ritish total of killed and wounded was very evenly distributed
throughout the fleet. Only the rear ship lost an important spar,--the
main topmast. It was upon her, as already mentioned, and upon the two
leading ships, the _Exeter_ and _Isis_, that fell the heaviest fire,
proportionately, of the French. From the position of the seven van
ships of the latter, such fire as they could make must needs be upon
the extreme British van, and the _Exeter_ was forced to leave the
line. The loss of the French that day was 82 killed and 255
wounded; of which 64 killed and 178 wounded belonged to the _Heros_,
_Illustre_, and _Ajax_. The British had 51 killed and 283 wounded; the
greatest number of casualties in one ship being 56. Singularly enough,
in such a small list of deaths, three were commanding officers:
Captains Watt of the _Sultan_, Wood of the _Worcester_, and Lumley of
the _Isis_.

At 5.30 P.M. the wind shifted suddenly from south-west to
east-south-east (C). The British wore together, formed on the other
tack, and continued the fight. It was during this final act, and at
6 P.M., that the mainmast of the French flagship came down. The van
ships of the French had towed their heads round with boats before
4, in order to come to the support of the centre, in obedience to a
signal from Suffren; but the light airs and calms had retarded them.
With the shift they approached, and passed in column (c) between their
crippled vessels and the enemy. This manoeuvre, and the failure of
daylight, brought the battle to an end. According to Hughes's report,
several of his fleet "were making much water from shot-holes so very
low down in the bottom as not to be come at to be effectually stopped;
and the whole had suffered severely in their masts and rigging."
Trincomalee being in the enemy's possession, and the east coast of
Ceylon an unsafe anchorage now, at the change of the monsoon, he
felt compelled to return to Madras, where he anchored on the 9th of
September. Suffren regained Trincomalee on the 7th of the month, but
the _Orient_, 74, running ashore at the entrance and being lost, he
remained outside until the 17th, saving material from the wreck.

The break-up of the south-west monsoon, then at hand, is apt to be
accompanied by violent hurricanes, and is succeeded by the north-east
monsoon, during which the east coasts of the peninsula and of Ceylon
give a lee shore, with heavy surf. Naval operations, therefore, were
suspended for