Elizabethan Sea Dogs | Page 8

English navy, alone among all the navies in the world, to
sailing-ship tactics, instead of continuing those founded on the rowing
galley of immemorial fame. The change from a sort of floating army to
a really naval fleet, from galleys moved by oars and depending on
boarders who were soldiers, to ships moved by sails and depending on
their broadside guns--this change was quite as important as the change
in the nineteenth century from sails and smooth-bores to steam and
rifled ordnance. It was, indeed, from at least one commanding point of
view, much more important; for it meant that England was easily first
in developing the only kind of navy which would count in any struggle
for oversea dominion after the discovery of America had made sea
power no longer a question of coasts and landlocked waters but of all
the outer oceans of the world.
The year that saw the birth of modern sea power is a date to be
remembered in this history; for 1545 was also the year in which the
mines of Potosi first aroused the Old World to the riches of the New; it
was the year, too, in which Sir Francis Drake was born. Moreover,
there was another significant birth in this same year. The parole aboard
the Portsmouth fleet was God save the King! The answering
countersign was Long to reign over us! These words formed the
nucleus of the national anthem now sung round all the Seven Seas. The
anthems of other countries were born on land. God save the King!
sprang from the navy and the sea.
* * * * *
The Reformation quickened seafaring life in many ways. After Henry's

excommunication every Roman Catholic crew had full Papal sanction
for attacking every English crew that would not submit to Rome, no
matter how Catholic its faith might be. Thus, in addition to danger from
pirates, privateers, and men-of-war, an English merchantman had to
risk attack by any one who was either passionately Roman or
determined to use religion as a cloak. Raids and reprisals grew apace.
The English were by no means always lambs in piteous contrast to the
Papal wolves. Rather, it might be said, they took a motto from this true
Russian proverb: 'Make yourself a sheep and you'll find no lack of
wolves.' But, rightly or wrongly, the general English view was that the
Papal attitude was one of attack while their own was one of defence.
Papal Europe of course thought quite the reverse.
Henry died in 1547, and the Lord Protector Somerset at once tried to
make England as Protestant as possible during the minority of Edward
VI, who was not yet ten years old. This brought every English seaman
under suspicion in every Spanish port, where the Holy Office of the
Inquisition was a great deal more vigilant and businesslike than the
Custom House or Harbor Master. Inquisitors had seized Englishmen in
Henry's time. But Charles had stayed their hand. Now that the ruler of
England was an open heretic, who appeared to reject the accepted
forms of Catholic belief as well as the Papal forms of Roman discipline,
the hour had come to strike. War would have followed in ordinary
times. But the Reformation had produced a cross-division among the
subjects of all the Great Powers. If Charles went to war with a
Protestant Lord Protector of England then some of his own subjects in
the Netherlands would probably revolt. France had her Huguenots;
England her ultra-Papists; Scotland some of both kinds. Every country
had an unknown number of enemies at home and friends abroad. All
feared war.
Somerset neglected the navy. But the seafaring men among the
Protestants, as among those Catholics who were anti-Roman, took to
privateering more than ever. Nor was exploration forgotten. A group of
merchant-adventurers sent Sir Hugh Willoughby to find the Northeast
Passage to Cathay. Willoughby's three ships were towed down the
Thames by oarsmen dressed in sky-blue jackets. As they passed the

palace at Greenwich they dipped their colors in salute. But the poor
young king was too weak to come to the window. Willoughby met his
death in Lapland. But Chancellor, his second-in-command, got through
to the White Sea, pushed on overland to Moscow, and returned safe in
1554, when Queen Mary was on the throne. Next year, strange to say,
the charter of the new Muscovy Company was granted by Philip of
Armada fame, now joint sovereign of England with his newly married
wife, soon to be known as 'Bloody Mary.' One of the directors of the
company was Lord Howard of Effingham, father of Drake's Lord
Admiral, while the governor was our old friend Sebastian Cabot, now
in his eightieth year. Philip was Crown Prince of the Spanish Empire,
and his father, Charles