Then came my Lord Chamberlain, with his white staff, And all the people begun for to laugh. And then the Queen begun to speak, "You're welcome home, Sir Francis Drake!"
'"Gallants all of British blood, Why do ye not sail in th' ocean flood? I protest ye are not all worth a Philberd Compared with Sir Humphrey _Gilberd_."
'For he walkt forth a rainy day, To the _Now-Found-land_ he took his way, With many a gallant fresh and green. He never came home again, God bless the Queen!'
Notes to this song explain: 'We understand as the three-fold holders of the name, "Sir Francis," three persons; Sir Francis Drake, Knighted by the Queen after his return from circumnavigating the world in 1580: Sir Francis Walsingham, and Sir Francis Vere. Sir William Cecil, Lord Burleigh, and his son, Sir Robert.... The Lord Chamberlain probably meant the despicable Sir James Crofts, who hated and calumniated Drake.'
The song probably reflects the temper of the time.
'They never came back agen. God bless the Queen.'
The lines are very characteristic of the spirit of the age that was bound to conquer. There was sorrow for those who were gone, but no complaint, no grudging those who had perished where the fame or power of the Queen could be furthered. Gloriana's subjects found no price too great, no sacrifice worth counting; a leader might fall, but the great scheme must go on, her rule spread farther and wider, and the hazards and failures overstepped.
Although upon all parts of the South Hams there hovers a spell that is inexplicable, perhaps it is felt more in Dartmouth than in any other place one can think of. Possibly it is the loveliness of sea and land, flowers in the crevices of the cliffs hanging low towards the water's edge, the round tower rising out of the sea, the picturesqueness of the town, with its thronging associations, or just the intangible influences of bygone days. But there is something of enchantment about the tower, especially when it is contemplated from the water. And to fully appreciate the whole, one should slip out of the harbour past the Mew Stone, where the sea-gulls rise like a drift of snowflakes on a sudden gust, into the midst of sliding walls of transparent green water beyond, where--if there is wind enough--glassy hillocks all round, at moments, hide everything else from sight. Besides the fascination of watching waves towering above the boat, and following it as if they would fall over and bury it in their depths, and climbing them, with the sudden plunge into the hollow beyond, it may be, especially if shoals of mackerel are near, that one may have the pleasure of coming upon a flock of gulls, swimming, swooping, flapping about, and all busy fishing. Or perhaps there will be a group of brown divers, floating placidly on the waves, and then suddenly disappearing, one or two at a time or several in a moment. And possibly a great black creature may appear a little way off, tossing and seeming to turn somersaults in the water, and another and another, and one may find oneself among a school of porpoises, and hear the curious puffing sounds they make that are not quite like anything else. From a little distance out, looking back across the changing lights that glance over the water, one gets a quite fresh view of the harbour's mouth, shut in by its high cliffs, half veiled by soft masses of green.