weapons. The Spanish defeat illustrates also the necessity
of expert planning and guidance of a naval campaign, with naval
counsels and requirements duly regarded; and the fatal effect of
failure to concentrate attention on the enemy fleet. It is doubtful,
however, whether it would have been better, as Drake urged, and as
was actually attempted in the month before the Armada's arrival, if
the English had shifted the war to the coast of Spain. The objections
arise chiefly from the difficulties, in that age, of maintaining
a large naval force far from its base, all of which the Spanish
encountered in their northward cruise. It is noteworthy that, even
after the brief Channel operations, an epidemic caused heavy mortality
in the English fleet. Finally, the Armada is a classic example
of the value of naval defense to an insular nation. In the often
quoted words of Raleigh, "To entertain the enemy with their own
beef in their bellies, before they eat of our Kentish capons, I
take it to be the wisest way, to do which his Majesty after God
will employ his good ships at sea."

Upon Spain, already tottering from inherent weakness, the Armada
defeat had the effect of casting down her pride and confidence
as leader of the Catholic world. Though it was not until three
centuries later that she lost her last colonies, her hold on her
vast empire was at once shaken by this blow at her sea control.
While she maintained large fleets until after the Napoleonic Wars,
she was never again truly formidable as a naval power. But the victory
lifted England more than it crushed Spain, inspiring an intenser
patriotism, an eagerness for colonial and commercial adventure, an
exaltation of spirit manifested in the men of genius who crowned
the Elizabethan age.

_The Last Years of the War_

The war was not ended; and though Philip was restrained by the
rise of Protestant power in France under Henry of Navarre, he was
still able to gather his sea forces on almost as grand a scale. In
the latter stages of the war the naval expeditions on both sides
were either, like the Armada, for the purpose of landing armies on
foreign soil, or raids on enemy ports, colonies and commerce. Thus
Drake in 1589 set out with a force of 18,000 men, which attacked
Corunna, moved thence upon Lisbon, and lost a third or more of
its number in a fruitless campaign on land. Both Drake and the
aged Hawkins, now his vice admiral, died in the winter of 1595-96
during a last