thick and thin, was
always at Drake's back, it was an unequal fight; with the stanchest of
his party in disgrace for Mary's premature execution, he was
single-handed against a host, and at last the friends of Spain
prevailed. Early in April a messenger sped down to Plymouth with orders
that operations were to be confined to the high seas. As Philip's ships
were all snug in port, and could well remain there as long as Drake's
stores allowed him to keep the sea, it was a complete triumph for Spain.
But when the messenger dashed into Plymouth with the fatal packet he
found the roadstead empty. Drake was gone.

In vain at the last moment a number of his sailors had been induced to
desert; he had filled their places with soldiers. In vain a swift
pinnace was despatched in pursuit; Drake had taken care no orders should
catch him, and, with his squadron increased by two warships from Lyme,
was already off Finisterre, battling with a gale which drove the pinnace
home. For seven days it raged and forced the fleet far out to sea. Still
Drake held on in its teeth, and so well had he his ships in hand that on
the 16th, within twenty-four hours after the gale had blown itself out,
the whole fleet in perfect order was sailing gayly eastward past Cape
St. Vincent.

Eastward--for he had intelligence that Cadiz harbor was full of
transports and store-ships, and on the afternoon of the 19th, as he
entered the bay, he saw a forest of masts in the road behind the city. A
council of war was summoned at once, and without asking their opinion he
quietly told them he was going to attack. It was his usual manner of
holding a council, but it took Borough's breath away. It shocked the old
Queen's officer, and outraged his sense of what was due to his own
reputation and experience and the time-honored customs of war. He wanted
to talk about it and think about it, and find out first whether it was
too dangerous. And there was certainly some excuse for his caution.
Cadiz stands on a precipitous rock at the end of a low and narrow neck
of land, some five miles in length, running parallel to the coast.
Within this natural breakwater are enclosed an outer and an i