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disagreeably situated, insisted that, instead of Sir Robert's departing . in a frigate, as directed, he should at least have the honour of returning in his own ninety-gun ship, ill as it could at this eventful crisis be spared from that station. Thus did the hero willingly hazard a degree of censure from his country, through excess of feeling for Sir Robert Calder; nor is it altogether an extravagant impossibility that, to this generous action, he owed even his owr: death, which the addition of a ship of such force might perhaps have prevented. In writing to the honourable Captain Blackwood a second letter, dated the 14th, soon after Sir Robert Calder's departure, his lordship feelingly says" Sir Robert is gone. Poor fellow! I hope he will get well over the enquiry" What a lesson is here of Christian virtue, left by our incomparable hero for the contemplation and admiration of mankind. It is asserted, on no light authority, that Sir Robert Calder had formerly, rather rashly, advised a court-martial on our hero, for his departure from his commander in chief's orders on the memorable 14th of February; when the great Earl of St. Vincent, with a generous, noble, and dignified disdain, instantly replied"You would, then, try a man for knowing better how to act than yourself."

Shortly before the commencement of the fatal battle of Trafalgar, the author relates, Lord Nelson took leave of the Captain of the Euryalus by saying, "My dear Blackwood, I shall never again speak to you ;" and it may be supposed from all circumstances, that he considered it as probable that his career would be terminated in the approaching combat.

Though we have quarrelled with the profusion and bad taste of the encomiastic expressions employed by this biographer, yet we have always considered Lord Nelson as an eminently great character in his profession; and the more intimately we regard him, in all the various parts of his arduous duties, the more are we disposed to pronounce that he was a wonderful man. His actions and his habits should be the study of every British youth, who is destined for the military profession either on land or at sea; and the present volumes, as affording a near view of him through the medium of his own letters, dispatches, conversation, and actions, form a very interesting and valuable text-book.

We have previously animadverted on the principal faults to be attributed to this piece of biography; and we have now to observe in conclusion that, as a composition, it betrays a material deficiency in having no arrangement nor subdivisions, and is disfigured by many inaccuracies and absurdities of expression. It contains also some errors in matters of fact.Mr. H. speaks of chiefest heroes, and boasts of humility; of persons being presageful, and of anticipatory reflections; of success being acquirable, and of the culture of the plough-share ;

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of the existences of people, and of the fleet passing through the Pharos of Messina; of limitless authority and a limitropic barrer; with many sentences involved in obscurity by ungrammatical construction, or deformed by grammatical violations. In one place, Mr. H. most unfortunately attempts a little Latin, and talks of Genius which is "nascetur, non fit."Among the errors, we find an observation p. 335. Vol. 1. that, after the battle of the Nile, all the Captains received the honour of knighthood. Vol. 2. p. 86. the Lion British man of war, and p. 90. the Minerve, are improperly called Neapolitan. P. 155. Captain Coote occurs for Cooke. P. 288. Captain Foley is mistakingly styled the Honourable; and at the commencement, the birth of the hero is thus incorrectly stated, Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson was born,' &c. In Vol 1. pp. 244. and 252. something is said about Lady Hamilton having procured and communicated a talisman to Nelson, which essentially promoted his operations when at Naples, but which is totally incomprehensible to us, unless the author means the great talismanic engine of corruption, gold. A portrait of Lord Nelson is prefixed to Vol. 1. but no other engraving is given; nor is any table of Contents or Index subjoined.

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ART. XI. Authentic Narrative of the Death of Lord Nelson; with the Circumstances preceding, attending, and subsequent to that Event; the professional Report of his Lordship's Wound, and several interesting Anecdotes. By William Beatty, M.D. Surgeon to the Victory in the Battle of Trafalgar. 8vo. 78. Boards. Cadell and Davies. 1807.

HE first passage that strikes us, in the preparatory part

of this narrative, is an observation made by Lord Nelson respecting General Mack, which decidedly coalesces with sentiments formerly expressed by him, and to which we have referred in our preceding article. When the Agamemnon joined the fleet off Cadiz, and brought newspapers, in one of which was a report that this General was about to be appointed to the command of the Austrian armies in Germany, the Admiral remarked: "I know General Mack too well. He sold the King of Naples; and if he is now entrusted with an important command, he will certainly betray the Austrian monarchy."

On advancing to the conflict which terminated the life of our great commander, we are furnished by Dr. Beatty with a circumstantial detail which is still interesting, but the main parts of which are sufficiently known. The most impressive scene occurs after the fatal wound had been inflicted; and it REV. JULY, 1808.

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is an object of curiosity to contemplate the last moments of the dying chief. That he felt "the ruling passion strong in death" is evident; and his attention to the proceedings of the moment, his anxiety for their successful issue, and his selfgratulation that "he had done his duty," were manifested as leng as his powers remained. These are circumstances of obvious interest in regarding him professionally; and in considering him in his private character, it is equally striking to the historian to observe that almost his first and last thoughts were directed towards Lady Hamilton and his adopted daughter Horatia, (whom in speaking to Dr. Scott he simply called my daughter Horatia,) while not a word of Lady Nelson ever escaped his lips. To this Clergyman also he said, "Doctor, I have not been a great sinner" but no farther reference to his situation, in a moral point of view, appears to have been testified by him. A short time previous to the battle, however, he quitted the deck, and retired to his cabin, where he committed to paper the following prayer; which is in unison with that attention to religious services, and that expression of pious feelings, by which he seems to have been distinguished:

"May the great Gon whom I worship grant to my Country, and for the benefit of Europe in general, a great and glorious victory; and may no misconduct in any one tarnish it, and may humanity after victory be the predominant feature in the British Fleet! For myself individually, I commit my life to Him that made me; and may His blessing alight on my endeavours for serving my Country faithfully! To Him I resign myself, and the just cause which is entrusted to me to defend. Amen, Amen, Amen."

Expressions of a similar import were found in his pocket book, written during his journey from Merton to join his ship:

"Friday Night, 13th September 1804. "Friday night, at half past ten, drove from dear, dear Merton, where I left all which I hold dear in this world, to go to serve my King and Country. May the great Gon whom I adore, enable me to fulfil the expectations of my Country! and if it is His good pleasure that I, should return, my thanks will never cease being offered up to the throne of His mercy. But if it is His good providence to cut short my days upon earth, I bow with the greatest submission; relying that He will protect those, so dear to me, that I may leave behind. His will be done! Amen, amen, amen."

It has been stated that Lord Nelson's health was become so bad, that long life could not have been his portion if he had survived this battle. From Dr. Beatty's report of his examination of the body, however, we learn that the contrary was the fact:

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The writer of this can assert that his Lordship's health was uniformly good, with the exception of some slight attacks of indisposi tion arising from accidental causes; and which never continued above two or three days, nor confined him in any degree with respect to either exercise or regimen *: and during the last twelve months of his life, he complained only three times in this way. It is true, that his Lordship, about the meridian of life, had been subject to frequent fits of the gout: which disease, however, as well as his constitutional, tendency to it, he totally overcame by abstaining for the space of nearly two years from animal food, and wine and all other fermented drink; confining his diet to vegetables, and commonly milk and wa ter. And it is also a fact, that early in life, when he first went to sea, he left off the use of salt, which he then believed to be the sole cause of scurvy, and never took it afterwards with his food.'

The Surgeon had, on the occasion of opening his Lordship's hody, an opportunity of acquiring an accurate knowledge of the sound and healthy state of the thoracic and abdomipal viscera, none of which appeared to have ever been the seat of inflammation or disease. There were no morbid indications to be seen; other than those unavoidably attending the human body six weeks after death, even under circumstances more favourable to its preservation. The heart was small, and dense in its substance; its valves, pericardium, and the large vessels, were sound, and firm in their structure. The lungs were sound, and free from adhesions. The liver was very small, in its colour natural, firm in its texture, and every way free from the smallest appearance of disorganization. The stomach, as well as the spleen and other abdominal contents, was alike free from the traces of disease. Indeed all the vital parts were so perfectly healthy in their appearance, and so small, that they resembled more those of a youth, than of a man who had attained his forty-seventh year; which state of the body, associated with habits of life favourable to health, gives every reason to believe that his Lordship might have lived to a great age.

The immediate cause of his Lordship's death was a wound of the left pulmonary artery, which poured out its blood into the cavity of the chest. The quantity of blood thus effused did not appear to be very great: but as the hemorrhage was from a vessel so near the heart, and the blood was consequently lost in a very short time, it produced death sooner than would have been effected by a larger quantity of blood lost from an artery in a more remote part of the body. The injury done to the spine must of itself have proved mortal, but his Lordship might perhaps have survived this alone for two or three days; though his existence protracted even for that short

• * These complaints were the consequence of indigestion, brought on by writing for several hours together. His Lordship had one of these attacks from that cause a few days before the battle, but on resuming his accustomed exercise he got rid of it. This attack alarmed him, as he attributed it to sudden and violent spasm; but it was merely an unpleasant symptom (globus hystericus) attending indigestion.'

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period would have been miserable to himself, and highly distressing to the feelings of all around him '

Dr. Beatty has illustrated his publication by a portrait of Lord Nelson, and a plate representing the appearance of the fatal ball and the substances adhering to it, after it was extracted from the body.

ART. XII. Captain Foote's Vindication of his Conduct, when Captain of His Majesty's Ship Sea-Horse, and Senior Officer in the Bay of Naples, in the Summer of 1799. 8vo. 18. 6d. Cadelt and Davies. 1807.

CONSIDERABLE notice was excited, though all investigation

seems to have been repressed, by the order of Lord Nelson to annul a treaty which, in June 1799, was executed between the Cardinal Ruffo on the part of his Sicilian Majesty, united with the Russian and Turkish Commanders and Captain Foote as senior British officer, and the Republi can garrisons of the Forts Nuovo and Uovo; and Mr. Harrison, in his memoirs of Lord N., having spoken of this capitulation as infamous, and having printed a private letter of his Lordship in which the same epithet is applied to the transaction, Captain Foote has very properly sent forth the present statement in vindication of the part which he acted.

In May 1799, Lord Nelson, being at Palermo, issued orders for the line of battle ships which had been left at Naples, to join him immediately; and the command of the blockade of that bay, the city being then in possession of the French, devolved on Captain Foote of the Sea-Horse frigate; to whom the orders and instructions previously delivered to Captains Troubridge and Hood were transferred. On the 16th of June, Captain F. writes to his Lordship that he had obtained by capitulation the fortified rock of Revigliano and the important fort of Castel à Mare; and that Naples was restored to the Royalists, with the exception of the Forts of St. Elmo, Nuovo, and Uovo.-In a progressive letter from June 18 to June 20, he states that the two latter forts had been summoned to capitulate; that, on their refusal, attacks had been made on them: but that subsequently the Cardinal had entered into an armistice, which was likely to end in a capitulation. It appears that this capitulation was actually ratified on the 22d inst. and an armistice settled with the commandant of St. Elmo. Captain F.'s correspondence with the Cardinal fully proves that, though his Eminence and the Russians arranged and executed the capitulation without consulting Captain Foote, he discharged the duty of an active and zealous British officer by

protesting

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