MAY-JULY, 1799. AGE, 40.
The intention of the French to send a fleet into the Mediterranean had transpired some time before, and the motive—to retrieve the destruction of their naval power in that sea by the Battle of the Nile—was so obvious that the attempt was regarded as probable. As far back as the 7th of January, Nelson had written to Commodore Duckworth, commanding the detachment of four ships-of-the-line at Minorca, that he had received notification of the force expected from Brest. If they got into the Mediterranean, he was confident they would go first to Toulon, and he wished to concert beforehand with Duckworth, who was not under his orders, the steps necessary to be taken at once, if the case arose. He did not think, so he wrote to Ball, that they would venture a squadron to Malta or Alexandria, in view of the certain destruction which in the end must befall it, even if successful in reaching the port.
Both remarks show that he did not look for the number of ships that were sent—nineteen, as the first news said, twenty-five, as was actually the case. An emergency so great and so imminent drew out all his latent strength, acute judgment, and promptitude. The brig that brought the news was sent off the same night to Naples, with orders to proceed from there to Minorca and Gibraltar, and to notify Duckworth and St. Vincent what Nelson intended to do. A cutter sailed at the same time for Malta. Troubridge and Ball were both directed to send or bring all their ships-of-the-line, save one each, to Minorca, there to unite with Duckworth. Troubridge's ships were to call off Palermo for further instructions, but not to lose time by coming to anchor there. Expresses were sent to the different ports of Sicily, in case any Russian or Turkish ships had arrived, to put them on their guard, and to request co-operation by joining the force assembling off Minorca, where Nelson reasoned Lord St. Vincent also would repair. To the latter he wrote: "Eight, nine, or ten sail of the line shall, in a few days, be off Mahon, ready to obey your orders (not in the port);" for his intention was that they should remain outside under sail. "You may depend upon my exertion, and I am only sorry that I cannot move[81] to your help, but this island appears to hang on my stay. Nothing could console the Queen this night, but my promise not to leave them unless the battle was to be fought off Sardinia."
The next day he wrote again in similar terms, seeking to reconcile his promise to the Queen with his impulses, and, it may be said safely, with his duty. "Should you come upwards without a battle, I hope in that case you will afford me an opportunity of joining you; for my heart would break to be near my commander-in-chief, and not assisting him at such a time. What a state I am in! If I go, I risk, and more than risk, Sicily, and what is now safe on the Continent; for we know, from experience, that more depends on opinion than on acts themselves. As I stay, my heart is breaking; and, to mend the matter, I am seriously unwell."
That evening, the 13th, at nine o'clock, a lieutenant arrived, who had been landed to the westward of Palermo by a sloop-of-war, the "Peterel," she not being able to beat up to the city against the east wind prevailing. From him Nelson learned that the French fleet had passed the Straits, and had been seen off Minorca. The next day, the "Peterel" having come off the port, he went alongside, and sent her on at once to Malta, with orders to Ball to abandon the blockade, bringing with him all his ships, and to proceed off Maritimo, a small island twenty miles west of Sicily, where he now proposed to concentrate his squadron and to go himself. Troubridge, having already orders to come to Palermo, needed no further instructions, except to bring all his ships, instead of leaving one at Naples. Every ship-of-the-line in the squadron, including the Portuguese, was thus summoned to join the Flag, in a position to cover Palermo and the approaches to the eastern Mediterranean. To these necessary dispositions was owing that the senior officer left at Naples was Captain Foote, who afterwards signed the articles of capitulation with the insurgents, which gave such offence to Nelson, and have occasioned much controversy in connection with his subsequent action.
Troubridge, having sailed at once on receipt of his first orders, arrived on the 17th with three British ships and one Portuguese. A heavy gale prevented Nelson getting to sea till the 20th, when he sailed, and was joined the next morning by the fourth ship from Naples. The same day came a Portuguese corvette from Gibraltar and Mahon, with letters from St. Vincent and Duckworth. The former announced that the French had passed the Straits, and that he was about to start in pursuit. Duckworth, who also was asked to join off Maritimo, declined to do so, saying that he must await the commander-in-chief. Nelson had of course immediately communicated to the latter his change of plan. He hoped to collect ten sail-of-the-line, which, "if Duckworth reinforce me, will enable me to look the enemy in the face"—fourteen ships to nineteen; "but should any of the Russians or Turks be off Malta, I hope to get a force of different nations equal to the enemy, when not a moment shall be lost in bringing them to battle."
On the 23d of May he was off Maritimo with seven ships, Ball not having joined yet. His spirits were fast rising, as in thought he drew near the enemy. "Duckworth means to leave me to my fate," he wrote to Lady Hamilton. "Never mind; if I can get eleven sail together, they shall not hurt me." "I am under no apprehension for the safety of his Majesty's squadron," he said in a circular letter to his scattered vessels, designed to heighten their ardor; "on the contrary, from the very high state of discipline of the ships, I am confident, should the enemy force us to battle, that we shall cut a very respectable figure; and if Admiral Duckworth joins, not one moment shall be lost in my attacking the enemy." It must be mentioned that St. Vincent had expressed his opinion that the French were bound for Malta and Alexandria, and Nelson, when he wrote these words, was hourly expecting to see their sails appear on the horizon. He did not know yet, however, that they were twenty-five, instead of nineteen, of the line. To St. Vincent he expressed himself with the sober, dauntless resolution of a consummate warrior, who recognized that opportunities must be seized, and detachments, if need be, sacrificed, for the furtherance of a great common object. "Your Lordship may depend that the squadron under my command shall never fall into the hands of the enemy; and before we are destroyed, I have little doubt but the enemy will have their wings so completely clipped that they may be easily overtaken"—by you. In this temper he waited. It is this clear perception of the utility of his contemplated grapple with superior numbers, and not the headlong valor and instinct for fighting that unquestionably distinguished him, which constitutes the excellence of Nelson's genius. This it was which guided him in the great Trafalgar campaign, and the lack of which betrayed Villeneuve at the same period to his wretched shortcomings. Yet, as has before been remarked, mere insight, however accurate and penetrating, ends only in itself, or at best falls far short of the mark, unless accompanied by Nelson's great power of disregarding contingencies—an inspired blindness, which at the moment of decisive action sees, not the risks, but the one only road to possible victory.
Whilst thus expecting an engagement which, from the disparity of numbers, could be nothing short of desperate, he drew up a codicil to his will, making to Lady Hamilton a bequest, in terms that show how complete were the infatuation and idealization now in possession of his mind: "I give and bequeath to my dear friend, Emma Hamilton, wife of the Right Hon. Sir William Hamilton, a nearly round box set with diamonds, said to have been sent me by the mother of the Grand Signor, which I request she will accept (and never part from) as token of regard and respect for her very eminent virtues (for she, the said Emma Hamilton, possesses them all to such a degree that it would be doing her injustice was any particular one to be mentioned) from her faithful and affectionate friend." During this short cruise he wrote her almost daily, and at some length, in addition to the more official communications addressed to Hamilton. At this same period he was excusing himself to his wife for the shortness and infrequency of his letters: "Pray attribute it to the true cause—viz., that in truth my poor hand cannot execute what my head tells me I ought to do."
On the 28th of May Nelson received letters from St. Vincent, dated the 21st, off Minorca, which put him in possession of the movements of the enemy up to that date. The French fleet, under the command of Admiral Bruix, had appeared on the 4th of the month off Cadiz. It was then blowing a half-gale of wind, and the French admiral did not care, under that condition, to engage the fifteen British ships-of-the-line which were cruising off the harbor, under Lord Keith, who had come out from England the previous autumn to be St. Vincent's second in command. The intended junction with the Spanish squadron in Cadiz being thus thwarted, Bruix passed the Straits on the 5th, and Lord St. Vincent, having recalled Keith, followed on the 12th with sixteen ships. On the 20th he joined Duckworth, and learned that the enemy, when last seen, were heading for Toulon. Keith's removal had uncovered Cadiz, and St. Vincent fully expected that the Spanish fleet would leave there for the Mediterranean, which it did, and on the 20th entered Cartagena, to the number of seventeen of the line, but much crippled from a stormy passage. This Nelson did not yet know, nor that Bruix had reached Toulon on the 14th of May, and sailed again on the 26th for the eastward.
Satisfied that the enemy would not at once come his way, and knowing that a vessel had passed up the Mediterranean from St. Vincent to put Sidney Smith on his guard, Nelson ordered Ball to resume the blockade of Malta with two ships-of-the-line. The rest of his squadron he kept massed, and took to Palermo, where he arrived May 29th. Lookout ships were stationed off the north end of Corsica and west of Sardinia. "My reason for remaining in Sicily," he wrote St. Vincent, "is the covering the blockade of Naples, and the certainty of preserving Sicily in case of an attack, for if we were to withdraw our ships, it would throw such a damp on the people that I am sure there would be no resistance."