Though the crews of the fleet did certainly come near the end of their victuals afloat, there is no case of their having actually run out of them.  The complement of an ordinary man-of-war in the latter part of the sixteenth century, judged by our modern standard, was very large in proportion to her size.  It was impossible for her to carry provisions enough to last her men for a long time.  Any unexpected prolongation of a cruise threatened a reduction to short commons.  A great deal has been made of the fact that Howard had to oblige six men to put up with the allowance of four.  ‘When a large force,’ says Mr. D. Hannay, ’was collected for service during any length of time, it was the common rule to divide four men’s allowance among six.’  There must be still many officers and men to whom the plan would seem quite familiar.  It is indicated by a recognised form of words, ‘six upon four.’  I have myself been ‘six upon four’ several times, mostly in the Pacific, but also, on at least one occasion, in the East Indies.  As far as I could see, no one appeared to regard it as an intolerable hardship.  The Government, it should be known, made no profit out of the process, because money was substituted for the food not issued.  Howard’s recourse to it was not due to immediate insufficiency.  Speaking of the merchant vessels which came to reinforce him, he says:  ’We are fain to help them with victuals to bring them thither.  There is not any of them that hath one day’s victuals.’  These merchant vessels were supplied by private owners; and it is worth noting that, in the teeth of this statement by Howard, Dr. Jessopp, in his eagerness to blacken Elizabeth, says that they ’were, as a rule, far better furnished than the Queen’s ships.’  The Lord Admiral on another occasion, before the fight off Gravelines, said of the ships he hoped would join him from Portsmouth:  ‘Though they have not two days’ victuals, let that not be the cause of their stay, for they shall have victuals out of our fleet,’ a conclusive proof that his ships were not very short.

As to the accusation of deliberately issuing food of bad quality, that is effectually disposed of by the explanation already given of the method employed in victualling the navy.  A sum was paid for each man’s daily allowance to a contractor, who was expressly bound to furnish ’good and seasonable victuals.’[72] Professor Laughton, whose competence in the matter is universally allowed, informs us that complaints of bad provisions are by no means confined to the Armada epoch, and were due, not to intentional dishonesty and neglect, but to insufficient knowledge of the way to preserve provisions for use on rather long cruises.  Mr. Hannay says that the fleet sent to the coast of Spain, in the year after the defeat of the Armada, suffered much from want of food and sickness.  ’Yet it was organised, not by the Queen, but by a committee of adventurers who had every motive to fit it out well.’  It is the fashion with English historians to paint the