(Palace of Whitehall, London, 1577)

In 1577 Queen Elizabeth I called a clandestine meeting with a young English mariner who was making a heroic name for himself in the New World. Known as Francis Drake in England for his daring deeds on the seas, he was also becoming maligned as 'El Draque'—"The Dagon" by in Seville and various Spanish seaports operating in the Caribbean. Drake had recently gained this notoriety for his daring raids upon the treasure infrastructure in the New World which had been bringing much wealth back to King Phillip II of Spain.

Drake's dashing career had begun in 1568 when at twenty-three he signed on as pilot and navigator with his second cousin John Hawkins, ship-owner, and who operated as a slave runner in the West Indies. It was a fleet of five ships and hundreds of men which Drake joined to test his metal as a trans-Atlantic mariner. Landing at San Juan de Ulúa (the latter-day Veracruz), on the eastern coast of New Spain (Mexico), the five vessels docked in the port under peaceful circumstances. They believed they were under a truce between the Spanish and English which had only recently been established.

Drake's and Hawkins' entire fleet, however, was suddenly the victim of a surprise-attack by Spanish vessels in the harbor, perhaps fearful of the Englishmen's possible pirating intentions. Only two of the ships were saved in the heated sea battle which ensued, and it claimed the lives of some five-hundred English sailors and crew. Drake and Hawkins narrowly escaped with their lives commandeering the ships they each commanded, while witnessing the other three vessels go down in flames. This violent event in the Caribbean set the stage and attitude for Drake's future raids upon Spanish trading fleet crossing the Atlantic.

Known as the 'Battle of San Juan de Ulúa,' the rout for the Spanish was considered a major loss for the English—and specifically Queen Elizabeth I, who had personally leased out one of her own ships for the enterprise. The action would be the precursor to the great naval battle declared in 1585 between Spain and England. Carried out on the high sea, this conflict would eventually climax with the massive attack upon England's Royal Navy by King Phillip II and his ' Spanish Armada' in 1588. History would subsequently see the final outcome of this unprecedented naval war as a sounding victory for the English. It was due in part to the fierce gales in the North Sea that season which destroyed most of the Spanish warships. Much credit was also given to the British vessels' better maneuverability under Drake's overall defensive command against the heavily fortified galleons from Spain.

Francis Drake, however, would later in life credit the earlier Battle of San Juan de Ulúa as his great personal motivator—both towards revenge against the Spanish, but also for amassing profits gained for his queen. Four years after this earlier defeat he would sail to the coast of Panama with two ships, privately purchased for the purpose of ambushing the strategic Spanish port of 'Nombre de Dios.' Between 1540 and 1580 this small Panamanian harbor had been the most significant point of departure for ferrying Spanish gold and silver as cargo from Peru back to Seville. Drake's plan was specifically to attack and plunder the port and seize all treasure for himself and the Crown of Elizabeth I in 1572. His assault was spectacularly successful, as his forces raised and looted the colony while confiscating the cargos of several Spanish ships in the harbor.

At one point in the melee, Drake was seriously wounded. As a testimonial to the loyalty of his forces to their captain, the men left their treasure unattended to return for his rescue. He and his crew remained at the conquered port for a number of months. During this time while Drake healed from injuries, the privateers molested several other Spanish vessels as they entered the port, unaware of his occupancy. The following year, before returning to the English port of Plymouth, Drake and his crew set out on another bold escapade which gained for Drake and his queen tremendous fame and fortune by 1574.

This second pillaging involved an overland plan to attack and rob the lucrative mule train which annually brought silver and gold from the mines of Peru to the Caribbean coast of Panama. The jungle route was known to the Spanish as the 'El Camino Real'—"the King's Road," and had literally over the years brought back millions of pesos in silver to Seville. Joining forces with the French privateer, Guillaume Le Testu, Drake successfully attacked the mule train, confiscating an estimated twenty tons of gold and silver. Le Testu was injured in the raid, captured by the Spanish, and beheaded for his acts of piracy.

For Drake, the method in which he ferried the treasure back to England was even more remarkable—adding to his legend and assuring his respect among other buccaneers of the times. Burying in the nearby jungle all the remaining precious metal from the attack the men could not carry, he and his small band of forces carried the heavy shipment through eighteen miles of rugged terrain to the coast. It was there where Drake believed his raiding ships and crew had been hidden. To the great surprise and dismay of these returning men, however, the vessels were gone!

Undaunted by this crushing setback and with the Spanish on the march to find them, the courageous and untiring Captain Drake ordered his men to bury the gold and silver on the beach. They then built a seaworthy raft on which he and several volunteers sailed along the rocky coast south to their flagship, which, under his previous orders had been awaiting their return. Drake's men aboard ship, seeing his distressed and exhausted condition, assumed his raiding party had been killed by the Spanish and the mission was a failure. It was then that the charismatic Drake stood on deck and dramatically produced a solid golden necklace he had been wearing as evidence of their great fortune safely buried. Amid hearty cheers the men set sail to join their 'lost' comrades on the beach to commence loading the buried treasure onboard for their heroic return to queen and country.

It was only a few years later, in 1577, that a secret meeting took place at the Palace of Whitehall with the celebrated Drake and Queen Elizabeth I. At this private visit, navigator and privateer Drake was given plans of a special nautical expedition to the New World. This voyage had on its agenda several critical objectives—two specifically involving the future expansion and welfare of England's commonwealth, and one of a personal nature for her Majesty.

This mysterious last element involved a commitment to carry out a duty. It was an obligation which, as a female monarch, had long before been bestowed upon her. A secret legacy she and her sister Mary I had learned of and undertaken as the girls of influential royal households. Both had the commitment of the 'Amazones Adelphes' instilled upon them in secrecy by their respective mothers and mentors. The custom of their eventual involvement, if ever elevated to such a position of power, was dictated to them by the Consilium Reginae, and was itself known to have been initiated 'time before time.'

Although the short, tumultuous reign of Mary I of England had its differences of faith and manners involving domestic tranquility or lack of it, when compared with her sister's long, formative tenure, both did share in as fundamental belief and obligation to their sex. They had since an early age been committed to the carrying out of a grand plan which held at its core the wellbeing and future plight of all women. At the death of Elizabeth I, in fact, she was buried at the side of her sister Mary I—as per their own, earlier requests. Written in Latin on their joined tombs was to be a telling connection as to this singularity of minds and purpose:

"Regno consortes et urna, hic obdormimus Elizabetha et Maria sorores, in spe resurrectionis." It translates: "Consorts in realm and tomb, here we sleep, Elizabeth and Mary, sisters, in hope of resurrection."

Francis Drake, being raised in the household of his cousin—a wealthy ship-owner and a gentleman known to the queen, had by now the knowledge, the skills, and connections to qualify him as a legitimate 'privateer' and special envoy. The fact that he had earned early the title of 'privateer extraordinaire,' only further brought him into Elizabeth's services for other pressing issues involving matters in the New World. At this intimate meeting with his queen over dinner in the palace, Drake was given further authority to remain a privileged buccaneer for the Crown, and specifically to carry on molesting enemy ships on the high seas for its lucrative rewards. He was also informed of several other issues which greatly concerned his monarch and for which she had planned a clandestine expedition to the newly discovered 'Island of California.'

It was known among map-makers and navigators of the times, some of whom Drake knew and had consulted, that a 'Northwest Passage'—the legendary "Strait of Anian" might well exist as a waterway interconnecting the Atlantic Ocean with the great Pacific. Such a passage through the continents of the Americas, if located and mapped, could insure England's advantage in trade with the Far East and the Spice Islands. These destinations for trade were at the time monopolized by the Portuguese and Spanish and required exhaustive sea travel to reach.

What Elizabeth requested at her meeting with Drake was an exploratory mission—up the western coast of South America and to the coastal perimeter of the newly discovered 'Isle of California.' The initial purpose of this secret voyage was to seek out such a waterway, if it in fact, existed. The 'Isle of California' was an area newly charted by the Spanish and threatened to be dominated by them through future colonization.

Drake understood that, though he was to be on the lookout for Spanish treasure ships, he was also to reconnoiter these coastlands for this mythical passage. If discovered, he was to secretly chart it and declare it for England. Queen Elizabeth confided in him that there were additional plans to establish an English colony at the mouth of such a passage and a future citadel to be constructed there for its protection. Drake, the explorer, accepted this secondary goal of the mission with great enthusiasm. He also saw such a possible waterway as a means to expedite his attacks against Spanish vessels on both sides of the Americas. For he knew full well of the New World Manila-Acapulco trade route, which provided strategic targets and considerable wealth for future attacks.

Lastly, as the queen herself poured the wine into Drake's glass and looked into his eyes with her arresting, cool gaze, there was a disclosure of her third and private objective associated with the mission. It was an unsettling moment for the mariner who had not anticipated such a solitary meeting or such intimate proximity to his fair queen. He had met her Majesty on only two other occasions, both in the presence of a court entourage of officials and with much merriment and fanfare following his lucrative returns from sea. This encounter, however, was very different. His queen sat at the small table across from him, not unlike an individual lady in waiting. And it was as such that her imposing presence was about to make a request of great confidence in him.

Her expression in the light of the many candles on the table had drifted from sobriety and a mannered countenance, to a look more of melancholy and deep concern. There was something in this last and third element of the voyage she would describe as being notably close to her—in heart and spirit. And there was in that quiet intensity, something which also implied a great resolve for him to commit the task to. Her close face demanded a look back from Drake that was, in itself, a promise not to fail.

His queen then insisted that he, on his honor, would not reveal the plan to anyone nor ever question it. This he swore to, accompanied by a humble lowering of his head as a gentleman and subject of the Crown. Elizabeth then took from a leather sheath a parchment map and several sketches which accompanied it. The map was of a coastline with longitudinal readings of the area's nominal reference points. Drake looked over it in the amber light and could see it was drawn by the experienced hand of a pilot. The name attached to the parchment read 'Juan de Fuca.'

It was of a coastline he had never seen, but by its longitude he knew generally where it had to be. On the attached drawings, there was a small X placed half way up a steep headland, looking much like the cliffs of Dover, only more forested. The map further illustrated the nearby bluffs and a wide river valley meeting the sea below them. Taller mountains loomed in the distance. Next to the X placed on these headlands, were four words written in Greek: ο τάφος εíναι εδώ.

Drake touched the Greek letters with his finger and looked with curiosity back into the intense eyes of his queen.

"In Greek it says, "The tomb is here," she clarified, her face softening into a content smile. "You will carry the body of a woman on your ship, Captain Drake. In private storage I command. She is long deceased. And her story is of no concern of yours."

Drake's eyes never left his queen's.

"Nor should she be the concern of any of the men in your command as captain of this expedition. Her future placement into that tomb on the western boundaries of the world is just the duty you must perform for me. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Your Majesty. It is."

"Her stone sarcophagus will be delivered to your ship by night before you sail. It shall be carried by sea to the 'Isle of California' during your travels. Then placed safely in the crypt which waits her . . . exactly there."

Now it was the queen's delicate and alabaster finger which caressed the small X on the leather drawing.

"Do you accept this portion of the mission? And in extreme secrecy?"

"I humbly do your majesty."

"I can tell you no more, Francis Drake. Your future charter has been revealed to you. You will be rewarded handsomely upon your return. You have given me your honorable promise to employ all the qualities inherent of your station as a trusted privateer. And beyond those credentials . . ., the behaviors of a gentleman and the skills of a fine captain, I expect your exact execution of this order."

Again, Drake nodded solemnly.

"This expedition of which we speak is being provisioned without delay," she added. "You are to commission your own ship, the 'Pelican' as 'flag,' and select your own crew. Four other vessels will be provided by a company of gentlemen close to the court and so invested. I will provide you the better portion of your manifest, although one thousand pounds you will so invest as parcel of the company. Your fleet will sail from Plymouth within two months. You will leave before the dead of winter and on the best tides."

The queen stood and rested her hand lightly on Drake's open palm. It seemed to have no weight.

"God's speed to you and your men, Captain Drake."

The privateer bowed deeply as Elizabeth I picked up a bronze hand bell from the table and rang it loudly. Suddenly, the wooden doors from both sides of the room opened and Francis Drake, privateer and navigator was escorted out of Whitehall Palace to a waiting coach by four of the queen's red-coated guards. Though his curiosity of that one mysterious element of the mission taunted his intrigue, the pirate and explorer in him stirred with excitement to sail with earliest fair tides.

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