e. Its ravages were arrested; but while at
Martinique, hostilities broke out between the French and the Spaniards,
and the two commanders could not agree as to the line of operations to
be pursued. Their combined fleets set sail again on the 5th of July, and
directed their course to St. Domingo, where they separated; de Guichen
returning to Europe with the homeward-bound convoy from the French sugar
islands, and Solano proceeding to the Havanah, to assist in the military
operations which the Spaniards were carrying on in Florida. All these
circumstances saved Jamaica and the other islands in the West Indies;
and conscious that they were safe, after detaching a part of his force
to Jamaica, Rodney set sail for New York.

EXPEDITION AGAINST SOUTH CAROLINA.

While Rodney was bravely supporting the honour of the British flag on
the ocean, the British arms were equally successful on the continent.
During the last days of December, Sir Henry Clinton, leaving New York
under the care of General Knyphausen, sailed away from Sandy Hook for
Charlestown in South Carolina. The ships in which he sailed, however,
were driven from their course by a long and terrible storm, so that it
was not till the 11th of February that he was enabled to disembark on
John's Island, about thirty miles from Charlestown. Other delays took
place; and it was the 29th of March when Clinton's army crossed Ashby
River and landed on Charlestown-neck. Ground was broken in front of the
American lines on the 11th of April; but as these lines were formidable,
it was evident that some time must elapse before the town could be
taken. Thus the Americans had built a chain of redoubts, lines, and
batteries right across the peninusular, from Ashby River to Cooper
River, on which were mounted eighty cannons and mortars; they had dug a
deep canal in front of this line, which was filled with water, and had
thrown two rows of abattis, and made a double picketed ditch; in the
centre of their works they had erected a kind of citadel, which was
bomb-proof; they had erected numerous batteries on the waterside, to
prevent the approach of ships; and they had raised a bar or sand-bank,
that rendered the approach of our largest ships of war impracticable,
and of the smaller craft difficult and dangerous. Within the bar,
however, there was a place called Five Fathom Hole, with a sufficient
depth of water to float second-rate ships; and here nine American ships
were moored, u