the advantage gained. The question of attacking Darby at
his anchors was discussed in a council of war, at which de Guichen
strongly advocated the measure; but a majority of votes decided
that Great Britain would be less hurt by ruining her fleet than
by intercepting the expected convoys. Even for the latter purpose,
however, de Cordova could not wait. On the 5th of September he
informed de Guichen that he was at liberty to return to Brest; and
he himself went back to Cadiz with thirty-nine ships, nine of which
were French. "This cruise of the combined fleet," says Chevalier,
"diminished the consideration of France and Spain. These two powers
had made a great display of force, without producing the slightest
result." It may be mentioned here that Minorca, after a six months'
siege, capitulated in February, 1782.

While Darby was beating down Channel in the early days of August,
1781, Vice-Admiral Hyde Parker, lately Rodney's second in command in
the West Indies, was returning to England convoying a large merchant
fleet from the Baltic. On the 5th of August, at daylight, a Dutch
squadron, also with a convoy, but outward bound, from the Texel to
the Baltic, was discovered in the south-west, near the Doggersbank.
Heading as the two enemies then were, their courses must shortly
intersect. Parker, therefore, ordered his convoy to steer to the
westward for England, while he himself bore down for the enemy. The
Dutch Rear-Admiral, Johan Arnold Zoutman, on the contrary, kept the
merchant vessels with him, under his lee, but drew out the ships of
war from among them, to form his order on the side towards the enemy.
Each opponent put seven sail into the line. The British vessels,
besides being of different rates, were chiefly very old ships, dragged
out from Rotten Row to meet the pressing emergency caused by the
greatly superior forces which were in coalition against Great Britain.
Owing to the decayed condition of some of them, their batteries had
been lightened, to the detriment of their fighting power. Two of them,
however, were good and new seventy-fours. It is probable that the
Dutch vessels, after a long peace, were not much better than their
antagonists. In fact, each squadron was a scratch lot, in the worst
sense of the phrase. The conduct of the affair by the two admirals,
even to the very intensity of their pugnaciousness, contributes a
tinge of the comic to the history of a desperately fought action. The
breeze was f