You hear nothing
of him in connection with the Channel pirates. It was not till he was
five-and-twenty that he was tempted by Hawkins into the negro-catching
business, and of this one experiment was enough. He never tried it
again.
The portraits of him vary very much, as indeed it is natural that they
should, for most of those which pass for Drake were not meant for Drake
at all. It is the fashion in this country, and a very bad fashion, when
we find a remarkable portrait with no name authoritatively attached to
it, to christen it at random after some eminent man, and there it
remains to perplex or mislead.
The best likeness of Drake that I know is an engraving in Sir William
Stirling-Maxwell's collection of sixteenth-century notabilities,
representing him, as a scroll says at the foot of the plate, at the age
of forty-three. The face is round, the forehead broad and full, with the
short brown hair curling crisply on either side. The eyebrows are highly
arched, the eyes firm, clear, and open. I cannot undertake for the
colour, but I should judge they would be dark grey, like an eagle's. The
nose is short and thick, the mouth and chin hid by a heavy moustache on
the upper lip, and a close-clipped beard well spread over chin and
cheek.
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