And anxious enough was the Lord-Admiral with his sailors perishing by pestilence, with many of his ships so weakly manned that as Lord Henry Seymour declared there were not mariners enough to weigh the anchors, and with the great naval heroes, on whose efforts the safety of the realm depended, wrangling like fisherwomen among themselves, when rumours came, as they did almost daily, of the return of the Spanish Armada, and of new demonstrations on the part of Farnese.  He was naturally unwilling that the fruits of English valour on the seas should now be sacrificed by the false economy of the government.  He felt that, after all that had been endured and accomplished, the Queen and her counsellors were still capable of leaving England at the mercy of a renewed attempt, “I know not what you think at the court,” said he; “but I think, and so do all here, that there cannot be too great forces maintained for the next five or six weeks.  God knoweth whether the Spanish fleet will not, after refreshing themselves in Norway; Denmark, and the Orkneys, return.  I think they dare not go back to Sprain with this, dishonour, to their King and overthrow of the Pope’s credit.  Sir, sure bind, sure find.  A kingdom is a grand wager.  Security is dangerous; and, if God had not been our best friend; we should have found it so.”

   [Howard to Walsingham, Aug.8/18 1588. (S.  P. Office Ms.)]

["Some haply may say that winter cometh on apace,” said Drake, “but my poor opinion is that I dare not advise her Majesty to hazard a kingdom with the saving of a little charge.” (Drake to Walsingham, Aug. 8/18 1588.)]

Nothing could be more replete, with sound common sense than this simple advice, given as it was in utter ignorance of the fate of the Armada; after it had been lost sight of by the English vessels off the Firth of Forth, and of the cold refreshment which:  it had found in Norway and the Orkneys.  But, Burghley had a store of pithy apophthegms, for which—­he knew he could always find sympathy in the Queen’s breast, and with which he could answer these demands of admirals and generals.  “To spend in time convenient is wisdom;” he observed—­“to continue charges without needful cause bringeth, repentance;”—­“to hold on charges without knowledge of the certainty thereof and of means how to support them, is lack of wisdom;” and so on.

Yet the Spanish fleet might have returned into the Channel for ought the Lord-Treasurer on the 22nd August knew—­or the Dutch fleet might have relaxed, in its vigilant watching of Farnese’s movements.  It might have then seemed a most plentiful lack of wisdom to allow English sailors to die of plague in the streets for want of hospitals; and to grow mutinous for default of pay.  To have saved under such circumstances would, perhaps have brought repentance.