Protestantism in England From the Times of Henry VIII - James Aitken Wylie

point of Sicily was converted into one vast
building-yard.[2] Whereever there was a harbor or
river's mouth, advantage was taken of it to
construct a war galley or a transport craft. At
intervals along this line of some 1,500 or 2,000
miles, might be seen keels laid down of a size then
deemed colossal, and carpenters busy fastening
thereto the bulging ribs, and clothing them with
planks. The entire seaboard rang without
intermission with the clang of hammer, the stroke
of ax, and the voices of myriad men, employed in
building the vessels that were to bear the
legionaries of Spain, the soldiers of the Inquisition,
over the seas to the shores of heretical England.
Wherever ship builders were to be found,
whether in the West Indies or in America, Philip II
searched them out, and had them transported to
Spain to help forward his great and holy work. The
inland forests were felled, and many a goodly oak
and cork tree were dragged to the coast; thousands
of looms were set to work to weave cloth for sails;
hundreds of forges were in full blaze, smelting the
ore, which gangs of workmen were hammering
369