213), we know it to be the work of 'William Gorges, gentleman.' He is to be identified as a son of Sir William Gorges, for he tells us he was afloat with his father in the Dreadnought as early as 1578, when Sir William was admiral on the Irish station with a squadron ordered to intercept the filibustering expedition which Sir Thomas Stucley was about to attempt under the auspices of Pope Gregory XIII.

Sir William was a cousin of Ralegh's and brother to Sir Arthur Gorges, who was Ralegh's captain in the Azores expedition of 1597, and who in Ralegh's interest wrote the account of the campaign which Purchas printed.

Though William, the son, freely quotes the experiences of the Armada campaign of 1588, he is not known to have ever held a naval command, and he calls himself 'unexperienced.' We may take it therefore that his treatise was mainly inspired by Ralegh, to whom indeed a large part of it is sometimes attributed.

This question, however, is of small importance.

The gist of the matter is a set of fleet orders which he has appended as a precedent at the end of his treatise, and it is on these orders that Ralegh's are clearly based.