This at a short distance must have caused great execution. When the Spanish Admiral at last formed his scattered divisions into line, he found the British in equal, if not better, alignment; and each side then drew off, the one to lament, the other to exult, over the events of the day. The Spanish were never accused of a lack of courage, either by sea or on land, and their discomfiture appears to have been caused principally by the worthlessness of the crews which manned their ships. These were composed of pressed landsmen, and soldiers of new levies, with a very few seamen in each ship. It has been reported that these “poor panic-stricken wretches,” when called upon to go aloft, to repair the damaged rigging, fell upon their knees, and cried out that they preferred being sacrificed on the spot to performing a duty where death seemed inevitable from more than one cause. The numerical superiority of their guns seemed little in their favor, for some of the San Josef’s were found with their tompions in, on the side which had been engaged, after the battle was over. Indeed, the numbers on board some of the Spanish ships seem to have been rather a detriment to them. A rather prejudiced writer says that if eight of their twenty-five ships had been left at Carthagena, and had the five or six hundred seamen they probably contained been substituted for twice that number of raw hands, taken from the remaining seventeen ships, the latter would probably have made a better stand; and the victory, if achieved at all, have been at the expense of a much greater number of lives in the British fleet. Whatever the fault of the crews, the officers fought well. “Upon the whole, the victory off Cape St. Vincent, although from its consequences pre-eminently great, from its results, dispassionately considered, cannot be pronounced in an equal degree glorious.” At about 3 P.M. of the 16th the British fleet and the prizes anchored in Lagos Bay. Here the Spanish prisoners, numbering about 3000 men, were landed; and, a receipt being given by the proper authority, were allowed to remain. On the 23d, after riding out a gale of wind with much difficulty, it blowing dead on shore, Sir John Jervis sailed, and in five days the whole were in safety in Lisbon. It was remarked that the prizes, under jury-masts, beat all the English ships in working into the Tagus. Great congratulations and celebrations took place at Lisbon, for the Portuguese had every reason to rejoice at this victory, while in England the news was met with immense enthusiasm. Sir John Jervis was created a peer of Great Britain, by the title of Baron Jervis of Meaford, and Earl of St. Vincent; with a pension of £3000 per annum. Vice-Admiral Thompson and Admiral Parker were created Baronets, and Vice-Admiral the Hon. William Waldegrave was appointed to a lucrative post abroad.