the reflections thereon contained in his letter; and this lack of sincerity is the spirit in which this Officer has always sought, sometimes to deny, and at others to misinterpret the orders given to him, to avoid the carrying out of which he refrained from mentioning them when he called the Council of the Captains. All of these documents I forward to Your Excellency for your full knowledge and my justification; and it is my duty to repeat to you, that when I have erred it has simply been from lack of ability, which I have always insisted was wanting in me for such important matters.
(Signed) Marquez do Lavradio.
No. 25.
OPINIONS of the different Commanding Officers of the Vessels composing the Fleet.
We, the Captains and Commanding Officers, José dos Santos Ferreira, Thomas Stevens, Antonio Januario do Valle, José da Silva Pimentel and D. Francisco Xavier Telles, giving our votes upon the question as to what our Fleet ought to do under its present circumstances, are of opinion that:—
As all the movements which we can, for the present, execute, whether attacking the Spanish Fleet, which is superior to ours, or cruising in sight of it, imply a risk of our inferior Fleet being destroyed, in spite of all
