by cessation of American trade,
with consequent fall of prices, was estimated to give a total loss
of L66 upon every L100 earned before the war. Yet, with all this,
the outward West India fleet in 1778 waited six weeks, April 10th-May
26th, for convoy. Immediately after it got away, a rigorous embargo
was laid upon all shipping in British ports, that their crews might
be impressed to man the Channel fleet. Market-boats, even, were not
allowed to pass between Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight.

Three days after Byron had sailed, Admiral Augustus Keppel also put
to sea with twenty-one ships of the line, to cruise off Brest. His
instructions were to prevent the junction of the Toulon and Brest
divisions, attacking either that he might meet. On the 17th of June,
two French frigates were sighted. In order that they might not report
his force or his movements, the British Admiral sent two of his own
frigates, with the request that they would speak him. One, the _Belle
Poule_, 36, refused; and an engagement followed between her and the
British ship, the _Arethusa_, 32. The King of France subsequently
declared that this occurrence fixed the date of the war's beginning.
Although both Keppel's and d'Estaing's orders prescribed acts of
hostility, no formal war yet existed.

Byron had a very tempestuous passage, with adverse winds, by which his
vessels were scattered and damaged. On the 18th of August, sixty-seven
days from Plymouth, the flagship arrived off the south coast of Long
Island, ninety miles east of New York, without one of the fleet in
company. There twelve ships were seen at anchor to leeward (north),
nine or ten miles distant, having jury masts, and showing other signs
of disability. The British vessel approached near enough to recognise
them as French. They were d'Estaing's squadron, crippled by a very
heavy gale, in which Howe's force had also suffered, though to a
less extent. Being alone, and ignorant of existing conditions,
Byron thought it inexpedient to continue on for either New York or
Narragansett Bay. The wind being southerly, he steered for Halifax,
which he reached August 26th. Some of his ships also entered there.
A very few had already succeeded in joining Howe in New York, being
fortunate enough to escape the enemy.

So far as help from England went, Lord Howe would have been crushed
long before this. He owed his safety partly to his own celerity,
partly to the delays of his opponent. Early in May h