ed down and watched Sir
Richard Grenville die, 'as a true soldier ought to do, fighting for his
country, queen, religion, and honour.' It seems almost fabulous that the
hour of pure poetical justice should strike so soon, and that Raleigh of
all living Englishmen should thus come face to face with those of all
the Spanish tyrants of the deep. As he swung forward into the harbour
and saw them there before him, the death of his kinsman in the Azores
was solemnly present to his memory, 'and being resolved to be revenged
for the "Revenge," or to second her with his own life,' as he says, he
came to anchor close to the galleons, and for three hours the battle
with them proceeded.

It began by the 'War Sprite' being in the centre and a little to the
front; on the one side, the 'Nonparilla,' in which Raleigh now perceived
Lord Thomas Howard, and the 'Lion;' on the other the 'Mary Rose' and the
'Dreadnought;' these, with the 'Rainbow' a little farther off, kept up
the fight alone until ten o'clock in the morning; waiting for the
fly-boats, which were to board the galleons, and which, for some reason
or other, did not arrive. Meanwhile, Essex, excited beyond all restraint
by the volleys of culverin and cannon, slipped anchor, and passing from
the body of the fleet, lay close up to the 'War Sprite,' pushing the
'Dreadnought' on one side. Raleigh, seeing him coming, went to meet him
in his skiff, and begged him to see that the fly-boats were sent, as the
battery was beginning to be more than his ships could bear. The Lord
Admiral was following Essex, and Raleigh passed on to him with the same
entreaty. This parley between the three commanders occupied about a
quarter of an hour.

Meanwhile, the men second in command had taken an unfair advantage of
Raleigh's absence. He hurried back to find that the Vice-Admiral had
pushed the 'Nonparilla' ahead, and that Sir Francis Vere, too, in the
'Rainbow,' had passed the 'War Sprite.' Finding himself, 'from being the
first to be but the third,' Raleigh skilfully thrust in between these
two ships, and threw himself in front of them broadside to the channel,
so that, as he says, 'I was sure no one should outstart me again, for
that day.' Finally, Essex and Lord Thomas Howard took the next places.
Sir Francis Vere, the marshal, who seems to have been mad for
precedence, 'while we had no leisure to look behind us, secretly
fastened a rope on my ship's side toward him, to draw himself up equally