next day for the north, with a view of discovering a northern passage to the Atlantic. Finding that impossible, he returned south, crossed to the Asiatic sea, doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and in November 1580 reached Plymouth, England. Besides his services to his country on European coasts, and at the destruction of the invincible armada, Drake made other voyages to the Spanish main after booty. So that it may be safely said that the punishment inflicted on Hawkins and Drake in 1568 at Vera Cruz was effectively avenged on Spain and her subjects.[1]
French pirates also made raids on the coasts of New Spain,[2] notably that of Yucatan. In 1561 the French attacked the town of Campeche and plundered it, doing also other damage; but they were soon after driven away and the plunder was recovered.[3] Soon afterward came rumors of fresh preparations by the French for a descent. The governor, Diego de Santillan, on receipt of orders from the crown to be on the watch for a powerful expedition, which, according to a report from the Spanish ambassador at Paris, was fitting out to raid upon the Spanish coasts in the Indies, lost no time in visiting all the ports within his government, and making every possible preparation to meet the filibusters, should they come. Some part of the expedition, if not the whole of it, made its appearance off the coast, for in May 1571 some Frenchmen landed at the port of Sisal, and meeting with no resistance, they went as far as the town of Hunucma, four leagues inland and on the road to Mérida. There being none bat the natives to oppose them, they secured the plaza, and then plundered the Franciscan convent of
- ↑ Drake's acts against Spain, her American colonies and commerce, are fully detailed in Hist. Cent. Am., ii., of this series.
- ↑ It may be that Spain invited aggression. June 6, 1556, the crown forbade its subjects to trade with French corsairs under heavy penalties. Puga, Cedulario, 187. Apprehensions of French encroachments had existed since 1541, and the court then adopted measures to meet the emergency. Florida, Col. Doc., 103-11, 114-18.
- ↑ The king was in 1566 asked for protection against 'los enemigos franceses luteranos' and other possible assailants. Carta del Cabildo al Rey, in Cartas de Indias, 397.
