Our second in command was Sir John Stuart, whom I saw for the first time. The best and bravest could not have chosen fitter company than every one of these. Sir James Craig and Sir John Stuart were of great experience and superior rank. Sir John Stuart had served long at Gibraltar; Sir James Craig everywhere. The rest might be called equals, for in youth, inexperience, and rank they were about equal, but of the whole party I was the junior officer.
Two excellent vessels, a ship and a brig, were appointed for our accommodation, and some of us were allotted to the ship and some to the brig.
Each party now addressed itself to the important task of laying in a comfortable sea stock, and the two ships agreed, as opportunity should occur, that they would interchange fresh meat on the voyage.
For our part we provided several sheep and pigs, a milch goat, and a great many ducks and fowls, with hay and grain for their provender, a prodigious quantity of eggs and potatoes, butter, cheese, and lard, of pickles, sauces, spices, portable soup, white and brown maccaroni, vermicelli, and celery seed, with a variety of other stores, but particularly a great stock of bottled porter, a barrel of ale, and a pretty allowance of wine and spirits.
The procuring and embarking of all these various things, animate and inanimate, fell in equal portions to Lewis and myself. It was no light task, but neither was it bad fun. Lewis was a pleasant, lively, and most efficient colleague; many a voyage did we make to Spithead; many an hour did we spend on board to see proper accommodation prepared for our live stock, and to place our stores out of the reach of damage or of breakage.
The general obligation of such provisioning makes the streets of Portsmouth like a rabbit-warren, the scarlet purchasers popping in and out of the shop doors incessantly in long succession.
Between two and three weeks passed over not unpleasantly, for letters and various accidents had extended my acquaintance amongst the staff of the army, and tended to wear off any feeling of strangeness.
The general impression was that Malta was our destination in the first instance, as indeed it was known that we were charged with despatches for that island.
On the 18th of April 1805 we set sail—a numerous fleet of transports under the convoy of the Queen, a three-decker, having the Commander of the Forces on board and his staff, and the Dragon, a seventy-four, carrying Sir John Stuart, the second in command, and his staff.
The army was supposed to be from 8000 to 10,000 strong, accompanied as well by four companies of artillery, and a prodigal supply of all warlike stores.