NELSON, OUR STEERSMAN, DROWNED.
We were grieved to hear that Nelson, whom I have more than once referred to as an able helmsman, fell from a boat in the harbor of New York a short time after we arrived, and was drowned. The report which we received of the event conveyed an intimation that he had been drinking too freely. He certainly had marks of genius, showing itself in the way in which he made the ship toss the waves from the bows. It was a pleasure, when he was steering, to go forward and climb into the knight heads, and lean over and feel by the way in which the ship went through the water that Nelson was driving her. To be there was as pleasurable as it ever can be to any one to sit by the side of Mr. Bonner, with a cigar in one’s mouth, while he is driving “Fashion.” A great swell coming toward you, looking every moment as though it would overflow the deck, Nelson sees, draws in his nigh rein, runs the ship into it as though he would say, Why leap ye, ye high hills? for now he is on the top of one of them and not a drop has reached the deck; though they are the mighty waves of the sea he seems to sport with them. He fell by strong drink; the great wave overtook him which has engulphed so many; he died ignobly in smooth water, not in battle, hand to hand with a tempest.