windward of Grenada for any other fleet. Nelson, however, with skill and exertions never exceeded and almost unexampled, bore for that island.

Advices met him on the way, that the combined fleets, having captured the Diamond Rock, were then at Martinique on the 4th, and were expected to sail that night for the attack of Granada. On the 9th Nelson arrived off that island, and there learned that they had passed to leeward of Antigua the preceding day, and taken a homewardbound convoy. Had it not been for false information, upon which Nelson had acted reluctantly and in opposition to his own judgment, he would have been off Port Royal just as they were leaving it, and the battle would have been fought on the spot where Rodney defeated De Grasse. This he remembered in his vexation; but he had saved the colonies and above two hundred ships laden for Europe, which would else have fallen into the enemy's hands, and he had the satisfaction of knowing that the mere terror of his name had effected this, and had put to flight the allied enemies, whose force nearly doubled that before which they fled. That they were flying back to Europe he believed, and for Europe he steered in pursuit on the 13th, having disembarked the troops at Antigua, and taking with him the Spartiate, 74, the only addition to the squadron with which he was pursuing so superior a force. Five days afterwards, the Amazon brought intelligence that she had spoke a schooner who had seen them, on the evening of the 15th, steering to the north, and by computation eighty-seven leagues off. Nelson's diary at this time denotes his great anxiety and his perpetual and all-observing vigilance:"June 21, midnight.-Nearly calm; saw three planks, which I think came from the French fleet. Very miserable, which is very foolish." On the 17th of July he came in sight of Cape St. Vincent, and steered for Gibraltar. "June 18th," his diary says, "Cape Spartel in sight, but no French fleet, nor any information about them.

How sorrowful this makes me, but I cannot help myself." The next day he anchored at Gibraltar, and on the 20th, says he, "I went on shore for the first time since June 16th 1803; and from having my foot out of the Victory, two years, wanting ten days."

Here he communicated with his old friend Collingwood, who, having been detached with a squadron when the disappearance of the combined fleets and of Nelson in their pursuit was known in England, had taken his station off Cadiz. He thought that Ireland was the enemy's ultimate object; that they would now liberate the Ferrol squadron, which was blocked up by Sir Robert Calder, call for the Rochefort ships, and then appear off Ushant with three or four and thirty sail, there to be joined by the Brest fleet. With this great force he supposed they would make for Ireland, the real mark and bent of all their operations; and their flight to the West Indies, he thought, had been merely undertaken to take off Nelson's force, which was the great impediment to their undertaking.

Collingwood was gifted with great political penetration. As yet, however, all was conjecture concerning the enemy, and Nelson having victualled and watered at Tetuan, stood for Ceuta on the 24th, still without information of their course. Next day intelligence arrived that the Curieux brig had seen them on the 19th standing to the northward. He proceeded off Cape St. Vincent, rather cruising for intelligence than knowing whither to betake himself, and here a case occurred that, more than any other event in real history, resembles those whimsical proofs of sagacity which Voltaire, in his "Zadig," has borrowed from the Orientals. One of our frigates spoke an American, who, a little to the westward of the Azores, had fallen in with an armed vessel, appearing to be a dismasted privateer, deserted by her crew, which had been run on board by another ship, and had been set fire to, but the fire had gone A log-book and a few seamen's jackets were found in

out.

the cabin, and these were brought to Nelson. The logbook closed with these words: "Two large vessels in the W.N.W. ;" and this led him to conclude that the vessel had been an English privateer cruising off the Western Islands. But there was in this book a scrap of dirty paper filled with figures. Nelson, immediately upon seeing it, observed that the figures were written by a Frenchman, and after studying this for a while, said: "I can explain the whole. The jackets are of French manufacture, and prove that the privateer was in possession of the enemy. She had been chased and taken by the two ships that were seen in the W.N.W. The prize-master, going on board in a hurry, forgot to take with him his reckoning; there is none in the log-book, and the dirty paper contains her work for the number of days since the privateer last left Corvo, with an unaccounted-for run, which I take to have been the chase, in his endeavour to find out her situation by back-reckonings. By some mismanagement, I conclude, she was run on board of by one of the enemy's ships, and dismasted. Not liking delay (for I am satisfied that those two ships. were the advanced ones of the French squadron), and fancying we were close at their heels, they set fire to the vessel, and abandoned her in a hurry. If this explanation be correct, I infer from it that they are gone more to the northward, and more to the northward I will look for them." This course accordingly he held, but still without success. Still persevering and still disappointed, he returned near enough to Cadiz to ascertain that they were not there, traversed the Bay of Biscay, and then, as a last hope, stood over for the north-west coast of Ireland, against adverse winds, till on the evening of the 12th of August he learned. that they had not been heard of there. Frustrated thus in all his hopes, after a pursuit to which, for its extent, rapidity, and perseverance, no parallel can be produced, he judged it best to reinforce the Channel Fleet with his squadron, lest the enemy, as Collingwood apprehended, should bear down.

upon Brest with their whole collected force.

On the 15th he joined Admiral Cornwallis off Ushant. No news had yet been obtained of the enemy, and on the same evening he received orders to proceed with the Victory and Superb to Portsmouth.

CHAPTER IX.

Sir Robert Calder's Action-Villeneuve's fleet gets into Cadiz-General approval of Nelson's conduct-His life at Merton-His anxiety regarding the combined fleets-Offers his services, and is re-appointed to the command in the Mediterranean-His departure from Portsmouth-Popular demonstrations of attachment to him-Arrives off Cadiz-Reception of him by the Fleet-Villeneuve puts to seaNelson's plan of attack-His last appeal on behalf of Lady Hamilton-Judicious dispositions of Villeneuve-Nelson's celebrated signal --Battle of Trafalgar—Breaking the enemy's line—Nelson receives his death-wound-His last moments--Capture of the Redoubta'le, from which the fatal shot was fired-Results of the battle-Honours conferred on Nelson's memory-Conclusion.

AT Portsmouth Nelson at length found news of the combined fleets. Sir Robert Calder, who had been sent out to intercept their return, had fallen in with them, on the 22nd of July, sixty leagues west of Cape Finisterre. Their force consisted of twenty sail of the line, three fifty-gun ships, five frigates, and two brigs; his, of fifteen line-of-battle ships, two frigates, a cutter, and a lugger. After an action. of four hours he had captured an eighty-four and a seventyfour, and then thought it necessary to bring-to the squadron for the purpose of securing their prizes. The hostile fleets remained in sight of each other till the 26th, when the enemy bore away. The capture of two ships from so superior a force would have been considered as no inconsiderable victory a few years earlier, but Nelson had introduced a new era in our naval history, and the nation felt respecting this action as he had felt on a somewhat similar occasion. They regretted that Nelson, with his eleven