excess of what their soldier masters thought necessary. The absolute numbers speak for themselves, and one comparison will be sufficient. The San Martin, of 1,000 tons, the flagship of the Duke of Medina-Sidonia, had 177 seamen and 300 soldiers. The Ark, of 800 tons, the flagship of Lord Howard, had 300 seamen and 125 soldiers.

More important, however, than even this inferiority of the Spanish ships and sailors was the inferiority of their guns and gunners. It was long believed in this country, and has been repeatedly stated, that the Spanish guns were both numerous and large. They were, in fact, neither one nor the other; as a rule they were small-4, 6 or 9-pounders ; they were comparatively few, and they were very badly worked.

The guns at that time in use on board ship were, roughly speaking, the same in the English and Spanish navies; and as everything was rough, as the minimum windage prescribed was one-fourth of the bore of the gun and as much more as pleased the gunner, the Englishmen felt no difficulty in assigning English names to the Spanish guns, as shown in the following tables. The weight of the shot is approximate, but sufficiently accurate for purposes of comparison (vol. ii. App. C).

And smaller pieces under the names of fowler, falcon, falconet, &c., throwing balls of from 3 pounds

With the exception of the Tiger, whose armament is taken from an order1 by Sir William Wynter in 1586, the English armaments are given from a table dated 1595-9, printed by Derrick.2 The comparison shows that the change between 1586 and 1595 had been rather to decrease the weight of the guns. Wynter's order of 1586 also gives the armament of two ships which he distinguishes as galleon P. Pett at Deptford, and galleon Ma. Baker at Woolwich. In 1588 they were known as the Rainbow and Vanguard. Two papers of 1595 give estimates for the armaments of three ships 'now in building,' the ordnance for the first two being described as answerable to the pieces that are in the

1 S.P. Dom. Eliz., clxxxvii. 65.

2 Kise and Progress of the Royal Navy, 31.
3 S.P. Dom. Eliz., ccliii. 114; ccliv. 43.

Mer Honour,' whose armament is here given from

and comparing the armament ordered in 1586 for the Rainbow and Vanguard, two ships which may be classed with the Nonpareil given in the former table, the necessary inference is that the armaments of 1595 were not so heavy as those carried in 1588.

Another estimate, which, though inexact, is entitled to credit, is that given of the armament of the Revenge, also a ship of 500 tons, taken by the Spaniards in 1591, and reported by them to have 43 brass guns: 20 on the lower deck of from 4,000 to 6,000 pounds weight, and the rest from 2,000 to 3,000.1 The greater weights correspond to the cannons, demi-cannons, or culverins; the smaller to the demi-culverins and sakers.

Of the Spanish armament we cannot speak with the same absolute knowledge; but it seems admitted that the galleasses were the most heavily armed ships in the fleet, and of these the San Lorenzo, which was taken at Calais, was the largest and heaviest. The report of her armament given by our

1 Duro, i. 76.

people (p. 349), who had possession of her for some time, corresponds fairly well with the official statement. The Nuestra Señora del Rosario was the large ship captured by Drake and sent into Torbay. Her armament is given from the official inventory taken at Torquay (vol. ii. August 29, November 5). She is spoken of by Duro as one of the most powerful and best ships of the fleet.2 The San Salvador was the ship partly blown up and sent to Weymouth (pp. 9, 301); her armament is also given from the official inventory (vol. ii. Aug. 24). Some of her small guns were very likely thrown overboard by the explosion. Duro tabulates her as carrying 25 in all. The inventory accounts for 19, including four old minions. and one old fowler. The missing six were probably fowlers or falcons. The two remaining ships have their armament given by Duro.3 They do not seem in any way distinguished from others of the same size; they belonged to the Levant squadron, and are classed with the San Juan de Sicilia, of 800 tons and 26 guns, which took a prominent part in the battle of the 29th of July. There is no published account of the armament of the great ships of the Portuguese squadron, and amongst them the San Martin, San Felipe, and San Mateo, of which all were in the thickest of the fight, and the two last were driven on shore in a sinking state. It was probably not very different from that of the N. S. del Rosario. There is here, of course, no suggestion that the more powerful ships were armed like the Anunciada or Santa Maria de Vison; but it 2 Ib. i. 83 n.

I Duro, i. 390.

3 Tom. i. 389.

appears a fair presumption that many of the ships which have been counted as effective were so armed.

It should also be noted that whereas the Spanish ships of below 300 tons burden carried only four or six small guns, English ships of 200 tons had a very respectable armament, and ships still smaller were not altogether despicable. Of the way in which the English merchant ships were armed we have little knowledge. The larger ones, under the command of men like Lancaster or George Fenner, may certainly be classed as efficient men-of-war. The Margaret and John, of 200 tons, is named as having rendered good service on more than one occasion; and considering that many of the others had probably been on privateering cruises, and that the Pelican or Golden Hind, in which Drake went round the worlda ship of nominally 100 tons-had 14 guns, it is allowable to question Barrow's judgment that, 'looking at their tonnage, two-thirds of them, at least, could have been of little, if any, service, and must have required uncommon vigilance to keep them out of harm's way.' They were not, indeed, the ships that were to be looked for in the forefront of the fight-no more was the Euryalus or the Naiad at Trafalgar—but there is no reason to doubt that they did, in their own way, render good and efficient service.

1

It was not only in the number and weight of guns that the English had a great comparative advantage; they were immensely superior in the working of them. According to Captain Duro, 1 Life of Drake, 270.