y the
English cruisers and secure him a passage across the Channel, so Parma,
in 1588, waited for Medina Sidonia to drive away the Dutch and English
squadrons that watched his flotilla, and to enable his veterans to cross
the sea to the land that they were to conquer. Thanks to Providence, in
each case England's enemy waited in vain!

Although the numbers of sail which the Queen's government and the
patriotic zeal of volunteers had collected for the defence of England
exceeded the number of sail in the Spanish fleet, the English ships
were, collectively, far inferior in size to their adversaries', their
aggregate tonnage being less by half than that of the enemy. In the
number of guns and weight of metal the disproportion was still greater.
The English admiral was also obliged to subdivide his force; and Lord
Henry Seymour, with forty of the best Dutch and English ships, was
employed in blockading the hostile ports in Flanders, and in preventing
the Duke of Parma from coming out of Dunkirk.

The Invincible Armada, as the Spaniards in the pride of their hearts
named it, set sail from the Tagus on May 29th, but near Corunna met with
a tempest that drove it into port with severe loss. It was the report of
the damage done to the enemy by this storm which had caused the English
Court to suppose that there would be no invasion that year. But, as
already mentioned, the English admiral had sailed to Corunna, and
learned the real state of the case, whence he had returned with his
ships to Plymouth.

The armada sailed again from Corunna on July 12th. The orders of King
Philip to the Duke of Medina Sidonia were that he should, on entering
the Channel, keep near the French coast, and, if attacked by the English
ships, avoid an action and steer on to Calais roads, where the Prince of
Parma's squadron was to join him. The hope of surprising and destroying
the English fleet in Plymouth led the Spanish admiral to deviate from
these orders and to stand across to the English shore; but, on finding
that Lord Howard was coming out to meet him, he resumed the original
plan, and determined to bend his way steadily toward Calais and Dunkirk,
and to keep merely on the defensive against such squadrons of the
English as might come up with him.

It was on Saturday, July 20th, that Lord Effingham came in sight of his
formidable adversaries. The armada was drawn up in form of a crescent,
which from horn to horn measured some seven miles. There