Plymouth Hoe in the time of Drake was a piece of hilly common land with a gallows standing at one corner, and nearer the sea a water tower and a beacon to signal the approach of enemies.  But it was also a place of recreation, and used for drilling soldiers and sailors.  There were archery butts, and there must also have been a bowling green, on which the captains of the fleet were playing bowls when the news reached them of the approach of the Spanish Armada.  Amongst the English captains were one from Cheshire, George de Beeston, of Beeston, and a near relative of his, Roger Townshend.  Both had charge of leading ships, and were knighted on board the Ark by Lord Howard for their services.

When we visited Plymouth Hoe we found it laid out with broad walks and large plots of grass, where sailors and soldiers were much in evidence.  In later years the greater portion of the old Eddystone Lighthouse was re-erected there, from the cage on the top of which was a very fine view over Plymouth Sound, one of the most beautiful in England.  Besides the town and the famous Hoe there could be seen, seawards, Drake’s or St. Nicholas’ Island, the famous Breakwater, and the still more famous Eddystone Lighthouse, while on the Cornish side were the beautiful woods of Mount Edgcumbe reaching down to the water’s edge.  Then there was the estuary of the River Tamar, called the Hamoaze, with the huge railway bridge crossing it to Saltash, the frame of the general picture being formed by the hills which surrounded Plymouth, including those of Dartmoor in the background.

  O the fair Town of Plymouth is by the sea-side,
  The Sound is so blue and so still and so wide,
  Encircled with hills, and with forests all green,
  As a crown of fresh leaves on the head of a queen. 
  O dear Plymouth town, and O blue Plymouth Sound! 
  O where is your equal on earth to be found?

Eddystone Lighthouse, the top of which could just be seen from the Hoe, stood on a group of rocks nine miles from the Cornish Coast and fourteen miles from Plymouth.  These rocks were covered at high water by the sea, and were so dangerous to ships moving in and out of Plymouth or along the coast, that a lighthouse of wood was built on them in the year 1700, which was washed away by a great storm three years afterwards, when the lighthouse people perished as well as the unfortunate architect, Winstanley, who happened to be there on a visit at the time.  In 1709 a second and a stronger wooden lighthouse was built by Rudyard, but the progress of the work was delayed owing to the workmen being carried on to France by a French ship and lodged in a prison there.  King Louis XIV, when he heard of this, chivalrously ordered the Englishmen to be liberated and their captors to be put in the prison in their places, remarking that “though he was at war with England, he was not at war with mankind.”  So the lighthouse was completed, and remained until 1755, when it was