n of propriety, in the heat of
battle and under the sting of shame. Nevertheless, scrupulous good
faith would seem to demand that their deliverance should be awaited
from other hands, not bound by the action of their commander; or at
least that the forbearing assailant should not have suffered from
them. The captain, suspended and sent home by Suffren, and cashiered
by the king, utterly condemned himself by his attempted defence: "When
Captain de Cillart saw the French squadron drawing off,--for all the
ships except the 'Brilliant' had fallen off on the other tack,--he
thought it useless to prolong his defence, and had the flag hauled
down. _The ships engaged with him immediately ceased their fire_, and
the one on the starboard side moved away. At this moment the 'Severe'
fell off to starboard and her sails filled; Captain de Cillart then
ordered the fire to be resumed by his lower-deck guns, the only ones
still manned, and he rejoined his squadron."[186]

This action was the only one of the five fought by Suffren on the
coast of India, in which the English admiral was the assailant. There
can be found in it no indication of military conceptions, of tactical
combinations; but on the other hand Hughes is continually showing the
aptitudes, habits of thought, and foresight of the skilful seaman, as
well as a courage beyond all proof. He was in truth an admirable
representative of the average English naval officer of the middle of
the eighteenth century; and while it is impossible not to condemn the
general ignorance of the most important part of the profession, it is
yet useful to remark how far thorough mastery of its other details,
and dogged determination not to yield, made up for so signal a defect.
As the Roman legions often redeemed the blunders of their generals, so
did English captains and seamen often save that which had been lost by
the errors of their admirals,--errors which neither captain nor seamen
recognized, nor would probably have admitted. Nowhere were these solid
qualities so clearly shown as in Suffren's battles, because nowhere
else were such demands made upon them. No more magnificent instances
of desperate yet useful resistance to overwhelming odds are to be
found in naval annals, than that of the "Monmouth" on April 12, and of
the "Exeter" on February 17. An incident told of the latter ship is
worth quoting. "At the heel of the action, when the 'Exeter' was
already in the state of a wreck, the maste