Then a dash of water as masts and spars fall from an immense height, and in the room of the floating, licking tiger-lily is a chasm of yellow and red whirling eddies. The guns start firing again.
Foot after foot across the sky goes the moon, with her train of swirling silver-blue stars.
The day is fair. In the clear Egyptian air, the water of Aboukir Bay is as blue as the bottom flowers of a larkspur spray. The shoals are green with a white metal sheen, and between its sand-bars the Nile can be seen, slowly rolling out to sea.
The Admiral's head is bound up, and his eye is bloodshot and very red, but he is sitting at his desk writing, for all that. Through the stern windows is the blue of the sea, and reflections dance waveringly on his paper. This is what he has written:
"VANGUARD. MOUTH OF THE NILE.
August 8th, 1798.
MY DEAR SIR—
Almighty God has made me the happy instrument in destroying the enemy's fleet; which, I hope, will be a blessing to Europe... I hope there will be no difficulty in our getting refitted at Naples...
Your most obliged and affectionate
HORATIO NELSON."
Dance, little reflections of blue water, dance, while there is yet time.
IV
NAPLES