These words he spake at Plymoth and a bord the Pellican, and at the ile of May.

(No signature to this.)

In my Cabyn abord the Pellycan he the sayd T. D. cam to me, when there had certayne words passed betwixt Willyam Seage and me, which T. D. sayd that the Captayne was very muche offended with me, and that our Captayne wold set me in the Bylbes, but he, the sayd T. D., sayd he wold not suffer it, and that our Captayne shold not offer it me, ffor I was one of them whom he, the sayd T. D., loved and made account of, and bad me kepe my Cabbyn two or three dayes, and that the Captayne and I should be ffrends agayne, and byd me so ffarewell, and be ruled by him, and he wold do me good.

In the Prise the sayd T. D. sayd that he was sorye that he had not taken the viage in hand of himself with our Captayne, and that he was sorye there weare any more adventurers than himself, sayinge that he could have don it of himselff well enough, and that the sayd T. D. could have made the matters good enough at his cominge home, and the sayd T. D. sayd that thei whole Counsayle would be corrupted with money-yea the Quene's Majestie herselff, which greved my conciens to heare.

More John Dowtye tould me and John Deane that he and his brother T. D. could Counger as well as any men, and that they could rayse the devell, and make him to meate any man in the lykenes of a Beare, a lyon, or a man in harnis.

More John Dowtye told me and John Deane, that he the sayd John Dowtye could poyson as well as any man, and that he could poyson a man with a dyamond that he should be twelve moneths affter or he should dye.

(No signature to this.)

Words uttered by Thomas Doughtye unto our Generall.

1. ffyrst, that the sayd T. D. cam unto oure sayd Generall, as one requested or sent from som or dyvers of the Companye, to knowe the sayd Generall's consent, in that all men are mortall, and that the sayd our Generall dyd enter into all action, who should suckcede our sayd Generall, iff God should do his will uppon him.

2. The sayd T. D. aboard the Pellican sent word by John Martyn and Gregorye to our Generall these words: Have me comended to my Generall, and tell him the tyme will com that he shall have more need of me, then I shall have of the viage.

3. The sayd T. D. makinge comparison upon board the ffly-bott sayd that he was as honest as any in the Companye, or as my Lord Burleye.

4. At the sayd instant ffolowinge, the sayd T. D. in the heringe of dyvers of the company affirmed that the worst word of the mothe of his, the sayd Thomas, was of more then 3 of the others of our sayd Generall ffrancis Drake.

The sayd Thomas Dowghty affirmed to Thomas Clackley, Boteswayne of the Pellican, that he the sayd Thomas Dowtye had in this adventure 15007., sayinge it was a pore gentleman's adventure.*

Thus abruptly ends the fragment, of the authenticity of which, as before observed, there can be little doubt; equally little as to the tendency of Doughty's proceedings. If an officer of the British

* Historical and Judicial Tracts, Harleian MSS., British Museum. The excommunication, in the same Tracts, of Fletcher, by Drake, sitting cross-legged on a chest, is too absurd and contemptible to deserve a moment's notice: it has not a shadow of Drake's character about it.

Navy should thus tamper with the crew of a ship, elevate his own importance at the expense of his commanding officer, and endeavour to seduce men into a contempt of their captain, by selecting a portion of the crew, and tempting them with promises of money and preferment if they would follow up his views-such an officer would subject himself to the severest penalty of the Articles of War.

When Doughty boasts of his interest and his friendship with Chancellor Hatton and Secretary Walsingham, and other great people, it will occur that neither they, nor his brother of whom he talks, nor any one else, took the least concern about him or his fate, either when the story was first brought to England in Captain Winter's ship, or long afterwards, when Drake himself and his crew arrived in England.

That Fletcher, who is related to have given Doughty so excellent a character, should sign his name to most of the charges, can only be explained by his having been present at the conversations to which he signs, and too honest not to give a true evidence when called upon.

The whole paper is a fragment only of a species of trial, as it would appear, on charges brought by Drake for the safety of himself and people; and that the twenty-nine names, separate from those who gave evidence, formed the jury.

Having left the port of a second slaughter,* Port St. Julian, on the 20th August, 1578, Drake came with his squadron to the eastern entrance of the Strait of Magelhaens, which no Englishman had ever passed, and only he whose name it bears: a strait which, though often since passed, is, even in our days, considered so troublesome, dangerous, and uncertain as to time, that the passage from the Atlantic into the Pacific is generally made round Cape Horn. Drake besides had the whole strait to examine as he went along, being without chart or sailing directions of any kind; yet he succeeded in working his way through it, and entered the Pacific on the sixteenth day.

Having passed into the Pacific, a gale of wind drove the fleet so far to the southward that Drake saw the land to the south of Tierra-del-fuego, from which it is separated by a wide channel, and thus was the first navigator that discovered Cape Horn, and the junction of the Pacific with the Southern Atlantic. Here, however, he had the misfortune of losing two of his three ships, that entered along with him the Strait of Magelhaens. The Pelican (her name now changed to that of the "Golden Hind") parted from her anchors, and drove out to sea. The Elizabeth, which was with her, got back into the strait, and, having waited a few days, made the best of her way home, "by Captain Winter's * That by Magelhaens being the first.

I

compulsion," says Cliffe, "full sore against the mariners' mind."* The Marigold, Captain Thomas, parted company in the gale, and was never more heard of. The Swan had separated before they reached Port St. Julian, and the Mary was broken up.

Here, then, was Drake left alone on an unknown coast, and on a wide ocean never navigated by an English seaman, in a small vessel of 100 tons, with a reduced crew, without medical assistance, and dependent entirely for provisions on what could be procured on an enemy's coast, or from enemy's shipping. But he had formed a settled plan in his mind, and was resolved to pursue it; and "resolution," as Dr. Johnson says, "is success." It requires nothing more to establish the character of this celebrated man for ability and spirit of enterprise, than to state that, through perils by land, perils by sea, and perils by the enemy, he carried his little bark from lat. 56° S. to 48° N.—a distance of more than seven thousand English miles-without losing more than two men killed by the savages, and one slain by the Spaniards. Before this, eight men had been driven back in the pinnace into the Strait of Magelhaens, one of whom only, after many perils, reached England. Fletcher the minister observes, that had the Pelican retained her name, she might now indeed have been said to be as "a pelican alone in the wilderness."

* Hakluyt, from Cliffe's Voyage.