Having got fairly into the trade winds, they run, on the 21st of May, in the last twenty-four hours, a hundred and ninety miles.  The next day, they passed the tropic, vulgarly called crossing the line; when Neptune performed the usual ceremony, to the no small diversion of the fleet.  There were, in the Victory alone, his lordship remarks, who highly enjoyed the scene, no less than five hundred persons by whom the tropic had never before been crossed.

On the 31st, at six in the evening, being within two hundred leagues of Barbadoes, the Amazon was sent forward for information.

On the 3d of June, at day-light, two Guinea ships, bound from Surinam to America, were seen to the westward; from whom intelligence was obtained, that they were told, the day before, by the Beaulieu frigate, that the French and Spanish squadrons had arrived at Martinico, but the African ships did not know the time of their arrival there.  In the evening, a sloop of war was perceived, with the signal of intelligence to communicate; but, missing the Victory, his lordship would not shorten sail, as he knew nothing more could be communicated, than when the enemy’s fleet had arrived at Martinico.  Next morning, at day-light, Barbadoes was seen by the fleet, distant about ten leagues to the west; and, at eleven in the forenoon, his lordship received the salutes of Rear-Admiral Cochrane, and Charles Fort.  The enemy’s fleet, Lord Nelson was now informed, had arrived at Martinico on the 14th of May, with their men sickly:  and, on the 28th, were seen to the windward of St. Lucia, standing to the southward; with the view, as was supposed, of attacking Tobago and Trinidada.  General Sir William Myers, at Barbadoes, having very handsomely offered his lordship to embark with two thousand troops for the relief of those islands, the fleet anchored in Carlisle Bay; and, though very rainy, with squalls of wind, the embarkment immediately commenced, and was continued all night.  In the morning, Le Curieux brig was sent forward, to look into Tobago; and Sir William Myers dispatched another vessel to General Prevost, at Dominica, to acquaint him with Lord Nelson’s arrival.

The happy tidings of his lordship’s approach expeditiously spread through all the West India islands.  The enemy were not the last who heard this intelligence, which acted with double force against these marauders:  it armed with resolution the defenceless inhabitants of even the least tenable situations, by inspiring them with hopes of a speedy and effectual aid to their own manly exertions; and filled with dread and horror those pusillanimous pillagers who had alone confided in their vast superiority of numbers, for the success of their plundering exploits, and now feared the avenging hand of our pursuing hero.  Villeneuve, the Gallic fugitive from the Nile, no sooner gained intelligence that the victor on that occasion was likely soon to be once more at his heels, than he again made the most expeditious use of them in returning back from the scene of his paltry depredations; and, with his former good fortune, escaped the chastising hand of our hero, who continued every where seeking him in vain.  His lordship, indeed, however aware of the dastardly disposition of the enemy, could scarcely think it possible for such a very superior force as the combined fleet thus timidly to fly before him.