But the slave trade itself soon grew too small to satisfy Hawkins, who sought a field for broader adventures. All the western ocean lay open to him, and mustering a squadron he offered Drake the command of one of the vessels, which were to go to the West Indies and engage in trading or fighting with the Spaniards, who had at that time almost a monopoly of the waters where Columbus had sailed some seventy years before. Spain and England were not openly at war when Hawkins was planning this voyage, but in unknown waters all law stopped; and it was not infrequent for Spanish and English vessels to fall afoul of each other with little or nothing said about it afterward in the Courts or Embassies. Queen Elizabeth hated the Spaniards and was glad to do them all the mischief she could, but she did not dare to go to war with them at that time or to give too open encouragement to her sea captains. They knew, none the less, that the sight of Spanish gold under English hatches was pleasant to good Queen Bess, and likely to result in honor, wealth and preferment for themselves.
It was on Drake's first expedition to the West Indies that he conceived a hatred for the Spaniards that was to last all his life as the result of the black treachery they played on Hawkins. After cruising along the western coast of what is now Florida, and being unable to find a proper harbor there, Hawkins set sail for Mexico and dropped anchor at a Spanish port in that country. While he was riding at anchor a large fleet of Spanish vessels arrived, and finding the English in possession and holding a strong position, agreed to let them sail away unmolested. Later, however, when the English had consented to these terms and after the Spanish Admiral had entertained the English officers in his own cabin, the Spaniards treacherously attacked the English, killing a number that had gone ashore before they could regain their boats and engaging in a sea fight with Hawkins' squadron, in which the English lost all but two of their ships, the _Judith_, Drake's vessel, and the _Minion_, on which Hawkins happened to be when the fight commenced. These two ships escaped and made their way back to England separately, Drake vowing vengeance against the Spaniards. And indeed they had made a dangerous enemy in this bold sailor, who very shortly paid them in full for the base treatment they had given him.