Answer During Examination
If I recall it goes something like:
"Wind blowing North by Northeast, Dover off the lee and the wind goes changes and goes aback 4 degrees, what do you do"?
Horatio does not get the time to answer before the other Admiral says, "by this time you are dismasted" and then Foster confirms this.
From what I think the answer would be that since the ship is dismasted, the best course would be use the current boat wind available and steer towards the cliffs and into the wind to stop the ship. Though the wind has changed only 4 degrees with the masts and sails down it would slow the ship down as well as going into the wind and perhaps into the dead area below the cliffs and as long as the wind does not change from north to south there should be less danger of hitting the cliffs. Then I would drop anchor. But of course none of this may occur without first taking care of the mess on the deck of the masts and sails in the water. If the sails were in the water this would be of paramount importance to remove these first, but if they did not sink the boat they would slow it down.
I suppose that is the answer I would give. The answer changes once dismasted.