command. Ayscue had
previously sailed up Channel with forty men-of-war and five fireships
for a similar purpose. The two fleets met on August 16, and despite his
inferiority of force De Ruyter forced Ayscue to withdraw into Plymouth,
and was able to bring his convoy home to safety.

The ill-success of Tromp, though he was in no way to blame for it,
caused considerable alarm and discontent in Holland. His enemies of the
States party in that province took advantage of it to suspend the
gallant old seaman from his command. He was an Orangist; and, as the
Orange partisans were everywhere clamorously active, the admiral was
suspect. In his place Cornelisz Witte de With was appointed, a capable
sailor, but disliked in the fleet as much as Tromp was beloved. De With
effected a junction with De Ruyter and with joint forces they attacked
Blake on October 8, near the shoal known as the Kentish Knock. The
English fleet was considerably more powerful than the Dutch, and the
desertion of De With by some twenty ships decided the issue. The Dutch
had to return home with some loss. The English were elated with their
victory and thought that they would be safe from further attack until
the spring. Blake accordingly was ordered to send a squadron of twenty
sail to the Mediterranean, where the Dutch admiral Jan van Galen held
the command of the sea. But they were deceived in thinking that the
struggle in the Channel was over for the winter. The deserters at the
Kentish Knock were punished, but the unpopularity of De With left the
authorities with no alternative but to offer the command-in-chief once
more to Martin Tromp. Full of resentment though he was at the bad
treatment he had received, Tromp was too good a patriot to refuse. At
the end of November the old admiral at the head of 100 warships put to
sea for the purpose of convoying some 450 merchantmen through the
Straits. Stormy weather compelled him to send the convoy with an escort
into shelter, but he himself with sixty ships set out to seek the
English fleet, which lay in the Downs. After some manoeuvring the two
fleets met on December 10, off Dungeness. A stubborn fight took place,
but this time it was some of the English ships that were defaulters.
The result was the complete victory of the Dutch; and Blake's fleet,
severely damaged, retreated under cover of the night into Dover roads.
Tromp was now for a time master of the Channel and commerce to and from
the ports of Holland a