Meanwhile the news that the French were in motion stirred the British Government to counter action. Boscawen was ordered to sail for America with instructions to intercept the French by force. He left on the 27th April, with eleven sail of the line, and two small vessels. After he had gone the cabinet received further reports which gave them an exaggerated idea of the French strength. Admiral Holburne was ordered to follow Boscawen with six sail of the line, and a frigate. He left on the 11th May, and joined his chief on the banks of Newfoundland on the 20th June. But Boscawen had already failed to stop the French. When Dubois de Lamotte approached Newfoundland he divided his squadron and convoy into two. One division was steered to enter St. Lawrence by the Straits of Belleisle, on the north of Newfoundland. The other took the commonly used route to the south between Cape Ray and Cape Breton. Boscawen had stationed himself off Cape Ray. On the 9th June the French were sighted, but the weather was foggy and covered them soon from view. Next day the fog lifted for a space, and three of the French ships were seen. They were the _Alcide_, 64, the _Lys_, armed _en flûte_ with 22 guns, and the _Dauphin Royal_, another of the man-of-war transports. The _Alcide_ was commanded by M. d’Hocquart who had already been twice prisoner of war to Boscawen. In 1744, when he was captain of the _Medée_, 26, he had been taken by the =Dreadnought=. This was Boscawen’s first ship, and from it he got his name of “Old Dreadnought” among the sailors. Again M. d’Hocquart had struck to Boscawen in Anson’s battle of 3rd May 1747. When the English officer commanded the =Namur= and he himself the _Diamant_, M. d’Hocquart’s ill fortune pursued him. The _Alcide_ was overhauled, hailed by Howe in the =Dunkirk=, 60, and told to stop. The French captain asked whether it was peace or war, and was told that he had better prepare for war. D’Hocquart made all the defence he could, but the =Dunkirk= was reinforced by Boscawen’s ship, the =Torbay=, 74, and he became a prisoner for the third time. The _Lys_ was taken by the =Defiance=, and the =Fougueux=. The _Dauphin Royal_ escaped in the fog. No other prizes were taken, so that Dubois de Lamotte carried two fully armed liners, three frigates, and ten transports with their men and stores safe into the French American ports. Boscawen’s expedition was therefore, in the main, a failure. The jail fever was raging in his squadron. It had been manned, according to old custom, in haste on the approach of war, by the press, from the slums and the prisons. Boscawen took his ships to Halifax in the hope of restoring the health of his crews, but with the result that he infected the town. Meanwhile the French commanders, finding the coast clear, sailed for home on the 15th August and reached Brest on the 21st September. Boscawen returned in the autumn, reaching England in November.