upon the coast of Spain, when I have every reason to believe they will put to sea, as I am told the troops are still embarked.  From Barcelona I shall proceed direct to Rendezvous 98."[90] Accordingly, on the 26th of March he anchored at Palmas, and began at once to clear the transports.  “By the report of the Fleet Captain, I trust [it will be evident that] it could not with propriety be longer deferred.”  Still satisfied that the French were bound to Egypt, he would here be close to their necessary route, and with a lookout ship thirty miles to the westward felt assured they would not escape him.  Four days after he anchored, Villeneuve started on his second venture, and thinking, as Nelson had plotted, that the British fleet was off Cape San Sebastian, he again shaped his course to pass east of the Balearics, between them and Sardinia.  The news of his sailing reached Nelson five days later, on April 4th, at 10 A.M.  He had left Palmas the morning before, and was then twenty miles west of it, beating against a head wind.  The weary work of doubt, inference, and speculation was about to begin once more, and to be protracted for over three months.

In the present gigantic combination of Napoleon, the Brest squadron, as well as those of Rochefort and Toulon, was to go to the West Indies, whence the three should return in mass to the English Channel, to the number of thirty-five French ships-of-the-line.  To these it was hoped to add a number of Spanish ships, from Cartagena and Cadiz.  If the movements were successful, this great force would overpower, or hold in check, the British Channel Fleet, and secure control of the Straits of Dover long enough for the army to cross.  It is with the Toulon squadron that we are immediately concerned, as it alone for the present touches the fortunes of Nelson.  Villeneuve’s orders were to make the best of his way to the Straits of Gibraltar, evading the British fleet, but calling off Cartagena, to pick up any Spanish ships there that might be perfectly ready to join him.  He was not, however, to delay for them on any account, but to push on at once to Cadiz.  This port he was not to enter, but to anchor outside, and there be joined by the “Aigle,” the ship that had so long worried Nelson, and also by six or eight Spanish ships believed to be ready.  As soon as these came out, he was to sail with all speed for Martinique, and there wait forty days for the Brest squadron, if the latter, whose admiral was to be commander-in-chief of the allied fleets, did not appear sooner.  Villeneuve had other contingent instructions, which became inoperative through the persistent pursuit of Nelson.