Chapter XVIII.

NELSON OF THE NILE.

“_Admirals all, for England’s sake,_ _Honour be yours, and fame!_ _And honour, as long as waves shall break,_ _To Nelson’s peerless fame._”

IT is a gray, melancholy spring day in the year 1771. You are at Chatham, looking on to the deck of his Majesty’s ship _Raisonnable_, commanded by Captain Maurice Suckling. The sixty-four is not yet ready for sea; her chief officers are not yet aboard. On the quay you see a thin, delicate-looking lad of twelve years of age dressed in a “middy’s” uniform. The wind bites shrewdly; the lad shivers in his thin jacket, and there is something like a tear in his eye. This morning his father left him in London to make the best of his way to Chatham and there join his ship. He has wandered about, friendless and alone, for hours; he is hungry, footsore, and weary, and he cannot discover the vessel to which he is posted. You feel sorry for the lonely little fellow, but his troubles are now over. A kindly officer accosts him, and brings him on board. The lad’s eyes gleam as he gazes on the ship which is to be his home. He glances down at the almond-white decks; he looks around at grinning lines of black cannon; he turns his eyes aloft to the symmetrical fabric of spars and sails and rigging. It is a wonder-world of delight. There is fascination everywhere—in the red muzzles of the guns, in their white tompions, in the petticoat trousers and long pigtails of the sailors. His young eyes, brilliant with intellect, dart hither and thither; he is astonished and delighted by all the novel sights which he sees.

This frail weakling is Horatio Nelson, the proudest name in the naval annals of his land. He is to develop into the “unique sailor,” the great hero of his race, the man whose statue is decked with laurel and whose fame is eagerly commemorated year by year, though well-nigh a century has elapsed since he passed away.

Horatio Nelson was born in the year before Wolfe captured Quebec. He was the son of a plain country parson with a quiver full of children and a modest income. The future hero first saw the light in the pleasant rectory of Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk. At nine years of age his mother died, and the weak, sickly lad grew up under the care of his grandmother. There was nothing remarkable about the boy’s school days, though many stories are told of his mischievous exploits, his fearlessness, and his high sense of honour. The best-known story relates that as a little boy he strayed from the house on a birds’-nesting excursion, and was absent so long that his grandmother grew alarmed and sent out servants to look for him. At length young Horatio was discovered sitting placidly by the side of a stream which he could not cross. When brought back his grandmother said, “I wonder that you were not driven home by hunger and fear.” “Fear! grandma,” said the boy. “Fear! what is that? I never saw it!” Truly the boy was father to the man. To the end of his life he never saw fear or knew what it meant.

You already know that at twelve years of age Nelson began his naval career as a midshipman on board his uncle’s ship, the _Raisonnable_. At twenty-one he was a captain in the Royal Navy—“the merest boy of a captain,” as Prince William, afterwards William the Fourth, described him. Nevertheless, there was no better seaman or more gallant officer in the service.

Now let us pass on to the year 1789, when Nelson was thirty-one years of age, and was regarded by those who knew him best as one of the finest commanders in the service. In this year that huge upheaval known as the French Revolution took place. For centuries the kings and nobles of France had grossly mismanaged the country and had bitterly oppressed the people. The State was well-nigh bankrupt, and the land was full of starving and despairing men. In July of this fateful year Paris rose, the Bastille, or State prison, was stormed, the prisoners were released, and the garrison slain. All over the country the peasants revolted, murdered the nobles, and burned their castles. The king was powerless to interfere, and the National Assembly, which had now seized the reins of power, passed laws sweeping away the privileges of the nobles and the rights of the Church. Before long the king and his family tried to escape from the country, but they were brought back and treated as prisoners. Meanwhile large numbers of the nobles had sought refuge abroad, and were urging foreign governments to declare war on France. When the German sovereigns threatened invasion, the French declared war against Austria and Prussia.

Now we must introduce the most dominant figure of the modern world—Napoleon Bonaparte. He was born in Corsica in the year which saw the American colonists beginning to rise against the British Government. In the first year of American independence he was a “gentleman cadet” in the military school at Paris. Here he was chiefly noteworthy as a silent, haughty lad, full of self-love and of great ambition. He was studious and very fond of mathematics and geography, but his abilities were not striking. None of his teachers prophesied for him the astonishing genius which he afterwards displayed. When Nelson was twenty-seven years of age, Napoleon became a lieutenant of artillery. He was a zealous republican, and was placed in command of the artillery which was to besiege the naval port of Toulon, then in possession of the British, who had been called in by the royalist inhabitants of the town. Napoleon conducted the siege with such skill that the British were forced to evacuate the place, not, however, without burning the French fleet which lay in the harbour and destroying the arsenal.

At this juncture Nelson was detailed to besiege certain coast towns of the island of Corsica. He captured Bastia and Calvi, but at the latter place he lost the sight of an eye. A period of dangerous and exhausting service followed. Napoleon was now in command of the army of Italy, and was at the beginning of his extraordinary career. He was marching along the narrow coast-road of the Riviera, and Nelson’s task was to harass his shoreward march. Scarcely a day passed without a skirmish of some kind with a battery, a gunboat, or an armed cruiser. Nelson’s force, however, was inadequate, and Napoleon accomplished his purpose. His victories in Italy were extraordinary, and speedily he was acclaimed on all hands as the greatest general of the republic. As he rose in fame and influence new vistas opened before him, and he soon perceived that the highest office in the State was his to grasp. Next he advanced into Austria itself, and carried all before him. When he was within eighty miles of Vienna the emperor begged for peace, and obtained it at the price of Belgium and Lombardy. Prussia now deserted the allies, and Holland and Spain had already purchased peace by promising the republic the use of their navies. Great Britain was in a state of “splendid isolation,” and all eyes turned to the fleet as the only hope of succour. The banks stopped cash payments, alarm was at its height, and Consols fell to fifty-one. Great Britain had her back to the wall.

Before long, however, the British fleet had its first great success. On February 14, 1797—that glorious St. Valentine’s Day—Admiral Jervis won a splendid victory over the Spanish fleet off Cape St. Vincent. In that confused scene of roaring cannon, rolling clouds of smoke, crash of falling spars, shrieks of the wounded, and stormy huzzas of the half-naked sailors wrestling at the guns, Nelson stands out as _the_ conspicuous figure of the day. At one time he was engaging nine Spanish ships. A little later he was abreast of the _San Josef_, pouring in such a murderous fire that speedily she was unmanageable. The _San Nicolas_ drifted on to the _San Josef_, and Nelson manœuvred to foul the _San Nicolas_. He hooked his sprit-sail yard into her rigging, and then boarded. The ship yielded, but at this moment a fierce fire of musketry was opened from the _San Josef_—only a jump away. Instantly Nelson and his men sprang aboard the _San Josef_, and as they did so a Spanish officer called out that the ship had surrendered. Thus on the deck of a Spanish man-of-war, which he had boarded across the deck of another then in his possession, Nelson received the swords of the vanquished Spaniards. Already he was the darling of his sailors and a source of pride to the nation.

In a daring but unsuccessful attack on Cadiz he lost an arm, and sank into a state of deep depression, thinking that he had become a burden on his friends and useless to his country. For a time our little one-armed, one-eyed hero retired to a quiet country home; but on April 1, 1798, he was afloat in command of a fleet scouring the Mediterranean with orders to seek the French fleet, and use his best endeavours to take, sink, burn, and destroy it. After a long and anxious quest he at last discovered it anchored in Aboukir Bay. “We are moored in such a manner,” wrote the French admiral, “as to bid defiance to a force more than double our own.” How vain the boast was will shortly appear. The French ships were anchored in single file along the shore, with three miles of shoal water between them and the land, and the admiral believed that no man-of-war could possibly get to the shoreward of him. He had actually piled up his mess gear on the shoreward side of his ships, thus rendering the guns on that side unworkable. As the British fleet drew near, under a press of sail, during the afternoon of August 1, Nelson observed that the enemy’s ships were moored five hundred yards apart, so as to permit them to swing at anchor. Instantly he perceived that where the enemy’s ship could swing there was room enough for one of his squadron to anchor. The French were trapped, and Nelson cried, “Before this time to-morrow I shall have gained a peerage or Westminster Abbey!”

Five ships with men in the chains, heaving the leads, now bore down, rounded the bows of the leading vessel, and got inshore of the French fleet. The rest of Nelson’s ships took up their stations on the seaward side, and at half-past six, just as the sun was setting, the action began. In twelve minutes the leading ship of the enemy was dismasted, and almost at the same instant the third ship of the line suffered the same fate. Black night came on at seven, and only the flash of guns, crimsoning the heavens, lit up the darkness. At half-past eight the fourth and fifth ships of the enemy’s line surrendered. At ten minutes past nine the flagship, the _Orient_, caught fire. She lay between two British ships, and was almost cut in halves by shot. Her gallant admiral lay dying on the deck, and every moment the flames raged higher.

The burning of the _Orient_ was the most terribly grand spectacle ever seen in naval warfare. Her magazine was full of powder, and an explosion was inevitable. Such, however, was the heroism of her crew that while the lower decks were in flames, her men continued to work the guns on the upper deck. Huge forked flames and living sheets of fire leapt up as though from the heart of a volcano. She had ceased to fire now, and the remnants of her crew crawled out on the spars like flies. The flames lit up the scene so vividly that even the Arabs could be seen on the shore. At a quarter past eleven she blew up with a thunderous roar, and the battle of the Nile was over. All that remained was to render the victory complete. By three in the morning two ships alone of that proud French fleet had escaped. Next morning Nelson, with a deep wound on his forehead, called the fleet to return public thanksgiving to Almighty God for the most decisive victory that has ever blessed British arms at sea. The number of the enemy taken, drowned, burnt, and missing was 5,225. On the English side 218 were killed and 677 wounded.

Napoleon was at this time in Egypt, which he proceeded to conquer as the first step towards striking at India. The disaster at Aboukir Bay cooped him up in the East. He crossed the desert into Syria, and drove the Turks out of the southern part of the land. Before the walls of Acre, however, his victorious march was checked. The Turks within, and a British fleet under Sir Sidney Smith outside, completely baffled him. In later years Napoleon said, “That man made me miss my destiny.” But for Sir Sidney Smith, Napoleon would have been Emperor of the East. As it was, he was forced to raise the siege of Acre and retire into Egypt, where news reached him that the French armies had suffered some reverses. He left his army in Egypt to get home as best it might, and returned to France, where his friends arranged a revolution. On December 24, 1797, a new French constitution was proclaimed, and shortly afterwards Napoleon became First Consul. He took up his abode in the Tuileries, and was now on the direct highroad to the lofty position which he meant to attain.

Napoleon had pledged his word to save France from her host of enemies, and in May 1800 he took the field once more. Crossing the Great St. Bernard Pass, never before traversed by a large army, he succeeded in planting himself in the rear of the Austrians, and at the battle of Marengo achieved a brilliant victory. Later in the year the French general, Moreau, crushed another Austrian army at Hohenlinden, and then Austria sued for peace.

The Tsar Paul had already abandoned the allies, and now confessed to great admiration for Napoleon, who proceeded to form a league for the purpose of subduing Britain by striking at her trade. He persuaded the northern powers—Russia, Denmark, and Sweden—to mass their fleets and close all their ports against British ships. This was a deep-laid scheme, but it was doomed to failure.

On March 12, 1801, Nelson left Yarmouth Roads as second in command to Sir Hyde Parker, a man of unflinching bravery but of no original ideas. The fleet which these admirals commanded was detailed to destroy the ships of the allies which lay at Copenhagen, backed by formidable batteries. Parker was irresolute as to the route to be taken through the dangerous channels that led to the town. “Let it be by the Sound, by the Belt, or anyhow,” cried Nelson, “only lose not an hour.” We cannot stay to recount the progress of the terrible battle that followed. When twenty of the enemy’s ships were almost destroyed, Nelson offered a truce, which was gladly accepted, and

“All amidst her wrecks and her gore, Proud Denmark blest our chief That he gave her wounds relief; And the sounds of joy and grief Filled the shore.”

In the very height of the engagement, Parker, greatly alarmed for the safety of his fleet, battered furiously by incessant broadsides, made the signal to retreat. Nelson’s attention was drawn to it. “What does it mean?” asked a colonel of marines standing by. “Why, to leave off action,” said Nelson; “but hang me if I do! You know,” he went on, “I have only one eye. I have a right to be blind sometimes.” Putting his telescope to his blind eye, he exclaimed, “I really do not see the signal.” So he nailed his colours to the mast, and in the midst of the most terrible cannonade to which a British fleet has ever been subjected, Nelson’s signal for “Close action” streamed high aloft, as clear to every man’s sight as a star in the sky.

Napoleon had thus failed in his attack on the obstinate islanders, and he was now ready for a breathing-space in which to recruit his armies and build a navy powerful enough to beat Britain. Accordingly peace was signed, and Great Britain restored all the colonial conquests which she had made during the war, except Ceylon and Trinidad. This was all she gained from a struggle which had cost her thousands of lives, and had added two hundred and seventy millions to the National Debt.

Before the ink was dry on the treaty, Napoleon was busy planning the establishment of a vast colonial empire, and aiming at the downfall of the one power which thwarted him at every turn. The English press bitterly attacked him, coarse and insulting caricatures of him were constantly appearing, and French exiles in England frequently plotted against him. He now demanded the suppression of the hostile newspapers and the expulsion of the plotters, but the British Government refused. Every day the relations between the two countries grew more and more strained, and the breaking-point was not far off.

On May 12, 1803, war was again declared. Napoleon speedily forced Spain to join him, and then began preparations for an invasion of Great Britain. One hundred thousand men were marched to Boulogne, and every road by which the soldiers passed bore the signpost, “To England.” A huge flotilla of flat-bottomed boats was collected, and exercises in embarking and disembarking went on within sight of the white cliffs of Dover. “The Channel,” said Napoleon, “is but a ditch, and any one can cross it who has but the courage to try.” He meant to put his courage to the test as soon as the Channel was clear of the British fleet. From June 1803 to September 1805 his men were waiting the word of command to cross. It was never given.

The prospect of invasion roused every patriotic man in Great Britain. Volunteers flocked to the standards, and soon, out of a nation of fifteen million souls, including the people of Ireland who were not allowed to volunteer, 300,000 men were in arms, besides 120,000 regular troops and 78,000 militia. The dockyards worked night and day, and before the end of the year one hundred and sixty-six new vessels had been added to the fleet. The fortresses were strengthened, martello towers were erected along the coast, and every possible preparation was made. Nevertheless the year 1803 was one of alarm and terror. Next year Napoleon attained the summit of his ambition—he crowned himself Emperor of the French.

Still the projected invasion hung fire, and now Napoleon devised a plan for securing the six hours’ command of the Channel on which the success of his enterprise depended. His fleet was then in the harbour of Toulon, which was being watched by a British fleet, with Nelson in chief command for the first time. Napoleon ordered his ships to slip out of harbour and sail for the West Indies, in order to decoy Nelson away from Europe. Arrived at the West Indies, the French fleet was to put about and return with all speed for Brest, where an attack was to be made on the British squadron blockading that port while Nelson was far away. The defeat of the British squadron at Brest would clear the Channel, and then the grand invasion was to take place.

The plan nearly succeeded. Villeneuve, the French admiral, did slip out of Toulon. Nelson was deceived, and went off on a false scent. When, however, news arrived that the French fleet had sailed for the West Indies, Nelson dashed after it in hot pursuit, and went half-way round the world and back again before he caught it up. Villeneuve had thirty-five days’ start, but Nelson arrived at Gibraltar on the return voyage only three days after the French fleet sighted Cape Finisterre. Here it found a British squadron under Admiral Calder. An indecisive battle took place; and though the result was considered in England as a failure, and almost a disgrace, it ended the grand invasion scheme. Villeneuve was obliged to put into Ferrol to refit, and, meanwhile, Nelson had arrived. Napoleon’s plan had failed, and Britain could breathe freely once more.

In disgust, Napoleon broke up his camp at Boulogne, and rapidly marched his army across France into Germany, where he met the Austrians and Russians, who had formed a new league against him. Now began a series of triumphs which laid the Austrian empire open to the invaders. While Napoleon was rejoicing in his victories, terrible news reached him. The greatest sea-fight in the history of the world had been fought, and the combined fleets of France and Spain were no more. The beginning of the end had arrived for the “terror of Europe.”

Villeneuve, with thirty-three Franco-Spanish vessels, lay in Cadiz harbour, and outside was Nelson with twenty-seven British ships. The French admiral had been stung to the quick by a bitter, taunting letter from the emperor, accusing him of cowardice. To vindicate his courage, Villeneuve gave the order to put to sea. On the morning of October 20, 1805, the fleets came in sight of each other.

“The sun never rose on a grander and more impressive ocean-picture. As the courses and hulls of the hindmost of the British vessels floated up the sea-line, the blue girdle of the deep became a field of ships; giant structures bristling with guns, canvas swelling in clouds to the heavens from their tall sides black with grim and formidable defences, crowds of sailors motionless in expectation, quarter-decks glittering with uniforms, and stillness everywhere, broken only by the creaming wash of the bow-surge as it was shouldered off into yeast by the towering battleships.”

At daybreak, after a night clouded with the presentiment that he would die on the morrow, Nelson arrayed himself in his full admiral’s uniform, and came on deck blazing with orders. Watching the fleet of the enemy forming line of battle, he exclaimed several times, “I’ll give them such a dressing as they never had before.” He advanced in two columns, intending to crash into the enemy’s line, thus breaking it and destroying the ships in the centre before those on the wings could come to their relief. Undoubtedly there _was_ a plan of attack, though modern critics have questioned the fact. The battle perhaps looked like a “heroic scramble,” but behind the apparent confusion there was a subtle, daring, and unexpected plan.

Just before the battle began Nelson went to his cabin, and there on his knees wrote a beautiful and touching prayer. Coming on deck again, he ordered that signal to be made which is his greatest bequest to his country—a signal which stirs the pulses of every true Briton even after the lapse of a century. High above the _Victory’s_ deck flew the colours, and as the words, =England expects every man to do his duty=, were interpreted, a great huzza rose from the fleet. “Now,” said Nelson, “I can do no more. We must trust to the great Disposer of all events and to the justice of our cause.”

The British ships now bore down, Collingwood in the _Royal Sovereign_ being the first to engage. He was twenty minutes in the midst of a furious cannonade before he received support. The whole British fleet now came into action, but not near enough for Nelson, and he signalled, “Engage the enemy more closely,” and set the example by dashing into the enemy’s line. Seven or eight of the weathermost ships immediately opened a terrific fire on him. So fierce was it that for a few minutes the _Victory_ made no reply. Her mizzen top-mast went over the side, her wheel was knocked away, and a double-headed shot killed eight marines at one stroke. Amidst this hail of death the hero moved with the utmost indifference. As a splinter tore the buckle from his shoe he remarked smilingly to his captain, “This is too warm work, Hardy, to last long.” But now the gallant old ship got to work, and with a broadside that disabled her immediate enemy, drove into the _Redoutable_ so closely that the muzzles of the _Victory’s_ guns touched the enemy’s side.

At half-past one, when Nelson was walking the deck, a musket-shot from the _Redoutable_ mizzen-top struck him, and he fell with his face to the deck. “They have done for me at last, Hardy,” he exclaimed. “I hope not,” answered the captain. “Yes,” said Nelson; “my backbone is shot through.” They bore him to the cockpit, and on the way he drew a handkerchief over his face that his sailors might not see him and be discouraged. The gloomy cockpit was a shambles, resounding with the groans of anguished men. Dr. Beatty flew to his side. “Ah, Mr. Beatty,” said Nelson, “you can do nothing for me. I have but a short time to live; my back is shot through.” And so it was. The decorations with which he had adorned himself were too good a mark for the French sharpshooters.

The hero lay a-dying while the storm of crashing artillery continued to rage. High above the thunder came the huzzas of his seamen as ship after ship of the enemy struck. The dying man turned and smiled. “Will no one bring Hardy to me?” he asked, but the captain could not be spared. All the beauty, the magnanimity, and tenderness of Nelson’s disposition shone out in those dying hours. At last Hardy came. “Well, Hardy, how goes the day with us?” “Very well, my lord,” was the reply; “we have got twelve or fourteen of the enemy’s ships.” “I hope,” said Nelson anxiously, “that none of our ships have struck.” “No fear of that, my lord,” replied Hardy. And now the surgeon tearfully told him that his life was done. “God be praised,” he whispered. “Now I am satisfied. Thank God I have done my duty!” Nelson was dead.

As his breath floated away, the cannonading ceased, and Trafalgar was won. Of the French and Spanish fleet that rose and fell upon the waves on that October morning all that remained was a huddle of hulks rolling helplessly in the trough of the sea, with the British colours flying on the stumps of the wreckage, and a trail of beaten ships staggering portwards for safety. Nelson had not spent his life’s blood in vain. He had ensured his land a century’s command of the sea, during which time she spread her empire far and wide, and developed her commerce to an extraordinary degree.