Her present voyage, however, was a failure. The Earl embarked in her as Admiral, with the Alcedo, Monson as Vice-Admiral, the Anthony, Daniel Jarret, and the old frigate. But when they had got the length of Plymouth, the Admiral received Her Majesty's commands to return, on which he gave up the command of the Scourge to Captain Langton, which occasioned the great displeasure of Captain Monson, who chose to seek his fortune in the Alcedo alone, which, for a man of his standing, had the Alcedo been a Queen's ship, would have subjected him to a charge of mutiny. He thus tells his own story:

"In this year I was married; but before my marriage I engaged myself, by promise, to attend my Lord of Cumberland as his Vice-Admiral to sea. His Lordship went in the Malice-Scourge, a brave ship built by himself; his Vice-Admiral was the Alcedo, a goodly ship hired of the merchants. Now I began to have proof of what I had before just cause to suspect-namely, the inconstant friendship of the Earl of Cumberland. For though I was drawn by his sweet words and promises to this voyage, and that we had proceeded upon it so far as Plymouth, and from thence eight or nine leagues to sea, towards the coast of Spain, without imparting or making show of anything to me, he suddenly quitted the voyage, and appointed another Captain for his own ship [his own Captain, Lang

ton], which so much displeased me for the present, that I abandoned the company of his ship at sea, and betook myself to my own adventure."

His voyage in the Alcedo, he says, produced no danger of famine or sword; the worst enemy he encountered were storms, which forced him to cut his mainmast by the board, and bear up for England. Captain Monson certainly did not act on this occasion with that strict propriety for which he was mostly distinguished, and which he would have been sure to exact from others.

The rest of the squadron when near Flores took a caravel laden with sugar, fell in, during a fog, with the St. Thomas, the Vice-Admiral of the Spanish fleet, from which she had separated, and they immediately engaged her; but, finding themselves an unequal match, they returned towards the coast of Spain; fell in with three Dutch ships laden with wheat, copper, ammunition and provisions, for the use of the King of Spain, which they took, and proceeded with them to England.

The Ninth Expedition.-This voyage of 1596, undertaken by the Earl himself in his new ship, accompanied by the Dreadnought of the Royal Navy, and a few small ships, was also a complete failure. They had not proceeded more than thirty or forty leagues from the English coast, when, in a violent storm, the Scourge of Malice split her main* Monson's Tracts.

mast, which made her unserviceable for the present voyage, so that he brought her back to England, accompanied by the Dreadnought.

The same year, however, his Lordship having learned that the Earl of Essex was on the coast with a fleet, fitted out the Ascension, of 300 tons and 34 guns, commanded by Captain Francis Slingsby; but, having narrowly escaped the Goodwin Sands, and lost two anchors, he was obliged to put into Plymouth.

Having again gone to sea, and standing off and on about the Rock of Lisbon, the Spanish Admiral sent out six ships to attack him. The Spanish flagship and another laid the Ascension on board, one on the bow, and the other on the quarter, when an action commenced with great fury and resolution on both sides. The Spaniards attempted to board, but were bravely repulsed; and some well-directed case-shot occasioned great slaughter among them. The effect of this, together with the warm reception the two Spaniards had met with, in their attempt to board the Ascension, obliged them to sheer off. The English had twenty killed and wounded in this action. The Ascension continued on the coast till she had only fourteen days' provisions left, and then returned without having obtained any booty.

The Tenth and last Expedition.-His Lordship having determined to send forth an expedition of such magnitude as would be able to defy any

Spanish force it might have to encounter, employed two years in fitting it out. It consisted of twenty ships, large and small; the greater part of them fitted out at his own expense, and the remainder by private individuals. He embarked himself in the Scourge of Malice as Admiral, his Captain John Wats; the Merchant Royal, Sir John Berkley, Vice-Admiral (and Lieutenant-General); and the Ascension, Rear-Admiral, Captain Robert Flicker. Several officers and gentlemen volunteers accompanied this little fleet.

On the 6th of March, 1598, the fleet set sail from Plymouth, in the hope of falling in with five large Spanish carracks about to sail to the Indies, accompanied by more than twenty sail for the Brazils. The Spaniards, however, having got intelligence of the Earl's preparations, had kept their ships in harbour. Learning this from some coasters, the Earl proceeded to the Canaries, landed upon, and ravaged, the island of Lancerota; the town, consisting of about one hundred houses, the castle, the church, and a convent, being left to the mercy of the invaders all the inhabitants had fled, the very name of the English having inspired terror. Little plunder, however, was obtained by the invaders.

The Earl next proceeded to Dominica and the Virgin Islands, where Indians only resided. Hence he made sail for Porto Rico, where 1000 men were landed, attacked the town, and took all the forts

and castles, garrisoned by about 400 men, after a stout resistance. The English, in order to get at them, had to pass along a narrow, rocky, rugged causeway, leading to a drawbridge. The Earl on the march fell from the causeway into the sea, where, by the weight and incumbrance of his armour, he narrowly escaped drowning; and received so much salt-water into his stomach as to stay his march for some time along the causeway. The Admiral soon, however, recovered; and, with his troop, added to that of Sir John Berkley, made a joint attack, and carried all before them; the Mora Castle among the rest; and the whole town, with its cathedral and monastery, were in the Earl's possession.

As this place was the common resort of all the plate-ships, and the key of the Carribean country, the Earl resolved to keep it; but he soon found it necessary to relinquish this scheme by the sickness which seized his troops. A violent flux carried off so many of his people that the number was soon found to be inadequate to keep the place, without unmanning the squadron. Of the thousand men who landed, it is said that seven hundred died.* The consequence was, that the ransom of the place, which might once have brought him a large sum, was now treated of by the Spaniards with coldness and indifference; and it appeared to the Earl that

Camden; but Purchas says six hundred.