your commanders play false,” he said, “overboard with them, and with myself the first.”  There was no defection.  There was no slackness.  Carter was the first who broke the French line.  He was struck by a splinter of one of his own yard arms, and fell dying on the deck.  He would not be carried below.  He would not let go his sword.  “Fight the ship,” were his last words:  “fight the ship as long as she can swim.”  The battle lasted till four in the afternoon.  The roar of the guns was distinctly heard more than twenty miles off by the army which was encamped on the coast of Normandy.  During the earlier part of the day the wind was favourable to the French; they were opposed to half of the allied fleet; and against that half they maintained the conflict with their usual courage and with more than their usual seamanship.  After a hard and doubtful fight of five hours, Tourville thought that enough had been done to maintain the honour of the white flag, and began to draw off.  But by this time the wind had veered, and was with the allies.  They were now able to avail themselves of their great superiority of force.  They came on fast.  The retreat of the French became a flight.  Tourville fought his own ship desperately.  She was named, in allusion to Lewis’s favourite emblem, the Royal Sun, and was widely renowned as the finest vessel in the world.  It was reported among the English sailors that she was adorned with an image of the Great King, and that he appeared there, as he appeared in the Place of Victories, with vanquished nations in chains beneath his feet.  The gallant ship, surrounded by enemies, lay like a great fortress on the sea, scattering death on every side from her hundred and four portholes.  She was so formidably manned that all attempts to board her failed.  Long after sunset, she got clear of her assailants, and, with all her scuppers spouting blood, made for the coast of Normandy.  She had suffered so much that Tourville hastily removed his flag to a ship of ninety guns which was named the Ambitious.  By this time his fleet was scattered far over the sea.  About twenty of his smallest ships made their escape by a road which was too perilous for any courage but the courage of despair.  In the double darkness of night and of a thick sea fog, they ran, with all their sails spread, through the boiling waves and treacherous rocks of the Race of Alderney, and, by a strange good fortune, arrived without a single disaster at Saint Maloes.  The pursuers did not venture to follow the fugitives into that terrible strait, the place of innumerable shipwrecks.267

Those French vessels which were too bulky to venture into the Race of Alderney fled to the havens of the Cotentin.  The Royal Sun and two other three deckers reached Cherburg in safety.  The Ambitious, with twelve other ships, all first rates or second rates, took refuge in the Bay of La Hogue, close to the headquarters of the army of James.