La Jonquière, however, would not yet despair. The troops were re-embarked; five hospital ships were devoted to the sick; the “Parfait,” a fifty-gun ship no longer serviceable, was burned, as were several smaller vessels, and on the fourth of October what was left of the fleet sailed out of Chibucto Harbor and steered for Annapolis, piloted by Acadians. The flag of truce from Louisbourg was compelled for a time to bear them company, and Joseph Foster of Beverly, an exchanged prisoner on board of her, deposed that as the fleet held its way, he saw “a great number of dead persons” dropped into the sea every day. Ill-luck still pursued the French. A storm off Cape Sable dispersed the ships, two of which some days later made their way to Annapolis Basin in expectation of finding some of their companions there. They found instead the British fifty-gun ship “Chester” and the Massachusetts frigate “Shirley” anchored before the fort, on which the two Frenchmen retired as they had come; and so ended the last aggressive movement on the part of the great armament. The journalist reports that on the night of the twenty-seventh there was a council of officers on board the “Northumberland,” at which it was resolved that no choice was left but to return to France with the 166 ships that still kept together. On the fourth of November there was another storm, and when it subsided, the “Prince d’Orange” found herself with but nine companions, all of which were transports. These had on board eleven companies of soldiers, of whom their senior officer reports that only ninety-one were in health. The pestilence made such ravages among the crews that four or five corpses were thrown into the sea every day, and there was fear that the vessels would be left helpless in mid-ocean for want of sailors to work them.[188] At last, on the seventh of December, after narrowly escaping an English squadron, they reached Port Louis in Brittany, where several ships of the fleet had arrived before them. Among these was the frigate “La Palme.” “Yesterday,” says the journalist, “I supped with M. Destrahoudal, who commands this frigate; and he told me things which from anybody else would have been incredible. This is his story, exactly as I had it from him.” And he goes on to the following effect.