Don Josef de Cordova , by whom Admiral Langara had been recently superseded), in the Santisima Trinidad four-decker, had sailed from Carthagena on the 1st of the month. It was composed of the:

exclusive of twelve 34-gun frigates and one brig-corvette, but in the names of which scarcely two accounts agree.

Some gun-boats, and about 70 transports having on board two battalions of guards and a Swiss regiment, besides a great quantity of ammunition and other military stores, all of which they had brought from Barcelona and were conveying to the camp of San-Roque, had quitted port along with the fleet.

On the 5th, at daylight, this numerically powerful fleet passed Gibraltar, and, on the afternoon of the same day the Neptuno, Bahama, Terrible, and the Guadalupa frigate, escorted the gunboats and transports into Algesiras, where the troops and stores were disembarked. One of the two-deckers immediately rejoined the fleet ; and, in a day or two afterwards, the two other line-of-battle ships stood out for the same purpose, but the fleet had made sail. While in search of the latter ; these two ships fell in with and chased the Minerve, as already related.

The primary destination of the Spanish admiral was Cadiz; but the strong easterly gale, which had quickened his passage through the Straits, soon blew right in his teeth, and drove his ships considerably to the westward of their port. The rumour was, that this fleet, if not blockaded in Cadiz, as it no doubt would have been, intended afterwards, if not stopped by the way, to proceed to Brest, there to join the French and (if another stubborn if could be got over) Dutch fleets ; and that then, with this assembled force, England was to be invaded.

On the evening of the 13th, while still buffeting with adverse winds, the look-out frigates of the Spanish fleet, now consisting of 25 sail of the line, 11 frigates, and one brig, got sight of some of the British ships ; but the latter, being taken for part of a convoy, excited very little attention. As the night advanced, the Spaniards busied themselves in making the most of a sudden favourable change of wind, and, without much regard to order, were crowding sail to get near the land.

The morning of the 14th, that disastrous day to the Spaniards, broke dark and hazy upon the two fleets. The fleet of the British was formed in two compact divisions, standing on the starboard tack with the wind at west by south, Cape St.-Vincent

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