Though the wind
was contrary, they beat back against it without loss, and in four or
five days the vessels, with their half-starved crews, all safely
arrived in Margate Roads, having done the noblest service that fleet
ever rendered to a country in the hour of supreme peril.
85. Meanwhile, so much as remained of the Invincible Armada was
buffeted to and fro by the resistless gale, like a shuttlecock between
two invisible players. The monster left its bones on the iron-bound
shore of Norway and on the granite cliffs of the Hebrides. Its course
could be traced by its wrecks. Day followed day, and still God's wrath
endured. On the 5th of August Admiral Oguendo, in his flag-ship,
together with one of the great galliasses and thirty-eight other
vessels, were driven by the fury of the tempest upon the rocks and
reefs of Ireland, and nearly every soul on board perished. Of one
hundred and thirty-four vessels which, gay with gold and amid
triumphal shouts and loud music, had sailed from Corunna July 12th,
only fifty-three battered and useless hulks returned to the ports of
Spain.
86. The fate and exploits of the Armada are graphically summed up in
the emphatic language of Sir Francis Drake. "It is happily
manifested," he says, "indeed, to all nations how their navy which
they termed _invincible_, consisting of nearly one hundred and forty
sail of ships, were by thirty of her Majesty's ships of war, and a few
of our own merchants, by the wise and advantageous conduct of Lord
Charles Howard, High Admiral of England, beaten and shuffled together
from Lizard in Cornwall to Portland, from Portland to Calais; and from
Calais, driven by squibs from their anchors, were chased out of sight
of England, round about Scotland and Ireland.
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