congruity of appearing to put new cloth to an old garment. It only remains for the Editor to express his grateful sense of the kindness which he has received from the many friends and some strangers whom he has consulted on doubtful or obscure points. He would record his obligations to his colleague at King's College, Professor J. W. Hales; to Mr. M. Oppenheim; to the Hydrographer, Captain Wharton, R.N., F.R.S.; to Mr. C. H. Coote of the British Museum; to M. Alfred Spont; to Mr. Hubert Hall of the Record Office; to the Director of Naval Intelligence, Rear-Admiral Bridge, who has assisted him in revising the proof-sheets, and in a very special degree to Mr. Edward Salisbury of the Record Office, to whose tireless generosity and marvellous skill in piecing out words from the faintest conceivable indications the accuracy of the present transcripts is largely due. Errata. P. 13. Note 2, last line, delete year [B.M. Cotton, Julius, F. x. ff. 111-117.-No date, title, signature, or endorsement. A neat, clerkly, contemporary writing.] WHEREAS the Queen's most excellent Majesty had of late years sundry and most certain intelligences of the great warlike preparation both for sea and land which the King of Spain of late years made from all parts, not only of the mightiest and most puissant ships and vessels that he could prepare, as The MS. has nothing externally to indicate its origin; internally, there is much in favour of the opinion that it is official; and it does not seem improbable that it was drawn up under Howard's authority, as 'the more particular relation' with which he proposed at better leisure' to supplement 'the brief abstract of accidents' sent to Walsyngham on August 7. It must, however, be remembered that this is only a conjecture, and that the Relation has not the authority of an authenticated document. Still, none of the statements in it are contradicted by other papers of greater value; and most of them are directly corroborated, often in the very words. VOL. I. B well from foreign places as in his own dominions, and by arresting of the ships of other countries that came into his dominions, but also of all kind of munition and victuals, and of captains, soldiers and mariners, and of all other provisions for a mighty army by seas, to come out of Spain and Portugal; for the more strength whereof it was notorious to the world how he had drawn into Spain and Portugal his principal and most experimented captains and old soldiers out of Naples, Sicilia, Lombardy and other parts of Italy, yea, and from sundry remote places of the Indies; the preparation whereof, with the numbers of ships, men, victuals, ordnance and all kind of munition, was made patent to the world by sundry books printed and published both in Spain, Portugal, and in many other countries of Christendom, carrying the titles of the Happy Armada1 of the King of Spain,' and in some specially expressed to be against England: And in like sort, where her Majesty had the like knowledge of the mighty and puissant forces of horses and footmen sufficient to make many armies prepared in the Low Countries under the conduct of the Duke of Parma, the King's Lieutenant-General, and of multitude of ships, bylanders,3 boats and other vessels fit for the transporting and landing of the said forces, armies from the coast of Flanders, with a general publication to the world that all these so mighty forces, both by sea and land, were intended to the invasion of her Majesty's realms, and as was pretended, to have 1 Felicisima Armada. It is so called in the official Relation published at Lisbon. 2 Whereas. 3 Bylander (Fr. belandre), from the Dutch binnenlander, was originally a small vessel adapted to Dutch inland navigation. At this time it seems to have been a one-masted craft carrying a spritsail; later on, the name was more especially applied to a kind of snow. made therewith a full conquest: Yet for that, in this time of their preparation, the King of Spain, by his Lieutenant-General, the Duke of Parma, caused certain offers to be made to her Majesty for a communication of a peace betwixt their Majesties; howsoever, by the common judgment of the world, the same was done but to abuse her Majesty and to win time whilst his preparations might be made complete; her Majesty, nevertheless, like a most godly and christian prince, did not refuse to give ear to so christian an1 offer, for which purpose she sent certain noblemen of her privy council into Flanders to treat with certain commissioners, who continued there without any good success by reason of the unreasonable delays of the King's commissioners; yea, they continued there until the navy of Spain was overcome and forced to fly. And yet, notwithstanding this her inclination to peace, and her princely offers of most reasonable conditions of peace, she, like a prince of wisdom and magnanimity, for defence of herself, her realm and people, was not negligent of her princely office to which God called her, and wherein He had stablished her and preserved her very many years, but providently did prepare a princely and strong army by sea, and put in readiness also sundry armies by land, to prevent and withstand the foresaid attempts so published to be made by such great armies, both by sea and land, as never were so great made in any part of Christendom, either by the said King or the Emperor, his father. For which, her preparations by seas, such diligence was used, as the same being begun to be made but about the 1st of November, yet the same was fully ready to take the seas by the 20th of December, a time very short for such an enterprise, having respect to the length 1 MS. and. of sundry years which the Spanish navy was in preparing. But yet such it was as God specially favoured, and as the force thereof hath been proved to have overmatched the mightiness of the enemy's navy; the charge whereof was committed by her Majesty to Charles Lord Howard, of the ancient house of Norfolk, High Admiral of England, who was accompanied with a great number of noblemen and others, the most sufficient and best experimented men for the seas. And after that he had continued a good time with the army upon the Narrow Seas betwixt England and Flanders, the said High Admiral, by her Majesty's commandment, sent Šir Francis Drake into the west part of this realm towards Spain, with certain of her Majesty's ships, and other ships of the subjects of the realm, to the number of fifty sail great and small, there to continue until such time as the Lord Admiral, with a great and strong force, should repair thither, if occasion should so require. And in the meantime, the Lord Admiral, with the Lord Henry Seymour, viceadmiral of that army, and many noblemen and gentlemen having charge of sundry of her Majesty's ships, continued in the Narrow Seas, having to attend upon them 20 ships of the city of London, very well and in good sort sent out, and sundry other good ships for the war which the coast towns, from the River of Thames to Newcastle northward, did send out for this service in warlike manner. And then, upon further intelligence of the readiness of the Armada of Spain to come to the seas, the 21st of May, 1588,1 the Lord Admiral, leaving the Lord Henry Seymour in the Narrow Seas, with a convenient force both of her Majesty's ships and of her subjects', to withstand all enterprises that the Duke 1 Cf. post, May 23, Howard to Burghley. |