By &c &c.

The present appointment of the Experiment being to prevent the Rebels from obstructing the passage of the Chevaux de Frize, or Sunk-frames, at Billingsport; it is necessary that you continue on that Service as long as from the state of the Weather you may judge to be practicable, or until the Ships allowed to Sail from this Port till the 24^th Instant shall have passed by; You are then hereby required to proceed down towards the Capes of the Delaware, to prevent the Rebels from getting Supplies into any of the lower parts of the River; and to prevent Ships and Vessels from attempting to come up to the Town whilst you judge that Navigation to be impracticable.

When the Season of the Year shall be still more advanced, and it appears to You necessary for the safety of the Ship to quit the Delaware entirely, You are then to Cruize off of Egg Harbour, and along the Coast to the Southward at such distances from the Shore as circumstances and the Weather will allow of; or as you may judge most proper for the purpose of intercepting any of the Enemys Armed Vessels, or the Trade (which from Information) the Rebels intend and expect to carry on during the Winter Months, in the different Inlets, between Chesepeak Bay, and the Delaware.

And whereas Intelligence has been received that a Dutch Ship is now laoding at S^t. Eustatius, which is intended for little Egg-Harbour, and is expected to arrive there about the 10^th. January, the Cruizing off that Port, when the Weather allows you no longer to remain with Safety in the Delaware, is, therefore, to be the first Object of your attention.

As soon as the Season of the Year will admit of your laying with safety within the Capes of the Delaware, which will be towards the latter end of February, the River being by that time allways clear of the Ice, it is material that you use your best endeavors to attain the Anchorage between the Brown and Brandy Wine Sands, giving me the earliest account of possible of your arrival, and wait there until you are releaved by one of the Frigates from hence, or until You shall receive further Orders.

In case you should meet with any Ships at Sea, that have Dispatches for the Admiral, or have Orders to join the Fleet in America; You are to acquaint them His Lordships Rendezvous is Rhode Island, until about the middle of March; after that time in the River Delaware.

The Several Chevaux de Frize Pilots ordered to the Experiment are to be put onboard any of His Majestys Ships that you may meet with bound hither in the Spring of the Year, but no Merchant Ship unless sufficiently Armed is to be permitted to come up the River until you shall have ascertained that the Passages of the Chevaux de Frize, has not been further obstructed by the Enemy during the absence of the Men of War.

The Admiral judging it necessary to cause an alteration to be made in the Monthly Change of Signals established for the purpose of the Ships under his Lordship's Command to know each at meeting, You will please to take notice that those Signals intended for the months of March and September are now to be used instead of those for January and July as is expressed below, and that the Alteration is to take place the 1^st. of January next.¹

Given &c. [on board the Roebuck at Philadelphia, 9 December 1777]