ill he cried to his men, 'Fight on, fight on!'

[Illustration: 'Still he cried to his men, "Fight on, fight on!"']

Before dawn the Spaniards, weary of the fight that had raged for fifteen
hours, that had cost them fifteen ships and fifteen hundred men, had
drawn off to a little distance, and lay around her in a ring.

Daylight discovered the little 'Revenge' a mere water-logged hulk, with
rigging and tackle shot away, her masts overboard, her upper works
riddled, her pikes broken, all her powder spent, and forty of her best
men slain.

The glow that heralded sunrise shot over the sky and stained the placid
waters beneath to crimson. In this sea of blood the wreck lay, her decks
ruddy with the stain of blood sacrificed for honour.

She lay alone at the mercy of the waves, and unable to move save by
their rise and fall, alone with her wounded and dying and her dead to
whom could come no help.

Then Sir Richard Grenville called for the master gunner, whom he knew to
be both brave and trusty, and told him to sink the ship, so that the
Spaniards might have no glory in their conquest. He besought his sailors
to trust themselves to the mercy of God, and not to the mercy of men,
telling them that for the honour of their country the greater glory
would be theirs if they would consent to die with him.

The gunner and many others cried, 'Ay, ay, sir,' and consented to the
sinking of the ship.

But the captain and master would not agree to it: they told Sir Richard
that the Spanish admiral would be glad to listen to a composition, as
themselves were willing to do. Moreover there were still some men left
who were not mortally wounded, and who might yet live to do their
country good service. They told him too that the Spaniard could never
glory in having taken the ship, for she had six feet of water in the
hold already, as well as three leaks from shot under water, that could
not be stopped to resist a heavy sea.

But Sir Richard would not listen to any of their reasoning. Meanwhile
the master had gone to the general of the Armada, Don Alfonso Baffan,
who, knowing Grenville's determination to fight to the last, was afraid
to send any of his men on board the 'Revenge' again, lest they should be
blown up or sink on board of her.

The general yielded that 'all their lives should be saved, the companie
sent for England, and the better sorte to pay such reasonable ransome as
their estate would beare, and in the meane season to