again and again that he fully acquitted them all.
Nevertheless it would, in his judgment, be for his service and for their
own honour that they should publicly vindicate themselves. He therefore
required them to draw up a paper setting forth their abhorrence of the
Prince's design. They remained silent: their silence was supposed to
imply consent; and they were suffered to withdraw. [501]

Meanwhile the fleet of William was on the German Ocean. It was on the
evening of Thursday the first of November that he put to sea the second
time. The wind blew fresh from the east. The armament, during twelve
hours, held a course towards the north west. The light vessels sent out
by the English Admiral for the purpose of obtaining intelligence brought
back news which confirmed the prevailing opinion that the enemy would
try to land in Yorkshire. All at once, on a signal from the Prince's
ship, the whole fleet tacked, and made sail for the British Channel.
The same breeze which favoured the voyage of the invaders prevented
Dartmouth from coming out of the Thames. His ships were forced to strike
yards and topmasts; and two of his frigates, which had gained the open
sea, were shattered by the violence of the weather and driven back into
the river. [502]

The Dutch fleet ran fast before the gale, and reached the Straits at
about ten in the morning of Saturday the third of November. William
himself, in the Brill, led the way. More than six hundred vessels,
with canvass spread to a favourable wind, followed in his train. The
transports were in the centre. The men of war, more than fifty in
number, formed an outer rampart. Herbert, with the title of Lieutenant
Admiral General, commanded the whole fleet. His post was in the rear,
and many English sailors, inflamed against Popery, and attracted by
high pay, served under him. It was not without great difficulty that the
Prince had prevailed on some Dutch officers of high reputation to
submit to the authority of a stranger. But the arrangement was eminently
judicious. There was, in the King's fleet, much discontent and an ardent
zeal for the Protestant faith. But within the memory of old mariners
the Dutch and English navies had thrice, with heroic spirit and various
fortune, contended for the empire of the sea. Our sailors had not
forgotten the broom with which Tromp had threatened to sweep the
Channel, or the fire which De Ruyter had lighted in the dockyards of the
Medway. Had the rival nat