Westward Ho!

Devon in the reign of Elizabeth: a Bideford boy goes to sea after the Spaniards, from the Caribbean to the Armada. Kingsley wrote it at speed during the Crimean War and dedicated it to a rajah and a colonial bishop; it sold enormously and gave a seaside town its name. The convictions of its author, Protestant and imperial, are on every page, and the sea passages are as good as anything in English. Fifty-six plates, from Tintoretto to David Roberts, bring the wider world of the Elizabethan sea story into the book.