to the north of Guadaloupe. It was our naval dockyard in the Leeward Islands. Antigua having a competent garrison was in no danger. Then he returned to Barbadoes, and waited till he was joined on the 10th December by Hotham with the ships and soldiers from New York. The combined squadrons at once proceeded to give the French a Roland for their Oliver by seizing Santa Lucia. The French island was not much better prepared for defence than Dominica, and when it was attacked on the 13th and 14th of December the Governor retired to one of the hills in the interior, while the coast fell into our hands. Barrington anchored in the Cul de Sac, a bay on the western side of the island opening on to the Caribbean Sea, while the troops besieged the French Governor. Next day D’Estaign appeared with his more powerful squadron. He had anchored at Fort Royal, in Martinique, on the 9th December, and it had been his intention to assail Barbadoes. The danger of Santa Lucia compelled him to change his plans. He shipped Bouillé and his troops, and on the 15th made his effort to rescue the island. It proved but feeble. Barrington had placed his seven ships across the mouth of the Cul de Sac, throwing up shore batteries to cover his flanks. If he was wanting in foresight and enterprise, he was stout. D’Estaign behaved as he had done at Sandy Hook, making mere shows of attack, and excusing himself by pleading that the treacherous breezes under the land hampered his movements. They presented real difficulties, but in the opinion of D’Estaign’s best officers he was too easily disconcerted by such obstacles. Bouillé landed with his troops, but failed to shake the hold of the British troops on their positions. Then D’Estaign heard by a privateer that Byron was on his way from North America. Instead of judging as his countryman Mahé de la Bourdonnais had done at Madras, that the approach of relief for his enemy was a reason for making an instant and strenuous effort, he re-embarked the troops on the 28th, and next day anchored at Fort Royal in one of the fits of depression and self-pity which alternated with his outbursts of energy. M. Micoud, the French Governor of Santa Lucia, surrendered on the 30th, he having also nothing else to do, and the island remained with us, to serve as Rodney’s headquarters in the great crisis of the war.