Walker, he says, "fought and commanded with a calmness almost peculiar to himself"; and his high example conduced to order and discipline even in the thickest of the fight. When the mainsail was set on fire he ordered some hands aloft to extinguish it, and when another man was somewhat officiously following, he called him down. "I have sent men enough aloft for the business, in my opinion; if they fail in their duty, I'll send for you"; such an episode, in the thick of a terrible engagement, is significant, indeed, of calmness and absolute self-possession, which is heroic in its measure. The action was fought, we are told, so close under Cape St. Vincent that the castle on the Cape repeatedly fired upon the combatants, "as a neutral power commanding peace"; in other words, as a protest against the action being fought in Portuguese waters, within gunshot of the coast. By half-past ten the _Prince Frederick_ came up to the assistance of her consort. At this time the _King George_ had received so much damage aloft, that there was no choice but to remain, for she could not have run away. "All our braces and maintopsail yard were shot away, the foremast quite disabled, and the mainmast damaged. We could not work our ship, and bravery became now a virtue of necessity." There was no mention of striking the colours, however; and half an hour later the _Glorioso_ desisted from action, and retired from the field. When, at daybreak, Captain Dottin, of the _Prince Frederick_, came on board, his first inquiry was as to whether the commodore was alive; then, seeing the ship's company so nearly intact, and his friends among the officers unhurt, he embraced the gallant commodore in the enthusiasm of his joy and admiration. Despatching the _Prince Frederick_, with the _Duke_ and _Prince George_, in pursuit of the enemy, Walker set to work to refit; and then a fresh alarm arose, for a large sail was seen approaching from the eastward. She proved, however, to be a friend, the _Russell_, an 80-gun ship, and Walker lost no time in acquainting her captain with the state of affairs. Helpless in his dismantled vessel, Walker watched with his glass the progress of the chase, his own three vessels nearing the Spaniard, with the giant _Russell_ crowding sail to join them; but he could not account for a fourth vessel which now seemed to be in the fight. The headmost ship, apparently the _Prince Frederick_, now engaged the Spaniard hotly, and Walker, speaking his thoughts aloud to his officers, deplored her captain's unwariness in not waiting for the others to come up; for Dottin was blazing away for all he was worth, and Walker's experience immediately suggested a new danger. "Dottin will fire away all his cartridges at too great a distance, and afterwards be obliged to load with loose powder, by which some fatal accident may happen."