al to the English in action, the
Spaniards were at least as courteous in victory. It is
due to them to say, that the conditions were faithfully
observed. And "the ship being marvellous unsavourie,"
Alonzo de Bacon, the Spanish Admiral, sent his boat
to bring Sir Richard on board his own vessel.

Sir Richard, whose life was fast ebbing away, replied,
that "he might do with his body what he list, for that
he esteemed it not; and as he was carried out of the
ship he swooned, and reviving again, desired the company
to pray for him."

The Admiral used him with all humanity, "commending
his valour and worthiness, being unto them a
rare spectacle and a resolution seldom approved." The
officers of the rest of the fleet, too, John Higgins tells
us, crowded round to look at him, and a new fight
had almost broken out between the Biscayans and the
"Portugals," each claiming the honour of having boarded
the Revenge.

"In a few hours Sir Richard, feeling his end approaching,
showed not any sign of faintness, but spake these words
in Spanish, and said, 'Here die I, Richard Grenville, with
a joyful and quiet mind, for that I have ended my life
as a true soldier ought to do that hath fought for his
country, queen, religion, and honour. Whereby my soul
most joyfully departeth out of this body, and shall always
leave behind it an everlasting fame of a valiant and true
soldier that hath done his duty as he was bound to do.'
When he had finished these or other such like words,
he gave up the ghost with great and stout courage, and
no man could perceive any sign of heaviness in him."

Such was the fight at Florez, in that August of 1591,
without its equal in such of the annals of mankind as
the thing which we call history has preserved to us;
scarcely equalled by the most glorious fate which the
imagination of Barrere could invent for the Vengeur;
nor did it end without a sequel awful as itself.
Sea battles have been often followed by storms, and
without a miracle; but with a miracle, as the Spaniards
and the English alike believed, or without one, as we
moderns would prefer believing, "there ensued on this
action a tempest so terrible as was never seen or heard
the like before." A fleet of merchantmen joined the
armada immediately after the battle, forming in all 140
sail; and of these 140, only 32 ever saw Spanish harbour.
The rest all foundered, or were lost on the Azores.
The men-of-war had been so shattered by shot as to be