seven o'clock in the morning
Greenly obeyed , of course , and he began to think better of audacity in naval warfare , than he had done before , that day . This was the usual course of things with these two officers ; one arguing and deciding according to the dictates of a cool judgment , and the other following his impulses quite as much as any thing else , until facts supervened to prove that human things are as much controlled by adventitious agencies , the results of remote and unseen causes , as by any well-digested plans laid at the moment . In their cooler hours , when they came to reason on the past , the vice-admiral generally consummated his triumphs , by reminding his captain that if he had not been in the way of luck , he never could have profited by it ; no bad creed for a naval officer , who is otherwise prudent and vigilant . The quarter-masters of the fleet were just striking six bells , or proclaiming that it was seven o'clock in the morning watch , as the Plantagenet and _ le Téméraire _ came abeam of each other . Both ships lurched heavily in the troughs of the seas , and both rolled to windward in stately majesty , and yet both slid through the brine with a momentum that resembled the imperceptible motion of a planet . The water rolled back from their black sides and shining hammock-cloths , and all the other dark panoply that distinguishes a ship-of-war glistened with the spray ; but no sign of hostility proceeded from either . The French admiral made no signal to engage , and Sir Gervaise had reasons of his own for wishing to pass the enemy 's van , if possible , unnoticed .