The admiral had all the qualities necessary for success and one gift more—that of complete and invariable good fortune. He was to concentrate either off the Panama Canal or the islets known as the Abrolhos Rocks far down towards Rio, according as he could best guess at Spee’s intentions. He guessed right, and chose the latter rendezvous, where, on the 26th, he met Admiral Stoddart with the _Carnarvon_, _Cornwall_, _Defence_, _Kent_, _Bristol_, and _Orama_. [Illustration: Battle of the Falkland Islands—December 8. First Phase—8 a.m.] On the same day, as it happened, Spee was moving south from St. Quentin Bay for an attack upon the Falklands, and Sturdee was receiving final orders to base himself upon the Falklands and search for Spee round the Horn. The meeting was therefore certain; but the fate of Port Stanley depended on the race between the two opposing squadrons. Fortune again favoured Sturdee: he was delayed at first by false reports, but Spee lost four full days in capturing and plundering a British collier. When he appeared off the Falklands in the early morning of the 8th December, Sturdee had already been nearly eighteen hours in harbour, and his ships had been busily coaling all night. When Spee was sighted from Port Stanley his arrival was a surprise to the British squadron. The battle-cruisers had not yet received their full supply of coal. But their oil supply was untouched, and by the admiral’s foresight steam had been ordered at half an hour’s notice for the _Kent_ and the _Inflexible_, and at two hours’ for the rest. The signal to prepare to weigh and to raise steam was made at 8.14 a.m. The _Gneisenau_ and the _Nürnberg_, after sheering off at a couple of salvos from the _Canopus_, came on again at 9.30 to attack the _Kent_ and the _Glasgow_, who were already on guard outside the harbour. The German ships were immediately recalled—their admiral may not have known yet that the battle-cruisers were there; but the report he received convinced him that he was in the presence of a superior force, and must therefore avoid action if possible, in accordance with German naval orders or tradition. He was a brave and chivalrous commander, and it was his misfortune that he was not at liberty to stand in to the harbour mouth and fight his enemy at close range while the squadron was coming out ship by ship. His own armour was superior to that of the battle-cruisers, and his guns were effective up to 13,000 yards; he could not have avoided destruction, but he could certainly have inflicted serious damage.