he took fright at the number of ships and the dreaded name of the pirate chief who was in command.  It would be futile to show fight, so he determined to accommodate himself to the Admiral’s terms, which were that he should have a free hand to replenish the fleet with water and provisions, or any other odds and ends, without interference.  This being accomplished, he agreed to sail, and no doubt the governor thought he had made a judicious bargain in getting rid of him so easily.  But Drake all the time had the Spanish gold fleet in his mind.  Sacrifices must be made in order that it may be captured, so off he went for the Cape de Verde islands, and found when he got there that the treasure-ships had arrived and sailed only a few hours before.  The disappointment was, according to custom, taken with Christian composure.  He had the aptitude of switching his mind from one form of warfare to another.  As I have said, he would just as soon attack and plunder a city as a church or a ship.  Drake had missed the gold fleet, so he turned his attention to the treasures of Santiago.  When the governor and population were made aware that the distinguished visitor to their island was the terrible “El Draque,” they and their spiritual advisers as usual flew to the mountains, without neglecting to take their money and priceless possessions with them.  Drake looted as much as was left in the city of wine and other valuables, but he got neither gold nor silver, and would probably have left Santiago unharmed but for the horrible murder of one of his sailor-boys, whose body was found hacked to pieces.  This settled the doom of the finest built city in the Old World.  “El Draque” at once set fire to it and burnt it to ashes, with that thoroughness which characterized all such dealings in an age when barbaric acts justified more than equivalent reprisals.

It would have been a wiser course for the governor to have treated for the ransom of the town than to have murdered a poor sailor lad who was innocently having a stroll.  It is balderdash to talk of the Spaniards as being too proud to treat with a person whom they believed to be nothing better than a pirate.  The Spaniards, like other nationalities, were never too proud to do anything that would strengthen or maintain their supremacy.  Their apparent pride in not treating with Drake at Santiago and on other rare occasions was really the acme of terror at hearing his name; there was neither high honour nor grandee dignity connected with it.  As to Philip’s kingly pride, it consisted in offering a special reward of L40,000 to have Elizabeth’s great sailor assassinated or kidnapped.  There were many to whom the thought of the bribe was fascinating.  Numerous attempts were made, but whenever the assassins came within sound of his name or sight of him or his ships they became possessed of involuntary twitchy sensations, and fled in a delirium of fear, which was attributed to his being a magician.