The newcomers were the powerful fleet fitted out at Brest, and they came under the command of Luc Urbain de Bouëxic, Comte de Guichen, a man of sixty-two, and one of the most interesting figures in the French Navy of the day. He represented at once all that was best in the French _noblesse_ of his generation, its virtues of good breeding, high personal honour, and loyalty—all that was most accomplished in the scientific training of the French naval officer of the eighteenth century, and all that was most fatal in their theories of the conduct of war. No man handled a fleet with more precision or with greater elegance, and no man manœuvred with more dexterity not to injure his opponent, but to baffle that opponent’s attempts to injure him. We shall see why he fairly divided the honours of the coming encounter with Rodney, but it was characteristic of his school, and was its condemnation, that his active career was to end in the Bay of Biscay two years later in failure and discredit, simply through the breakdown of the manœuvring he loved under the direct thrust of Kempenfelt. On the 23rd March he joined Grasse at sea to windward of Martinique. Having now twenty-four sail of the line to Parker’s sixteen, he prepared for the reconquest of Santa Lucia, and appeared to leeward of the island on the 24th. He was not quick or energetic enough to prevent Parker from covering the entry of another convoy of troops from Barbadoes, which came in round the north end of the island, on that day; nor did he intercept Rodney, who joined Parker on the 27th, raising the total British force to twenty-two of the line, and taking up the command.