Drake had believed better of Winter, and had not expected to be so deserted.  He had himself taken refuge among the islands which form the Cape, waiting for the spring and milder weather.  He used the time in making surveys, and observing the habits of the native Patagonians, whom he found a tough race, going naked amidst ice and snow.  The days lengthened, and the sea smoothed at last.  He then sailed for Valparaiso, hoping to meet Winter there, as he had arranged.  At Valparaiso there was no Winter, but there was in the port instead a great galleon just come in from Peru.  The galleon’s crew took him for a Spaniard, hoisted their colours, and beat their drums.  The Pelican shot alongside.  The English sailors in high spirits leapt on board.  A Plymouth lad who could speak Spanish knocked down the first man he met with an ‘Abajo, perro!’ ’Down, you dog, down!’ No life was taken; Drake never hurt man if he could help it.  The crew crossed themselves, jumped overboard, and swam ashore.  The prize was examined.  Four hundred pounds’ weight of gold was found in her, besides other plunder.

The galleon being disposed of, Drake and his men pulled ashore to look at the town.  The people had all fled.  In the church they found a chalice, two cruets, and an altar-cloth, which were made over to the chaplain to improve his Communion furniture.  A few pipes of wine and a Greek pilot who knew the way to Lima completed the booty.

‘Shocking piracy,’ you will perhaps say.  But what Drake was doing would have been all right and good service had war been declared, and the essence of things does not alter with the form.  In essence there was war, deadly war, between Philip and Elizabeth.  Even later, when the Armada sailed, there had been no formal declaration.  The reality is the important part of the matter.  It was but stroke for stroke, and the English arm proved the stronger.

Still hoping to find Winter in advance of him, Drake went on next to Tarapaca, where silver from the Andes mines was shipped for Panama.  At Tarapaca there was the same unconsciousness of danger.  The silver bars lay piled on the quay, the muleteers who had brought them were sleeping peacefully in the sunshine at their side.  The muleteers were left to their slumbers.  The bars were lifted into the English boats.  A train of mules or llamas came in at the moment with a second load as rich as the first.  This, too, went into the Pelican’s hold.  The bullion taken at Tarapaca was worth near half a million ducats.

Still there were no news of Winter.  Drake began to realise that he was now entirely alone, and had only himself and his own crew to depend on.  There was nothing to do but to go through with it, danger adding to the interest.  Arica was the next point visited.  Half a hundred blocks of silver were picked up at Arica.  After Arica came Lima, the chief depot of all, where the grandest haul was looked for.  At Lima, alas! they were just too late.