a doubt, to which there should have been but one solution, namely:  to support the ships engaged, and to close down upon the enemy, as near as possible to the Commander-in-Chief.  And in moments of actual perplexity such will always be the truth.  It is like marching towards the sound of guns, or, to use Nelson’s words, “In case signals cannot be understood, no captain can do very wrong if he places his ship alongside that of an enemy.”  The “In Case,” however, needs also to be kept in mind; and that it was Nelson who said it.  Utterances of to-day, like utterances of all time, show how few are the men who can hold both sides of a truth firmly, without exaggeration or defect.  Judicial impartiality can be had, and positive convictions too; but their combination is rare.  A two-sided man is apt also to be double-minded.

The loss of men in this sharp encounter was:  British, killed, 120, wounded, 354; French, killed, 222, wounded, 537.[85] This gives three French hit for every two British, from which, and from the much greater damage received aloft by the latter, it may be inferred that both followed their usual custom of aiming, the British at the hull, the French at the spars.  To the latter conduced also the lee-gage, which the French had.  The British, as the attacking party, suffered likewise a raking fire as they bore down.

Rodney repaired damages at sea, and pursued, taking care to keep between Martinique and the French.  The latter going into Guadeloupe, he reconnoitred them there under the batteries, and then took his station off Fort Royal.  “The only chance of bringing them to action,” he wrote to the Admiralty on the 26th of April, “was to be off that port before them, where the fleet now is, in daily expectation of their arrival.”  The French represent that he avoided them, but as they assert that they came out best on the 17th, and yet admit that he appeared off Guadeloupe, the claim is not tenable.  Rodney here showed thorough tenacity of purpose.  De Guichen’s orders were “to keep the sea, so far as the force maintained by England in the Windward Islands would permit, without too far compromising the fleet intrusted to him."[86] With such instructions, he naturally and consistently shrunk from decisive engagement.  After landing his wounded and refitting in Guadeloupe, he again put to sea, with the intention of proceeding to Santa Lucia, resuming against that island the project which both he and De Bouille continuously entertained.  The latter and his troops remained with the fleet.

Rodney meantime had felt compelled to return momentarily to Santa Lucia.  “The fleet continued before Fort Royal till the condition of many of the ships under my command, and the lee currents,[87] rendered it necessary to anchor in Choque Bay (Anse du Choc), St. Lucie, in order to put the wounded and sick men on shore, and to water and refit the fleet, frigates having been detached both to leeward and to windward of every island, in order to gain intelligence of the motions of the enemy, and timely notice of their approach towards Martinique, the only place they could refit at in these seas.”  In this last clause is seen the strategic idea of the British Admiral:  the French must come back to Martinique.