Page:A book of the west; being an introduction to Devon and Cornwall.djvu/439

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HAWKINS
355

The importance of Plymouth as a starting-point for discovery, and as the cradle of our maritime power, must never be forgotten.

Old Carew says:—

"Here have the troops of adventurers made their rendezvous for attempting new discoveries or inhabitances, as Thomas Stukeleigh for Florida, Sir Humfrey Gilbert for Newfoundland, Sir Richard Grenville for Virginia, Sir Martin Frobisher and Master Davies for the North-West Passage, Sir Walter Raleigh for Guiana."

It is indeed no exaggeration to say that in the reign of Elizabeth Plymouth had become the foremost port in England.

"If any person desired to see her English worthies, Plymouth was the likeliest place to seek them. All were in some fashion associated with the old town. These were days when men were indifferent whether they fought upon land or water, when the fact that a man was a good general was considered the best of all reasons why he should be a good admiral likewise. 'Per mare per terram' was the motto of Elizabeth's true-born Englishmen, and familiar and dear to them was Plymouth, with its narrow streets, its dwarfish quays, its broad waters, and its glorious Hoe."

The roll of Plymouth's naval heroes begins with the Hawkins family, and one looks in vain in modern Plymouth for some statue to commemorate the most illustrious of her sons.

These Hawkinses were a remarkable race. "Gentlemen," as Prince says, "of worshipful extraction for several descents," they were made more worshipful by their deeds.