dismasted and foundering; drifted towards Newport, where camp-marshal Don
Francisco de Toledo hoped in, vain for succour. La Motte made a feeble
attempt at rescue, but some vessels from the Holland fleet, being much
more active, seized the unfortunate galleon, and carried her into
Flushing. The captors found forty-eight brass cannon and other things of
value on board, but there were some casks of Ribadavia wine which was
more fatal to her enemies than those pieces of artillery had proved. For
while the rebels were refreshing themselves, after the fatigues of the
capture, with large draughts of that famous vintage, the St. Philip,
which had been bored through and through with English shot, and had been
rapidly filling with water, gave a sudden lurch, and went down in a
moment, carrying with her to the bottom three hundred of those convivial
Hollanders.

A large Biscay galleon, too, of Recalde's squadron, much disabled in
action, and now, like many others, unable to follow the Armada, was
summoned by Captain Cross of the Hope, 48 guns, to surrender. Although
foundering, she resisted, and refused to strike her flag. One of her
officers attempted to haul down her colours, and was run through the body
by the captain, who, in his turn, was struck dead by a brother of the
officer thus slain. In the midst of this quarrel the ship went down with
all her crew.

Six hours and more, from ten till nearly five, the fight had lasted--
a most cruel battle, as the Spaniard declared. There were men in the
Armada who had served in the action of Lepanto, and who declared that
famous encounter to have been far surpassed in severity and spirit by
this fight off Gravelines. "Surely every man in our fleet did well,"
said Winter, "and the slaughter the enemy received was great." Nor
would the Spaniards have escaped even worse punishment, had not, most