" Before two years more had passed
Hawkins put forth for a third voyage, this time with six ships, two of them
among the largest then afloat. The cargo of slaves, procured by aiding a
Guinea tribe in an attack upon its neighbor, had been duly sold in the
Indies when dearth of supplies and stress of weather drove the fleet into
the Mexican port of San Juan de Ulloa. There a Spanish fleet of thirteen
ships attacked the intruders, capturing their treasure ship and three of
her consorts. Only the _Minion_ under Hawkins and the bark _Judith_ under
the young Francis Drake escaped to carry the harrowing tale to England. One
result of the episode was that it filled Hawkins and Drake with desire for
revenge on Spain, which was wreaked in due time but in European waters.
Another consequence was a discouragement of English slave trading for
nearly a century to follow.
[Footnote 2: Hakluyt, _Voyages_, ed. 1589. This and the accounts of
Hawkins' later exploits in the same line are reprinted with a valuable
introduction in C.R. Beazley, ed., _Voyages and Travels_ (New York, 1903),
I, 29-126.]
The defeat of the Armada in 1588 led the world to suspect the decline of
Spain's maritime power, but only in the lapse of decades did the suspicion
of her helplessness become a certainty.
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