with the other surviving officers, hauled the ensign down and hailed the _Alcide_ that they had surrendered. A fourth ship, the _Ardent_, was taken about the same time. She was one of Bougainville's squadron, and the only ship of all the French van that, on seeing how things were likely to fare with the commander-in-chief, had turned back to lend him a hand. In so doing she met her fate. The _Ardent_ was intercepted and cut off by the British _Belliqueux_ and the _Prince William_, who brought her to close action, and after a sharp set-to of a quarter of an hour, made her lower her colours. Some English prisoners, taken a few weeks before out of a merchantman prize, happened to be on board, and their red ensign was hoisted in token of surrender. The taking of the _Ardent_ was peculiarly gratifying to the British fleet. In point of fact it was a recapture. The _Ardent_ was a British-built man-of-war which had fallen into the hands of the enemy in very discreditable circumstances earlier in the war. It was this same ship that the Franco-Spanish combined fleet had snapped up, practically without her firing a shot, off Plymouth Sound three years before, when they were parading the English Channel in triumph at the time they compelled the Channel Fleet to retreat before them to Spithead. It was a satisfactory stroke of retaliation, although if it had taken place six weeks earlier it would have been still more satisfactory. Then the Vicomte de Marigny--Charles Rene Louis, of an old Norman family, elder brother to Comte Bernard, the captain of the _Cesar_--the officer who had been the original captor of the _Ardent_, would have been on board. In honour of his capture of a British man-of-war, 'si vaillamment,' Charles de Marigny had been posted to the prize by the King of France's special command, his commission being accompanied by a picture in oils representing his feat, painted at the instance of His Most Christian Majesty, and sent by the King's order to be hung in the cabin of the _Ardent_, with the legend over it: 'Donne par le Roi au brave Vicomte de Marigny.'[41] The Vicomte, unfortunately for the dramatic completeness of the situation, had been sent home with De Grasse's despatch after the capture of St. Kitts, and he had taken the oil-painting with him. Still, though, even without De Marigny, it was a good thing to have the _Ardent_ back under her old flag once more.