LITMIR.BIZ

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and a small one under Commodore Fox, to look for the home-coming French West India convoy. Both were successful. Fortune, which was never tired of rewarding Anson for so magnificently supporting the honour of the English flag in the bad times when Vernon was failing at Carthagena and Mathews was wrangling with Lestock in the Mediterranean, threw the East India convoy in his way. He captured ten of them—thereby earning his peerage and a second sackful of prize-money. Rodney served in the subordinate squadron under Fox. His ship the Eagle was one of the six which this commodore had under him. To them also fortune was kind. In June, about a month after Anson’s victory, the English squadron fell in, off Cape Ortugal, with the West India convoy of one hundred and seventy sail of merchant ships, under the guard of four war-ships. Men-of-war and merchant ships scattered at the sight of them. The King’s ships got off, but Fox’s squadron had a day of easy and lucrative work in snapping up the merchant runaways, whereof they took forty-eight of 16,051 tons in all. As they were laden with West Indian produce, the day’s work must have been better than a year’s pay to at least every captain in the squadron.

      Here Rodney had seen how a convoy ought not to be protected. It was the clear duty of the four French captains to fight so long as fighting was possible, to cover the escape of the unarmed ships. Before the year was out he had an opportunity of seeing how that duty could be fulfilled in the most noble manner. During the summer the French were collecting in the Basque Roads a great convoy of outward-bound merchant ships. The English Government resolved to intercept this also, and in the autumn Lord Anson, who was at the head of the Admiralty, selected the best officer he could have found in the navy to replace himself. A squadron of fourteen sail, with the Eagle among them, was collected at Plymouth, and placed under the command of Rear-Admiral Edward Hawke. In August Admiral Hawke sailed with orders to attack the convoy in the roadstead; but when he was on Lord Anson’s cruising ground, off Finisterre, he came at daybreak on August 14th upon the French at sea under the protection of nine ships of war. There was on the English side a superiority of five ships and more than two hundred guns, but the French commander, Desherbiers de l’Etenduère, decided to make a fight. He had approached the English under the impression that they were a portion of his own convoy, which had parted in the night. So soon as he saw his mistake he did his best to correct it. The convoy was sent off under the care of the Content, sixty-four. Then, having weakened himself for the sake of his charge, M. de l’Etenduère made ready to sacrifice himself for it also. He formed his remaining eight ships into a line of battle across the road of the English squadron, and, keeping vigilantly on his guard, edged away after his flying convoy.

      At the sight of the French, Hawke had at first formed his line of battle; but as the day wore on he saw the extent of his own superiority, and saw also that the French, being to windward of him, would be able to keep their distance till dark if he continued to approach them in the regular formation, which would necessarily mean at something a little below the speed of the slowest of his fourteen ships. He therefore hauled down the signal for the line of battle, and ordered a general chase, which is the technical name of the simplest of all possible manœuvres—going, namely, at the enemy as fast as wind, tide, and the sailing powers of your ship would allow you. Hawke was fond of attacking in this fashion, and about eleven years after this day did so, under heroic circumstances, at the magnificent sea-fight off Quiberon. In the battle with L’Etenduère there was less to do, but such as it was, it was gallantly done. The first to come up with the enemy was Captain Arthur Scott of the Lion, who, at about midday, as it were, seized hold of them, and clung to their skirts till help came. It was not delayed. Other English ships swarmed up fast—the Eagle among them—each getting into action as she could, and all pressing on the Frenchmen. Six of the eight struck, but not till after hard fighting, prolonged in the case of two of them till seven in the evening. There was no manœuvring; it was all plain hammer-and-tongs work, in which the Eagle had her full share. Early in the fight she came under the guns of the Tonnant, the French flag-ship, an eighty-gunner, and was badly mauled. Her steering-gear being disabled, she fell on board of Hawke’s own ship the Devonshire, and the two drifted out of the fight before they could get clear of one another. This stop was only temporary. Hawke soon got back into action, and Rodney made good his damage. When at last L’Etenduère, having done enough for honour, prepared to escape with his own ship the Tonnant, and the only other survivor of his squadron the Intrepide, Rodney joined Saunders of the Yarmouth (he who afterwards helped Wolfe to conquer Quebec) and Philip Saumarez of the Nottingham in pursuing the only remains of the enemy. The Eagle and the Yarmouth were soon left behind. The Nottingham alone came up with the retreating Frenchmen. In this stage of the fight the odds had shifted to the other side. The Tonnant was an eighty-gun ship; the Intrepide a seventy-four. Against two such enemies the sixty guns of the Nottingham were too few. Captain Saumarez indeed fought till he fell mortally wounded; but the officer who succeeded him gave up the unequal conflict, and at dark Hawke hoisted the signal of recall. The Tonnant and the Intrepide made their way back to port.

      It was a very pretty fight altogether, and on L’Etenduère’s part a most gallant and able one. His bravery and his judgment were equally conspicuous. Not only did he save his honour, but he saved his convoy. During those seven hours of fighting the merchant ships had escaped to windward. When dark came down Hawke, with six shattered French prizes on his hands, and several of his own ships greatly damaged in hull and rigging, had nothing for it but to make his way back to England. On our side again, though it was not one of the fights we should rank with Quiberon or the Nile, it was a creditable piece of service. Good use was made of our superior numbers, and as the French ships were larger than our own, and the calibre of the guns somewhat heavier, the odds in our favour were not so great as they look on a mere statement of numbers and broadsides. One unhappy feature of the naval war of the time was not wanting. There was a court-martial on Captain Fox of the Kent—Rodney’s commodore in the cruise of the previous June—who was accused of hanging back in the action. The charge was largely supported by Rodney’s own evidence, and was held to be proved. Fox was dismissed the service, and though afterwards restored by the King, was not again employed. Rodney was thought to have borne somewhat hardly on the poor man, being aggrieved by want of support when he felt he needed it in the action. As we get more means of seeing Rodney’s character it will, I think, become very credible that he would be especially harsh in his condemnation of want of zeal when he had himself suffered from it. That Fox had not behaved so well in the action as Rodney, Saunders, Saumarez, or Scott is beyond question. It is also certain that the naval courts-martial of that time were not, as a rule, remarkable for the severity of their sentences, and we may rest content that substantial justice was done.

      The Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle did not turn Rodney on shore. His interest was good enough to save him from the too common fate of naval officers in the days when the reduction of the establishment from a war to a peace footing was carried out with but little regard to the claims of those who could not make their voice heard loudly at Whitehall. Moreover, he was now known as one who was well able to fulfil his side of the bargain which is generally made, at least tacitly, between patron and client. He was an officer whom it was a credit to push. When he happened to be in London, just after the action with L’Etenduère, Anson took him to the King. George the Second expressed his surprise at Captain Rodney’s youth, which, by the way, would imply that His Majesty’s acquaintance with his own post list was not exhaustive, for it certainly contained several younger officers than the commander of the Eagle. Then Anson, so says the story, replied by expressing a wish that His Majesty’s Navy contained more young captains of the stamp of Captain Rodney. This was high praise indeed from Anson, who was never lavish of praise, and was indeed so cold that Smollett accused him of raying out frost on all who came near him. The words of a First Lord, and one who had a particular care in pushing on men whom he thought worthy of promotion, were not likely to fall to the ground. In March, 1749, Rodney was appointed Governor of Newfoundland, and at the same time Captain of H.M.S. Rainbow.

      This was not a cumulation of offices. The governorship of Newfoundland was then a naval post. We considered the place as a fishing-station, and indeed it was little else. The fishermen and the fisheries were directly under “Admirals of the Fisheries,” resident officers from whom there lay an appeal to the officers of H.M. ships on the coast. Other settlers were under justices, who

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