t Leicester, or Burghley, or Queen Elizabeth, knew at the time, the
army of Farnese might, on Monday, have been marching upon London. Now, on
that Monday morning, the army of Lord Hunsdon was not assembled at all,
and Leicester with but four thousand men, under his command, was just
commencing his camp at Tilbury. The "Bellona-like" appearance of the
Queen on her white palfrey,--with truncheon in hand, addressing her
troops, in that magnificent burst of eloquence which has so often been
repeated, was not till eleven days afterwards; not till the great Armada,
shattered and tempest-tossed, had been, a week long, dashing itself
against the cliffs of Norway and the Faroes, on, its forlorn retreat to
Spain.

Leicester, courageous, self-confident, and sanguine as ever; could not
restrain his indignation at the parsimony with which his own impatient
spirit had to contend. "Be you assured," said he, on the 3rd August, when
the Armada was off the Isle of Wight, "if the Spanish fleet arrive safely
in the narrow seas, the Duke of Parma will join presently with all his
forces, and lose no time in invading this realm. Therefore I beseech you,
my good Lords, let no man, by hope or other abuse; prevent your speedy
providing defence against, this mighty enemy now knocking at our gate."

For even at this supreme moment doubts were entertained at court as to
the intentions of the Spaniards:

Next day he informed Walsingham that his four thousand men had arrived.
"They be as forward men and willing to meet the enemy as I ever saw,"
said he. He could not say as much in, praise of the commissariat: "Some
want the captains showed," he observed, "for these men arrived without
one meal of victuals so that on their-arrival, they had not one barrel of
beer nor loaf of bread--enough after twenty miles' march to have
discouraged them, and brought them to mutiny. I see many causes to
increase my former opinion of the dilatory wants you shall find upon all
sudden hurley burleys. In no former time was ever so great a cause, and
albeit her Majesty hath appointed an army to resist her enemies if they
land, yet how hard a matter it will be to gather men together, I find it
now. If it will be five days to gather these countrymen, judge what it
will be to look in short space for those that dwell forty, fifty, sixty
miles off."

He had immense difficulty in feeding even this slender force. "I made
proclamation," said he, "two days ago, in all market to