In this dilemma the court of Spain applied to Louis XV.
and obtained an order for the French fleet, under the command of Admiral de Court,--an old man of eighty years, a veteran of the days of Louis XIV.,--to escort the Spaniards either to the Gulf of Genoa or to their own ports, it does not clearly appear which.

The French admiral was ordered not to fire unless he was attacked.

In order to secure the best co-operation of the Spaniards, whose efficiency he probably distrusted, De Court proposed, as Ruyter had done in days long gone by, to scatter their ships among his own; but as the Spanish admiral, Navarro, refused, the line-of-battle was formed with nine French ships in the van, in the centre six French and three Spaniards, in the rear nine Spanish ships; in all, twenty-seven.

In this order the combined fleets sailed from Toulon February 19, 1744.

The English fleet, which had been cruising off Hyeres in observation, chased, and on the 22d its van and centre came up with the allies; but the rear division was then several miles to windward and astern, quite out of supporting distance (Plate VII., r).