VOBISCUM EST IOPE These dull note we sing Discords need for helps to grace them; Knows no discord; But still moves delight, Like clear springs renew'd by flowing, 181 DEVOTION FOLLOW your saint, follow with accents sweet! And tell the ravisher of my soul I perish for her love : But if she scorns my never-ceasing pain, Then burst with sighing in her sight, and ne'er return again! All that I sung still to her praise did tend; Still she was first, still she my songs did end; Yet she my love and music both doth fly, The music that her echo is and beauty's sympathy: Then let my notes pursue her scornful flight! It shall suffice that they were breathed and died for her delight. VOBISCUM EST IOPE WHEN thou must home to shades of underground, And there arrived, a new admired guest, The beauteous spirits do engirt thee round, White Iope, blithe Helen, and the rest, To hear the stories of thy finish'd love From that smooth tongue whose music hell can move : Then wilt thou speak of banqueting delights, O COME QUICKLY! NEVER weather-beaten sail more willing bent to shore, Than my wearied sprite now longs to fly out of my troubled breast: Ever blooming are the joys of heaven's high Paradise, SIR WALTER RALEIGH THE LAST FIGHT OF THE "REVENGE ” THE Spanish fleet having shrouded their approach by reason of the island, were now so soon at hand, as our ships had scarce time to weigh their anchors, but some of them were driven to let slip their cables and set sail. Sir Richard Grenville was the last weighed, to recover the men that were upon the island, which otherwise had been lost. The Lord Thomas with the rest very hardly recovered the wind, which Sir Richard Grenville not being able to do, was persuaded by the master and others to cut his main sail and cast about, and to trust to the sailing of the ship, for the squadron of Seville were on his weather bow. But Sir Richard utterly refused to turn from the enemy, alleging THE LAST FIGHT OF THE "REVENGE" 183 that he would rather choose to die, than to dishonour himself, his country, and Her Majesty's ship, persuading his company that he would pass through the two squadrons in despite of them, and enforce those of Seville to give him way. Which he performed upon divers of the foremost, who, as the mariners term it, sprang their luff, and fell under the lee of the Revenge. But the other course had been the better, and might right well have been answered in so great an impossibility of prevailing. Notwithstanding out of the greatness of his mind, he could not be persuaded. In the meanwhile as he attended those which were nearest him, the great San Philip being in the wind of him, and coming towards him, becalmed his sails in such sort, as the ship could neither weigh nor feel the helm, so huge and high charged was the Spanish ship, being of a thousand and five hundred tons. Who after laid the Revenge aboard. When he was thus bereft of his sails, the ships that were under his lee luffing up, also laid him aboard, of which the next was the Admiral of the Biscaines, a very mighty and puissant ship commanded by Brittan Dona. The said Philip carried three tier of ordinance on a side, and eleven pieces in every tier. She shot eight forthright out of her chase, besides those of her stern ports. After the Revenge was entangled with this Philip, four others boarded her; two on her larboard and two on her starboard. The fight thus beginning at three of the clock in the afternoon, continued very terrible all that evening. But the great San Philip having received the lower tier of the Revenge, discharged with cross-bar shot, shifted herself with all diligence from her sides, utterly misliking her first entertainment. Some say that the ship foundered, but we cannot report it for truth, unless we were assured. The Spanish ships were filled with companies of soldiers, in some two hundred, besides the mariners; in some five, in others eight hundred. In ours there were none at all, besides the mariners, but the servants of the commanders and some few voluntary gentlemen only. After many interchanged volleys of great ordnance and small shot, the Spaniards deliberated to enter the Revenge, and made G divers attempts, hoping to force her by the multitudes of their armed soldiers and musketeers, but were still repulsed again and again, and at all times beaten back into their own ships, or into the seas. In the beginning of the fight the George Noble, of London, having received some shot through her by the armadas, fell under the lee of the Revenge, and asked Sir Richard what he would command him, being but one of the victuallers and of small force; Sir Richard bid him save himself, and leave him to his fortune. After the fight had thus, without intermission, continued while the day lasted and some hours of the night, many of our men were slain and hurt, and one of the great galleons of the Armada and the Admiral of the Hulks both sunk, and in many other of the Spanish ships great slaughter was made. Some write that Sir Richard was very dangerously hurt almost in the beginning of the fight, and lay speechless for a time ere he recovered. But two of the Revenge's own company, brought home in a ship of Lime from the Island, examined by some of the Lords and others, affirmed that he was never so wounded as that he forsook the upper deck till an hour before midnight, and then being shot into the body with a musket as he was dressing, was again shot into the head, and withal his surgeon wounded to death. This agrees also with an examination taken by Sir Francis Godolphin, of four other mariners of the same ship being returned, which examination the said Sir Francis sent unto Master William Killigrew, of Her Majesty's Privy Chamber. But to return to the fight, the Spanish ships which attempted to board the Revenge, as they were wounded and beaten off, so always others came in their places, she having never less than two mighty galleons by her sides and aboard her. So that ere the morning from three of the clock the day before, there had fifteen several armadas assailed her, and all so ill approved their entertainment, as they were by the break of day, far more willing to hearken to a composition, than hastily to make any more assaults or entries. But as the day increased so our men decreased; and as the light grew more and more, by so much more THE LAST FIGHT OF THE "REVENGE" 185 grew our discomforts. For none appeared in sight but enemies, saving one small ship called the Pilgrim, commanded by Jacob Whiddon, who hovered all night to see the success: but in the morning bearing with the Revenge, was hunted like a hare amongst many ravenous hounds, but escaped. All the powder of the Revenge to the last barrel was now spent, all her pikes broken, forty of her best men slain, and the most part of the rest hurt. In the beginning of the fight she had but one hundred free from sickness, and fourscore and ten sick, laid in hold upon the ballast. A small troop to man such a ship, and a weak garrison to resist so mighty an army. By those hundred all was sustained, the volleys, boardings, and enterings of fifteen. ships of war, besides those which beat her at large. On the contrary, the Spanish were always supplied with soldiers brought from every squadron: all manner of arms and powder at will. Unto ours there remained no comfort at all, no hope, no supply either of ships, men, or weapons; the masts all beaten overboard, all her tackle cut asunder, her upper work altogether razed, and in effect evened she was with the water, but the very foundation or bottom of a ship, nothing being left overhead either for flight or defence. Sir Richard finding himself in this distress, and unable any longer to make resistance, having endured in this fifteen hours' fight, the assault of fifteen several armadas, all by turns aboard him, and by estimation eight hundred shot of great artillery, besides many assaults and entries. And that himself and the ship must needs be possessed by the enemy, who were now all cast in a ring round about him; the Revenge not able to move one way or other, but as she was moved with the waves and billow of the sea: commanded the master Gunner, whom he knew to be a most resolute man, to split and sink the ship; that thereby nothing might remain of glory or victory to the Spaniards: seeing in so many hours' fight, and with so great a Navy they were not able to take her, having had fifteen hours' time, fifteen thousand men, and fifty and three sail of men-of-war to perform it withal. And persuaded the |