was made to keep his destination unknown. One statement which was communicated to him as an important secret had been the talk of all the coffee-houses in Portsmouth long before it reached him. The newspapers published details of every ship-load of arms and stores that was sent to the West Indies, and as a climax printed in full a proclamation which had been prepared for Cathcart to issue on his arrival in South America.[140] Such were the English ideas of organising victory. [Sidenote: Oct. 24/Nov. 4.] [Sidenote: 1740, Dec. 23./1741, Jan. 3.] At length, on the 4th of November, the fleet sailed, just four months too late, and after a very stormy passage, which scattered the ships in all directions, the bulk of the transports arrived at St. Rupert's Bay, Dominica, on the 3rd of January 1741. Already the force had suffered heavy losses. The fleet was very sickly, over one hundred soldiers had died, and worst of all, Lord Cathcart himself had been seized with dysentery and was also dead.[141] Wentworth assumed the command in his stead; and the fleet after a day or two proceeded to St. Kitts, where all the missing ships were found at anchor safe and sound. But among them too sickness had made sad havoc, and of the six hundred marines transferred despite Cathcart's warnings to the men-of-war, many were dead and few fit for duty. From thence the fleet sailed, as had been appointed, for Jamaica, where it found Vernon's squadron awaiting it in the harbour, and the American battalions, now regimented under the command of Colonel Gooch, in camp on the island. The Americans were in a very bad state. Their ranks had been filled without difficulty, but with bad material: they were guiltless of drill or discipline, and on arrival at Jamaica had at once become disorderly and mutinous. There was good excuse for their discontent, for the English Government, though it had made arrangements for the payment and victualling of the British troops, had made none whatever for the Americans, who were thus compelled to fall back on such meagre resources as Jamaica could provide.[142] Moreover, the Americans were even more sickly than the British, and had buried scores of men since their disembarkation. By the first returns sent home from Jamaica it appears that of the nine thousand soldiers who had started from England and America in October, seventeen officers and six hundred men had died before the end of the year, while fifteen hundred more were actually on the sick-list.[143] [Sidenote: Feb. 24/March 7.]