It was a long madness which has now happily
passed off, or at least shows itself in a milder and rarer form.
Foolish as it appears to us, there were some solid reasons to
account for it. You have read doubtless how, a century before I was
born, the great kingdom of Spain waxed and prospered. Her ships covered
every sea. Her troops were victorious wherever they appeared.
In letters, in learning, in all the arts of war and peace they were the
foremost nation in Europe. You have heard also of the ill-blood which
existed between this great nation and ourselves; how our adventurers
harried their possessions across the Atlantic, while they retorted by
burning such of our seamen as they could catch by their devilish
Inquisition, and by threatening our coasts both from Cadiz and
from their provinces in the Netherlands. At last so hot became the
quarrel that the other nations stood off, as I have seen the folk clear
a space for the sword-players at Hockley-in-the-Hole, so that the
Spanish giant and tough little England were left face to face to fight
the matter out. Throughout all that business it was as the emissary of
the Pope, and as the avenger of the dishonoured Roman Church, that King
Philip professed to come.
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