Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
lomons were 'lost'. For almost two centuries no mariner, with the
exception of another Spaniard, de Quiros, was able to locate them.
Steadily these elusive islands grew into a legend. Mariners' tales told
of a land abounding in precious metals hidden somewhere in the
vast expanse of the Great South Sea.
But the majority of adventurous and avaricious seamen looked,
not to the mythical Solomons for rich pickings, but to the loaded ar-
gosies plying the Atlantic and Pacific along Spain's dangerously ex-
posed and over-extended trade routes. Which brings us to the brave,
rumbustious and not wholly admirable Francis Drake:
He is low in stature, thick set and very robust. He has a fine coun-
tenance, is ruddy of complexion and has a fair beard . . . In one leg he
has the ball of an arquebus that was shot at him in the Indies. He is a
great mariner, the son and relative of seamen, and particularly of John
Hawkins in whose company he was for a long time . . . Francis Drake
read the psalms and preached . . . He also carried with him, from his
country, a negro, named Diego, who spoke Spanish and English, and
whom he had taken prisoner from a frigate in the North Sea [i.e. the
Atlantic], near Nombre de Dios, about seven or eight years previously . 1
Thus was Francis Drake described by a Portuguese fellow mar-
iner who sailed with him. He might also have added that Drake was
fearless, ruthless and fierce in his hatred of Spain and Catholicism.
In an age when religious apathy and toleration were virtually un-
heard of, this Devonshire seaman was aggressively Protestant. He
was the son of a tenant farmer-turned-clergyman who had suffered
at the hands of Catholic persecutors during the reign of 'Bloody'
Mary. Young Francis was only seven when his family were harried
from their home on the slopes of Dartmoor. During his teenage years
and his early twenties he had opportunities to witness what can hap-
pen when religious fanaticism and political power go hand-in-hand.
 
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