of Arragon, with her cold Spanish pride,
stepped on shore at Plymouth, on her way to
meet her husband. An old house in Catte-
street used to be shown as the one in which
Painter, the mayor, welcomed her. Spenser
mentions the Hoe as the spot, according to
the fabulous British history, where Corineus,
the companion of Brute of Troy, fought with
Goemot, one of the stoutest of those giant
aborigines, tall as lighthouses, who once
prevailed here. Two giants, with clubs in their
hands, were cut, ages ago, on the turf of the
Hoe to celebrate this great duel, and the steps
were, till recently, pointed out by which
Corineus dragged down the lumbering body
of his rival and flung it over the cliff into the
sea.

The crow remembers that, from the Hoe,
keen eyes first saw the great gilded and
crimson sails of the Armada, towering against
the horizon. There is a legend, that, some
hours before this, Drake was pacing here
in jewelled hat, ruff, cloak, and rapier, with
other brave Devonshire captains. He was
playing at bowls when news of the proud
fleet's approach came, but he would not leave
till the game was finished. "Let's play the
last bowl," he said, "and then have a bowl
at the Spaniards." Could men of such calm
courage fail to give the Armada to fire and
storm, to hungry reefs and greedy sands? No
wonder that on the anniversary of that grand
day it was the fashion for Devonshire bells to
clash, and men to shout, maidens to wear posies,
'prentices to rejoice, and the mayor and
corporation of Plymouth to flaunt their grandeur in
scarlet, and to treat their visitors with cake
and wine.

Sir Francis Drake appears in Plymouth legends
as a magician. It is believed by the country
people that when the Plymouth people wanted
water, Sir Francis Drake called for his horse and
rode straight to Dartmoor. There, among the
granite blocks and the heathery valleys, he
searched about for, and found, the clearest and
fullest spring of Sheeps Tor. Instantly uttering
some words of incantation, Sir Francis galloped
back the thirty miles to Plymouth, without
pulling bridle, the obedient stream racing after its
master close at his horse's heels, and following
him into the grateful and rejoicing town. The
sober fact is, that Sir Francis obtained a prosaic
act of parliament from good Queen Bess, and
coaxed a score of proud private gentlemen
to allow the stream to pass through their
lands. When, at last, the water coursed into
Plymouth, it was welcomed as if it had been a
living sovereign, by the firing of cannon and
by mayor and corporation in full scarlet.

Plymouth had some hard rubs in 1643, when,
after the Cavaliers had taken Exeter, Prince
Maurice levied an army of seven thousand
stout-hearted western men, and joined Colonel
John Digby, who, with three thousand Royalist
foot and six hundred horse, had already
taken Mount Stamford, which was within half
a mile of the Sound, and commanded part
of the river.

What was Plymouth then? Clarendon tells
us it was a rich and populous corporation, and
the greatest port in the west, next to Bristol.
The castle stood strong towards the sea, with
good platforms and ordnance, and a little more
than musket-shot from the town rose a fort
much stronger than the castle, both commanding
the entrance into the harbour, then under
command of Sir Jacob Ashley, and a garrison
of not more than fifty men. These forts
had guns and shot, but no provisions, the king
having been afraid of alarming his enemies by
making any preparations for war. Sir Jacob
Ashley being recalled to the king's side, the
mayor, aided by a parliamentary committee, who
kept a sharp eye on him, held the castle and town,
which was guarded with a small and irregular
earthwork, while to Sir Alexander Carew, a
Cornish gentleman of fortune, the fort and
island were entrusted. And here one of those
romantic episodes, so frequent in the civil war,
mingles its intrigues and vicissitudes with the
story of Plymouth. Carew, afraid for his
Cornish estates, and seeing Cornwall and all
Devonshire, but Plymouth, pass over to
the king, began to propose secret terms to Sir
John Berkley, the governor of Exeter. But
Carew, too anxious for a pardon, under the
king's own hand, delayed so long that he was
betrayed by a servant, and the mayor instantly
surprised him in his fort, and packed him off, a
prisoner, by sea to London.

Clarendon paints very strongly the state of
mutual distrust in Plymouth when Digby first sat
down before the walls. If Carew, who had been
so violent for the Puritan cause, had been false,
who could hope to be unsuspected? But the
trembling town was saved by the indiscretion of
Prince Maurice who, on taking Exeter, marched
to Dartmouth, which he surprised. He had lost
the tide in the affairs of men when he returned
to Plymouth. The parliament had sent five
hundred resolute men and a staunch Scotch
officer, who meant mischief, a perfect Dalgetty,
ready to eat his own boots and everybody else's,
and prepared for rat soup and nettle salad,
rather than surrender. The Cavaliers made no
way against Plymouth.

In 1644, the king appeared, in person, before
the place, hoping to scare it into a sudden
surrender; but the Governor Essex had put in the
town Lord Roberts, a sour dogged man, who
never knew when he was beaten. The king,
tired of waiting for the surrender, left it to Sir
Richard Grenville, who had sworn a soldier's
oath to take the town before Christmas, and
who had already so quarrelled with Lord
Roberts, that every prisoner on either side was
either hung or put to the sword.

Sir Richard drew off from the town, and
retired to Ockington, which he barricaded with
three regiments of old soldiers to keep the
Parliament men from Plymouth, and then
proposed, among other crazed schemes, to cut a
trench for forty miles from Barnstaple to
the sea, by which, like a true Bobadil, he
offered to defend Cornwall and Devon from
all the world. After that Grenville's vanity,