The most affecting part, for us of the fleet, was the feeling that it was our duty to stand by until the matter with Josiah was settled. The Admiral hated shirking an ordeal above everything in the world. It was to him a form of cowardice, which he called the root of all evil. He himself was absolutely undeterred by risk or responsibility.
“Madam,” said the Admiral, “I fear that I must leave this hospitable home to-night.” This we heard with our own ears before we left to follow the two Captains and the struggling Josiah to the grand stairway, where a look from Captain Troubridge’s eye told us that we should go no further.
What happened after this was, of course, known only to the Admiral and Lady Hamilton, seeing that ordinary manners prompted the withdrawal of all spectators from the ante-room in which this deplorable incident took place. For occasions like this I shall quote from the Admiral’s Journal, which came into Will’s hands under such extraordinary circumstances. I cannot vouch for its authenticity, coming through such hands; but Mrs. Hunter certainly seemed to us three witnesses to be giving a truthful account. And as I have said, to us who knew the Admiral so well—his temperament, his habits, his mode of expressing himself, and the turns of his handwriting—the Journal presented every outward evidence of being genuine, though to Will it seemed well-nigh impossible that the Admiral should have filled three such bulky volumes without his ever having occasion to suspect their existence.
Extract from the Admiral’s Journal, dated Sept. 30th, 1798.
“I take up my pen as the only object to which I can make confession. Heretofore my confidante has been Lady Nelson. Since our marriage I have written to her in the fullest and freest manner upon all matters personal to me; but something prompts me not to vex her with the matter. She is the best creature in the world; but her mind is of the slower kind which does not, at a glance, distinguish between what is essential or merely accidental. She would have made no commander, though she could have been trusted to defend her post till Death.
“A most unfortunate occurrence happened last night. My stepson, Josiah Nisbet, of whom I had written to his mother when we were in Naples before, to say that Lady Hamilton had been so wonderfully kind and fond of him, introducing him to all manner of exalted people, and taking him everywhere as her escort in her carriage, chose to make an extraordinary exhibition of himself last night. The young man had been supping with his messmates at a ball Sir William and Lady Hamilton had given in my honour; and he had, I doubt not, partaken too freely of the potent South Italian wines. He was decidedly unsteady, when perceiving me, as he returned from the supper-room, sitting by Lady H., in the presence of others, he reeled up to us, applying the grossest epithets to her Ladyship, and insinuating that relations existed between us incompatible with my character as a gentleman.
“I have no reason for stifling the truth to you, my pen, and you will be content with my plain asseveration that all which he insinuated was gross falsehood. Unfortunately to you only, or to Sir William, who persists in ignoring handsomely the whole incident, can I discuss the matter. I could not write of it to Lady Nelson without raising the very suspicions which justice demands should be allayed; and my rank makes it impossible for me to consult my oldest friends, like Troubridge, who occupy positions under my command.
“I hope I am not a bad man to have passages in my behaviour which it is not expedient to discuss with my wife. I have now lived thirty-nine years, and I have ever, I think, been eminently amenable to the gentle influence of women. But, not even excepting the young lady at Quebec whom I should have left the service to marry, becoming a fellow-settler with the United Empire loyalists in Upper Canada, if it had not been for the wise persuasions of my valued friend Alexander Davison, I have never known but two of them in the intimate fashion which is open to landsmen. I am telling the strict truth when I say that I never kissed a lady until I married Lady Nelson, nor after till within this few days; though what harm there be in it I know not, if it be conducted in decent and not outrageous fashion. It seems to me a natural mode of expression of sympathy between a man and a woman who are friends sufficient, and I feel confident that I never did it before solely from the fact that my seafaring life, up to the time I was married, prevented my forming a friendship close enough to require such expression. And in the years that I was on shore before St. Vincent, my life was filled with the friendship and companionship of my wife and father.
“It is now a day above a week since I landed in Naples more dead than alive; and that I am now alive, though very unwell, and weary of this country of fiddlers and poets, and ——, and scoundrels, is due, I may say, solely to my Lady Hamilton, who took me into the Embassy and by giving me the best chamber in Naples for an ailing man, and the best-chosen nourishment, and her own unremitting attention, gave me life and strength for this very trying week.
“It has ever been my belief that in making and keeping men well—I am speaking now of ships’ crews exposed to the ailments that come of prolonged cruises, such as scurvy and the rest—the keeping them entertained plays the most important part; and for this reason I have promoted all manner of diversions and educational exercises among them. And this is the treatment my Lady applied to me.