, he said in his journal, he feared that he would otherwise be
removed from his position as commodore. In a letter to Hewes he gave
Franklin's command as the cause.

The squadron, accompanied at the outset by two French privateers, sailed
finally from L'Orient, after one futile attempt, August 14, 1779, and
made during the first forty days of the fifty days' cruise a number of
unimportant prizes. On the 18th of August, the privateer Monsieur,
which was not bound by the _concordat_, took a prize, which the captain
of the Monsieur rifled, and then ordered into port. Jones, however,
opposed the captain's order, and sent the prize to L'Orient, whereupon
the Monsieur parted company with the squadron. According to Fanning, one
of Jones's midshipmen, who has left a spirited account of the cruise,
Jones attempted to prevent the departure of the privateer by force, and
when she escaped was so angry that he "struck several of his officers
with his speaking trumpet over their heads," and confined one of them
below, but immediately afterwards invited him to dinner. "Thus it was
with Jones," says Fanning, "passionate to the highest degree one minute,
and the next ready to make a reconciliation."

The defection of the Monsieur was, however, only the beginning of
Jones's troubles with the insubordinate officers. While attempting to
capture a brigantine, Jones, through the desertion of some of his
English sailors, lost two of his small boats, for which he was bitterly
and unjustly reproached by the crazy, incompetent, and greedy Landais,
captain of the Alliance, who said that hereafter he would chase in the
manner he saw fit. Shortly afterwards, the Cerf abruptly left the fleet,
and the other privateer also went off on its own account. Jones was left
with only the Bonhomme Richard, the Pallas, the Vengeance, and the
Alliance; and it would have been better, as the result showed, if the
last-mentioned vessel and its extraordinary captain had also decamped at
this time for good. Landais paid no attention to Jones's signals, but
left the squadron for days, unfortunately returning. Against Jones's
orders he sent two prizes into Bergen, Norway, where they were given by
the Danish government to the English, and were for many years after the
war a source of trouble between Denmark and the United States.

Jones was also compelled to treat with the other French captains, and
several times modified his course in compliance with their demands. He