When the tidings of a French occupancy of Florida startled the Spanish Court, a second attempt of the Huguenots at settlement had been made,—this time at the mouth of St. John’s River, where Fort Caroline was a direct menace to the rich Spanish fleets, offering a safe refuge to cruisers, which in the name of a pure gospel could sally out to plunder and to slay. Yet that settlement, thus provoking the fiercest hostility of Spain, was ill-managed. It was, in fact, sinking, like its predecessor, from the unfitness of its members to make the teeming earth yield them its fruits for their maintenance. René Laudonnière, the commandant, after receiving some temporary relief from the English corsair Hawkins,[883] and learning that the Spaniards meditated hostilities, was about to burn his fort and abandon the country, when John Ribault arrived as commandant, with supplies and colonists, as well as orders to maintain the post. His instructions from Coligny clearly intended that he should attack the Spaniards.[884] The two bitter antagonists, each stimulated by his superiors, were thus racing across the Atlantic, each endeavoring to outstrip the other, so as to be able first to assume the offensive. The struggle was to be a deadly one, for on neither side were there any of the ordinary restraints; it was to be a warfare without mercy. After leaving the Canaries, Menendez’ fleet was scattered by storms. One vessel put back; the flagship and another were driven in one direction, five vessels in another. These, after encountering another storm, finally reached Porto Rico on the 9th of August, and found the flagship and its tender there.[885] The other ships from Biscay and Asturias had not arrived; but Menendez, fearing that Ribault might outstrip him, resolved to proceed, though his vessels needed repairs from the injuries sustained in the storm. If he was to crush Fort Caroline, he felt that it must be done before the French post was reinforced; if not, all the force at his disposal would be insufficient to assume the offensive. He made the coast of Florida near Cape Cañaveral on the 25th of August; and soon after, by landing a party, ascertained from the natives that the French post was to the northward. Following the coast in that direction, he discovered, on the 28th, a harbor which seemed to possess advantages, and to which he gave the name of the great Bishop of Hippo, Augustine, who is honored on that day. Sailing on cautiously, he came in sight of the mouth of the St. John’s River about two o’clock in the afternoon of the 4th of September. The ten days he had lost creeping along the coast were fatal to his project, for there lay the four vessels of Ribault, the flagship and its consort flinging to the breeze the colors of France.