Rear-Admiral Louis got this intelligence on the 3d of October, and at once returned to the main fleet with his squadron; but Lord Nelson, conceiving the news to be a stratagem to draw him nearer to Cadiz, so as to obtain a knowledge of his force, ordered Louis to proceed in the execution of his orders. On the 4th the weather was very calm, and some Spanish gunboats pulled out from Cadiz and attacked the two English frigates which were on duty close in; but they soon retired again. By the 8th of October two more line-of-battle-ships had joined the English fleet, and the same day the Euryalus again counted thirty-four sail-of-the-line in Cadiz harbor. The possibility that the Cadiz, Carthagena and Rochefort ships might effect a junction, and thereby present a force of forty-six sail-of-the-line, induced Lord Nelson to draw up and transmit to his second in command a plan of attack in which he supposed that, by the junction of a squadron under Sir Richard Strachan, and other ships, from Gibraltar and elsewhere, he might be able to assemble a force of forty sail-of-the-line. His plan was regarded by naval men as a master-piece of naval strategy, and agreed in principle with that pursued in the great battle then impending. Condensed, it was as follows: Taking it for granted that it was next to impossible to form a fleet of forty sail-of-the-line in line of battle, with varying winds, thick weather, and other difficulties which might arise, without so much delay that the opportunity would probably be lost of bringing the enemy to battle in such a manner as to render it decisive, Lord Nelson resolved to keep the fleet in such a position that, with the exception of the first and second in command, the order of sailing would be the order of battle. The fleet was to be placed in two lines, of sixteen ships each, with an advanced squadron of eight of the fastest sailing, two-decked ships, which latter would always make, if wanted, a line of twenty-four sail, on any line the Commander-in-chief might direct. The second in command would, after this latter intention was made known to him, have the entire direction of his line, and was to make the attack, and to follow up the blow, until the enemy’s ships were captured or destroyed. Should the enemy’s fleet--supposed to consist of forty-six sail-of-the-line, be seen to windward, in line of battle, and the two British lines and the advanced squadron be able to fetch it, the ships of the former would probably be so extended that their van could not succor their rear. The English second in command would then probably be signalled to lead through, at about the twelfth ship from the enemy’s rear, or wherever he could fetch, if not able to advance so far. The Commander-in-chief’s line would lead through at the centre, and the advanced squadron cut through at about three or four ships ahead of the centre, so as to ensure getting at the enemy’s Commander-in-chief, whom every effort should be used to capture.