straits, and there they had to
await their companions. The _Hannibal_ was unable to join them, and
reanchored at Algeciras. At half-past two the _Caesar_ hauled out from
Gibraltar mole, her band playing, "Cheer up, my lads, 't is to glory we
steer!" which was answered from the mole-head with "Britons, strike
home!" At the same moment Saumarez's flag, provisionally shifted to
another vessel, was rehoisted at her masthead. The rugged flanks of the
rock and the shores of Algeciras were crowded with eager and cheering
sight-seers, whose shouts echoed back the hurrahs of the seamen. Rarely,
indeed, is so much of the pride and circumstance, if not of the pomp, of
war rehearsed before an audience which, breathless with expectation, has
in it no part save to admire and applaud.

Off Europa Point, on the Gibraltar side, there clustered round the
_Caesar_ her four consorts, all but one bearing, like herself, the still
fresh wounds of the recent conflict. Four miles away, off Cabrita Point,
assembled the three French of Linois's division, having like honorable
marks, together with the six new unscarred arrivals. At 8 P.M. of the
summer evening the allies kept away for Cadiz; Linois's division
leading, the other six interposing between them and the five ships of
Saumarez, which followed at once. It was a singular sight, this pursuit
of nine ships by five, suggestive of much of the fatal difference, in
ideals and efficiency, between the navies concerned. Towards nine
o'clock Saumarez ordered the _Superb_, whose condition alone was
unimpaired by battle, to press ahead and bring the rear of the enemy to
action. The wind was blowing strong from the east, with a heavy sea. At
half-past eleven the _Superb_ overtook the _Real Carlos_, and opened
fire. Abreast the Spanish vessel, on her other side, was the
_Hermenegildo_. The latter, probably through receiving some of the
_Superb's_ shot, fancied the ship nearest her to be an enemy, and
replied. In the confusion, one of them caught fire, the other ran on
board her, and in a few moments there was presented to the oncoming
British the tremendous sight of these two huge ships, with their twenty
hundred men, locked in a fast embrace and blazing together. At half-past
two in the morning, having by that time drifted apart, they blew up in
quick succession.

Leaving them to their fate, the hostile squadron passed on. The _Superb_
next encountered the _St. Antoine_, and forced her to strike. Soon