Both sides claimed the advantage.  This was simply a point of honour, or of credit, for material advantage accrued to neither.  Keppel had succeeded in forcing d’Orvilliers to action against his will; d’Orvilliers, by a well-judged evolution, had retained a superiority of manoeuvring power after the engagement.  Had his next signal been promptly obeyed, he might have passed again by the British fleet, in fairly good order, before it re-formed, and concentrated his fire on the more leewardly of its vessels.  Even under the delay, it was distinctly in his power to renew the fight; and that he did not do so forfeits all claim to victory.  Not to speak of the better condition of the French ships, Keppel, by running off the wind, had given his opponent full opportunity to reach his fleet and to attack.  Instead of so doing, d’Orvilliers drew up under the British lee, out of range, and offered battle; a gallant defiance, but to a crippled foe.

Time was thus given to the British to refit their ships sufficiently to bear down again.  This the French admiral should not have permitted.  He should have attacked promptly, or else have retreated; to windward, or to leeward, as seemed most expedient.  Under the conditions, it was not good generalship to give the enemy time, and to await his pleasure.  Keppel, on the other hand, being granted this chance, should have renewed the fight; and here arose the controversy which set all England by the ears, and may be said to have immortalised this otherwise trivial incident.  Palliser’s division was to windward from 4 to 7 P.M., while the signals were flying to form line of battle, and to bear down in the Admiral’s wake; and Keppel alleged that, had these been obeyed by 6 P.M., he would have renewed the battle, having still over two hours of daylight.  It has been stated already that, besides the signals, a frigate brought Palliser word that the Admiral was waiting only for him.

The immediate dispute is of slight present interest, except as an historical link in the fighting development of the British Navy; and only this historical significance justifies more than a passing mention.  In 1778 men’s minds were still full of Byng’s execution in 1757, and of the Mathews and Lestock affair in 1744, which had materially influenced Byng in his action off Minorca.  Keppel repeatedly spoke of himself as on trial for his life; and he had been a member of Byng’s court-martial.  The gist of the charges against him, preferred by Palliser, was that he attacked in the first instance without properly forming his line, for which Mathews had been censured; and, secondly, that by not renewing the action after the first pass-by, and by wearing away from the French fleet, he had not done his utmost to “take, sink, burn, and destroy.”  This had been the charge on which Byng was shot.  Keppel, besides his justifying reasons for his course in general, alleged and proved his full intention to attack again, had not Palliser failed to come into line, a delinquency the same as that of Lestock, which contributed to Mathew’s ruin.