The defeat of the Armada of 1588 is commonly regarded as the end of any danger to England from Spain. This, however, is far from the truth. Had Elizabeth and her minister Burghley been less timid, it might have been. But they would not allow a great counter-attack on Spain to be delivered by the whole strength of England; and the semi-private expedition of Drake and Sir John Norreys in 1589, though gallantly made, was hampered by injudicious instructions, and eventually failed. Worse still, Drake lost Elizabeth’s confidence, and retired into private life. The English relapsed into mere aimless, commerce-destroying attempts, which had very little real success.

Philip, with a heroism which compels admiration, despite the misery which it entailed upon his people, set to work immediately after 1588 to build up a properly organized navy. His dogged determination never wavered. In his efforts he was splendidly assisted by Pero Menendez Marquez, son of Menendez de Aviles, who invented a new type of swift warship for treasure-carrying service. Spain lacked good timber, and the supplies of it, brought from the Baltic, were often intercepted by English cruisers. Seamen also were lacking, and the old faulty threefold division of the crews was adhered to. Yet, in 1591, Don Alonso de Bazan, brother of Santa Cruz, was able to appear at the Azores with a fleet of sixty-three sail, and to drive away Lord Thomas Howard’s squadron, with the loss of the far-famed Revenge, the story of whose wonderful fight is enshrined in English poetry.

Meanwhile in France the Huguenot Henry of Navarre had become king. He was opposed by the Catholic League, which was energetically supported by Philip. Elizabeth sent troops to the support of Henry; but the Spaniards were able to seize ports in Brittany, and there establish a base of operations dangerously close to England, occupied not only by a strong force of troops, but by a squadron of galleys, available for brief raids in fine weather. The reports of the progress of the new Spanish Navy were more and more alarming. The English squadrons were kept off the trade routes by powerful Spanish fleets, and year after year the American bullion came safely home.

Elizabeth now did what she should have done before, and summoned Drake from Devon to take a fleet to America. The object was to attack Panama, and intercept Philip’s treasure trains. But she made the mistake of associating with him his kinsman Hawkins, broken by age and ill-health. This was in the summer of 1595, and while Drake was organizing his squadron at Plymouth, four of the galleys in Brittany sailed, about July 15, from the Blavet River on a raid against the Channel Islands. They raided Penmarch, but found the wind foul for the Islands, and decided to make a descent on the Scillies instead. The galley was always useless for a voyage of any length, being unable to carry supplies sufficient for its crew of some 400 soldiers, slaves, and seamen. Water ran out, and the galleys put into Mount’s Bay. On the 23rd they were before Mousehole. Six hundred soldiers were landed, and finding nothing to oppose them, they devastated the neighbourhood, burned Mousehole, Newlyn, St. Paul, and the adjoining hamlets, and marched on Penzance. Sir Francis Godolphin hurriedly collected 200 peasants for its defence, but they dared not face the Spanish veterans, and dispersed. The Spaniards burned Penzance, and next day held a church parade on Western Hill, and vowed to found a monastery there when England was conquered. They might have done more mischief, but when they heard that the terrible Drake was at Plymouth, they withdrew forthwith. This petty operation, after years of patient toil, and though the war was to last for eight years longer, was the only Spanish landing on English soil.

Elizabeth’s last West Indian expedition was a melancholy failure. Hawkins died on the way out. The ports were now found fortified and garrisoned; Drake failed before Puerto Rico, and on January 27, 1596, the great seaman, baffled and broken-hearted, died of dysentery off Puerto Bello, and was laid to rest in the waters whereon so many of his boldest deeds had been wrought.

His death was a national misfortune. In 1596 the Spaniards took Calais, and thus gained an outpost only twenty miles from England. Elizabeth retorted by a great expedition under the young Earl of Essex and Howard of Effingham. Cadiz was taken and destroyed, with twelve warships and a merchant fleet worth 8,000,000 ducats. The blow to Spanish industry was crushing, but, despite Essex’s entreaty, Howard would not garrison the impregnable port. Had he done so, it might well have become to England what Gibraltar is now. As it was, Philip was goaded into a fresh attempt at invasion; but the ill-equipped fleet, largely composed of embargoed foreign craft filled with soldiers, which he hounded to sea in October, under the Conde de Santa Gadea, was so shattered by a storm, that little of it could ever be rallied again.

Philip was now bankrupt, but at the cost of misery, which left its mark on Spain for centuries, he prepared for yet one attempt more. In 1597 Essex sailed with a large fleet to the Azores on a nearly fruitless cruise against the Spanish treasure fleet. By amazing exertions a new Spanish fleet had been assembled in Ferrol, and while Essex was on his way home the last great Armada, 136 ships strong, reached the coast of Brittany. Another fleet was following from Lisbon, and in all there were some 18,000 troops on board. The plan of action was that which Menendez had laid down twenty years before. Essex, however, safely made Plymouth in a violent gale, which scattered the ill-found Spanish fleet, this time, happily, with little loss of life. It was Philip’s last effort, and a year later he died.

After his death the war languished until 1601. The English Navy was only employed on abortive commerce-destroying expeditions, and was looked upon with contempt by the bold privateers who harried the Spanish Main. In 1602 Spain made a last effort, and, assisted by the slackness and want of foresight of Elizabeth’s chief minister, Sir Robert Cecil, son of Burghley, succeeded in landing 4,000 troops in Ireland. This woke up the drowsy government. The Spaniards were blockaded in Kinsale by the army of Lord Deputy Mountjoy and the fleet under Sir Richard Leveson. A reinforcing squadron was annihilated in Castlehaven, and Kinsale forced to surrender. In 1602 Leveson sailed to the Spanish coast and won a victory at Cezimbra, but in 1603 Elizabeth died. Her successor, James I., was only too ready to come to terms, and made peace forthwith, without settling the Indies trade question, over which so much blood was subsequently shed. It was the first ill-service done by the Stuarts to the country over which they had come to rule, and it was not to be the last.

The lessons to be drawn from the story of the first Anglo-Spanish War appear to be three: 1. So long as an island state hold the command of the sea, and it be exercised with reasonable skill and prudence, that state is practically invulnerable. Excepting Drake, no Englishman of the sixteenth century apparently understood how to utilize England’s naval supremacy, hence the frequent approach to success of the Spaniards.

2. In a naval war the operations must be vigorous and drastic, and not wasted upon mere commerce destroying. All England’s privateers and cruisers failed to take a single Spanish treasure fleet.

3. It is necessary to have (a) a regular military force strong enough to assist the fleet in its operations on an enemy’s coast; (b) an organized defensive force to deal with isolated raids.