The spring came.

The merchants loudly complained that they had already lost more by delay than they could hope to gain by the most successful voyage; and still the ships of war were not half manned or half provisioned.

The Amsterdam squadron did not arrive on our coast till late in April; the Zealand squadron not till the middle of May.

[453] It was June before the immense fleet, near five hundred sail, lost sight of the cliffs of England.
Tourville was already on the sea, and was steering southward.

But Killegrew and Delaval were so negligent or so unfortunate that they had no intelligence of his movements.