In June 1787, accordingly, the term of three years usually allotted to ships employed on such stations in times of peace being expired, he was ordered home; and arrived at Portsmouth the beginning of July, with Mrs.
Nelson and her son.
From this place he writes, on the 3d instant, to his friend Captain Locker; and, speaking of his "dear wife," says-- "I have no doubt you will like her, on acquaintance; for, although I must be partial, yet she possesses great good sense, and good temper."
In all these praises of his lady may be clearly discerned, that he congratulated himself on having made, at least, a prudent choice. There is little, however, of that rapturous extasy which issues from many a finally most infelicitous husband, some days, weeks, or even months, after the conjugal union.
It was not, certainly, on his side, a mercenary match. He would have been incapable of marrying with so mean a motive. He is said, indeed, to have given, about this period, a substantial proof of very much the contrary disposition. This appears in the following anecdote, which has been repeatedly published.
The President of Nevis had been so excessively displeased with his only daughter, that he resolved to disinherit the young lady, and leave her immense fortune to his niece, Mrs. Nelson: but Captain Nelson, most generously, instead of widening the breach between them, actually made use of all his interest with the president, who had the highest regard for him, completely to close it, by bringing about a perfect reconciliation; which, at length, to his unspeakable satisfaction, he had the happiness of accomplishing.
Dr. Nesbit, Mrs. Nelson"s first husband, was a native of Scotland. He had, formerly, been an apothecary at Coventry; but, at Nevis, he practised as a physician. He had not, however, acquired any very considerable wealth. It has even been a.s.serted, that Captain Nelson received the widow and child without any present fortune whatever; and that four thousand pounds, some years afterwards bequeathed Mrs. Nelson, on the death of her father or uncle, was the whole that ever came into his hands by his marriage with that lady. When it is considered, that he was, at this time, a post-captain in the British navy, of more than eight years standing, though only twenty-nine years of age, there could, surely, be no reason for him to expect, without saying a word about prospects from his transcendent abilities, that he was ever to hear any reflections on the pecuniary advantages which he derived from this most disinterested union!
The Boreas was paid off at Sheerness, on the 30th of November 1787; and the winter was chiefly employed in visiting places of public amus.e.m.e.nt, and introducing Mrs. Nelson to his numerous respectable friends.
In a letter, written at Bath, April 3, 1778, to his friend Captain Locker, he says, that he has been, for the last month, at a relation"s near Bristol, and is only just returned, to drink the waters another fortnight. He was, in fact, very partial to Bath: not only on account of the present cure he had himself received there; but because his venerable and much afflicted father was under the absolute necessity of spending his winters in that city, during so many of the latter years of his life. The Reverend Mr. Nelson, indeed, from paralytic and asthmatic affections, which would scarcely permit him to speak for several hours after rising in the morning, had actually been given over by the physicians almost forty years prior to his decease.
From Bath, Captain Nelson proceeded, on another visit of a month, to Exmouth; and, pa.s.sing through London, in the summer, went immediately into Norfolk, where it was agreed to fix his future residence.
His father, accordingly, gave him up the parsonage-house at Burnham-Thorpe, where he formed his little domestic establishment. He had, in the mean time, since his arrival in England, been again pestered with prosecutions from some of the Americans whose ships he seized in the West Indies, On this subject he says, in a letter to Captain Locker, "I have written them word, that I will have nothing to do with them, and they must act as they think proper: government, I suppose, will do what is right, and not leave me in the lurch. We have heard enough, lately, of the consequence of the Act of Navigation to this country. They may take my person; but, if six-pence would save me from a prosecution, I would not give it."
Though this may have the semblance of treating lightly these menaced legal prosecutions, it is well known that he felt very acutely on the occasion: and nothing is more certain, than that he would have for ever quitted England, had not government so far interfered as entirely to quiet all his apprehensions on the subject. His remonstrances were too strong to be resisted. He was a man to be in no way trifled with. Thus, had a thoughtless or careless administration slighted, or neglected, his claim to protection, and left him a prey to legal machinations, the nation would have certainly lost it"s chief champion; for, on the best authority, it is here repeated, he once had it in contemplation to leave for ever his native country!
What an awful consideration does this demand, from those who are entrusted with the administration of justice! How many great men have been driven into eternal exile by the terrors of abused justice, by legal constructions of equity, and by the horrors of an impending prison for the perpetual incarceration of unfortunate and injured innocence!
Not, now, likely to be disturbed in the calmness of his retirement, he willingly descended, from the hero, to the private gentleman. Nor did he even disdain to cultivate a few acres of glebe land annexed to the rectory. Known, and beloved, by all the gentry in the neighbourhood, he joined frequently in their field diversions, and was particularly fond of coursing. Though one of the best gunners in the world, he was a bad shot at a hare, a woodc.o.c.k, or a partridge. In pointing a great gun, however, on grand and suitable occasions, at a ship, a castle, or a fort, he was scarcely to be equalled: so well, indeed, was this talent known, and so universally recognized, by his frequently volunteering his services on sh.o.r.e, that he was familiarly called the brigadier, ever after the affair of San Juan.
In cultivating the friendship of respectable neighbours, who laudably courted his society; in rendering kind offices to the humbler inhabitants of his vicinity, by whom he was universally beloved; in enriching his mind by reading and reflection, and improving his land by cultivation; this great man employed most part of the leisure which peace afforded him. Sometimes, indeed, he went to Bath, or other fashionable resorts, during the seasons, where he might meet with his old friends; and sometimes sought them in the metropolis, where he occasionally paid his respects at the Admiralty.
His heroic mind, no doubt, amidst the calm of peace, prepared for the storm of war; and, though he disdained not the culture of the ploughshare, he looked forward to the day when it would become necessary to exchange it for the sword. He was particularly fond of geographical studies: few men were so well acquainted with maps and charts; and his accurate eye frequently traced with eagerness the various parts of the globe which he had pa.s.sed with difficulty or delight, and the spots at which he had successfully or unpleasantly paused.
In the mean time, as he had become an affectionate husband to Dr.
Nesbit"s widow, so he proved, in every possible sense, a faithful father to his child. The youth was carefully educated, with all the advantages of this great man"s excellent directions, and his progress was minutely inspected by the same truly paternal attention. Being treated, in every respect, with the most indulgent tenderness, and seeming early to evince an inclination for the naval service, Captain Nelson, who had no prospect of issue by his lady, willingly consented to take him, as an only son, under his own immediate protection.
Doubtless, while the mind of this exalted man was thus innocently and laudably engaged in attending to the various duties of private life, he not unfrequently felt disposed to indulge in deep reflections on numerous n.o.ble plans meditated for the future service of his country: for, in common with almost every gifted possessor of superior genius, he seems to have constantly borne about him an invincible conviction, that he should, at some period of his life, be enabled to give the fullest manifestation of it"s presence to an admiring world. As war was his element, he could have no hope of any opportunity to demonstrate his wonderful abilities till that national calamity should arrive: and, though he was much too good and pious a man, to be desirous of war, for no other purpose than a display of his own skill and valour; he was, at the same time, far too wise and wary, to imagine that a nation so rich in commerce as Great Britain, surrounded by artful, envious, and powerful enemies, would be permitted long to preserve an honourable state of public tranquillity. He was, therefore, as an individual, ever prepared for what he naturally expected soon to occur; and he was of opinion, that the power of the country should be kept in an equal state of continual readiness.
In the year 1790, when the cruelties exercised by the Spaniards at Nootka Sound, seemed to have awakened the national vengeance, and an armament was accordingly ordered to be prepared, he immediately offered his services at the Admiralty; and is said to have felt not a little mortified, at finding his application ineffectual. The fact, however, appears to have been, that offers from commanders of longer standing had previously been made and accepted for all the ships then meant to be immediately commissioned. No blame, therefore, could be fairly imputed to the Admiralty, on the occasion: and, when that business came, soon afterwards, to be adjusted, and the ships paid off, he had reason to congratulate himself on not having been put to expences for equipment, which the advantages of so little actual service were quite inadequate to repay. This, perhaps, at that period, might be no inconsiderable consolation.
The sum finally stipulated to be paid by Spain, on this occasion, besides restoring the vessels unjustly seized, was two hundred and ten thousand dollars.
After two years more pa.s.sed in retirement, the French revolutionary war having extended it"s baneful influence to this country, there became an instant necessity for preparing all the strength of our navy to oppose it"s pernicious tendency. He had now, happily, no difficulty in obtaining a ship; but, at the very commencement of the war, having made the usual application, he immediately received a positive promise from Lord Howe, which was handsomely performed still sooner than he had the smallest reason to expect.
On the 26th of January 1793, he says, in a letter to his friend Captain Locker, "Lord Hood tells me, that I am now fixed for the Agamemnon, at Chatham; and, that whatever men are raised for her will be taken care of on board the Sandwich."
The name of the ship having been thus fixed for the purpose of his immediately raising men for sea, he had already sent out a lieutenant and four midshipmen to get men at every sea-port in Norfolk. He applied, also, to his friends in Yorkshire, and the north, who promised to obtain him what hands they could, and deliver them over to the regulating captains at Whitby and Newcastle. To Captain Locker, he says--"I hope, if any men in London are inclined to enter for the Agamemnon, you will not turn your back on them; as, though my bills are dispersed over this country, &c. I have desired that no bills may be stuck up in London till my commission is signed."
This was one of his delicate punctilios; for he did not expect that, from what Lord Howe had written him on the occasion, the ship would have been actually commissioned till about a fortnight longer.
On the 30th of January, however, being only four days, instead of fourteen, after the date of the above letter, his commission was actually signed; and, on the 7th of February, he joined his ship, the Agamemnon of sixty-four guns, which was then under orders of equipment for the Mediterranean.
His ship"s company was soon raised; chiefly from Norfolk and Suffolk, and not a few from his own immediate neighbourhood. So universally was he esteemed, and such was even then the general opinion of his conduct and abilities, that many gentlemen in the vicinity were desirous of placing their sons under his command; some of whom, persons of considerable respectability, solicited and obtained this distinguished favour: particularly, the Reverend Mr. Bolton, his relation, brother of Thomas Bolton, Esq. his eldest sister"s husband; with the Reverend Mr.
Hoste, and the Reverend Mr. Wetherhead, his intimate friends.
Nor must it be forgotten that, on the very first appearance of actual service, he had taken his son-in-law, young Josiah Nesbit, from school, equipped him as a midshipman, and carried him on board the Agamemnon.
There is a curious anecdote related, and that from the very best authority, respecting one of the young gentlemen thus taken as a midshipman by Captain Nelson. The father of this youth, though a friend of Captain Nelson, happened to be a very staunch whig. The youth, therefore, he apprehended, might possibly require some little counteraction of the principles of modern whiggism, which he did not think very conducive to the loyalty and subordination of a young British sailor. Accordingly, when this youth came on board, he called him into his cabbin, and immediately addressed him in the most impressive manner, to the following effect.
"There are three things, young gentleman," said he, "which you are constantly to bear in mind: first, you must always implicitly obey orders, without attempting to form any opinion of your own respecting their propriety; secondly, you must consider every man as your enemy who speaks ill of your king; and, thirdly, you must hate a Frenchman as you do the devil."
The youth, who had been thus prepared, always conducted himself with great propriety; and, it is believed, ever afterwards retained a truly filial regard for his friendly patron.
Captain Nelson was perfectly indefatigable in getting his ship ready for sea. In a letter to Captain Locker, written at the Navy Office, the beginning of February 1793, where his brother Maurice had long held a situation, after requesting him to discharge Maurice Suckling, and such men as may be on board the Sandwich, into the Agamemnon, he says--"Pray, have you got a clerk whom you can recommend? I want one very much, I urge nothing; I know your willingness to serve. The Duke of Clarence desires me to say, that he requests you will discharge Joseph King into the Agamemnon; or, that I am welcome to any other man, to a.s.sist me in fitting out. He is but poorly; but expresses the greatest satisfaction at the appointment you are likely to succeed to, and in which no one rejoices more than your affectionate Horatio Nelson."
In another letter to this much honoured and honourable officer, written at Chatham towards the end of the same month, he congratulates him on having obtained his appointment, which was that of Lieutenant-Governor of Greenwich Hospital; from which, he hopes, his friend will derive every comfort: and tells him, that he need not hurry himself about the charts, as he shall certainly see him before he sails.
It was not, in fact, till about the middle of May, that the Agamemnon, in company with the Robust of seventy-four guns, Captain the Honourable George Keith Elphinstone, proceeded to it"s station in the Mediterranean, under the command of Lord Hood; who followed, a few days after, with the rest of his fleet, from Plymouth, on the 22d of that month.
About the beginning of June, he went with six sail of the line to Cadiz, where they took in water. They also took in some wine: for he tells his worthy old friend, Captain Locker, that he has got him a cask of, he hopes, good sherry; which he shall take an early opportunity of sending home, and begs him to accept as a proof of his remembrance. He observes, that they have done nothing; and, that the same prospect appears before them: for, the French would not come out, and they had no means of getting at them in Toulon. Lord Hood was to be joined, off Barcelona, by twenty-one Spanish ships of the line: "but," adds he, "if they are no better manned than those at Cadiz, much service cannot be expected of them; though, as to ships, I never saw finer men of war."
It was on the occasion above alluded to, when Captain Nelson put into Cadiz to water, that he exclaimed, at the moment of first beholding the Spanish fleet--"These ships are, certainly, the finest in the world: thank G.o.d, the Spaniards cannot build men!"
Early in August, Lord Hood went with the fleet to remonstrate with the Genoese respecting their supply of corn to the French, and bringing back French property under neutral papers: a practice which Captain Nelson, who was then off Toulon, justly observed, rendered the station there a mere farce, if such trade should continue to be allowed.
On the 20th of this month, writing to Captain Locker, he observes that the Agamemnon sails well, and is healthy; but, that he wants to get into port for refreshment. He says that, by all the accounts, the district of Provence would gladly become a separate republic under the protection of England; and, that the people of Ma.r.s.eilles declared they would willingly destroy Toulon to accomplish this measure.
There seems, at the time of his thus writing, to have been a positive proposal to this effect then under the consideration of the commander in chief: for, on the 23d of August, only three days after, did Admiral Lord Hood publish his celebrated preliminary declaration to the inhabitants of Toulon, as well as his proclamation to the inhabitants of the towns and provinces in the south of France, which ended in his taking a provisional possession of Toulon, with all the ships of war in the harbour, &c. on the 28th of the same month.
Captain Nelson, however, was not present during the period of this negociation, or the subsequent taking possession of Toulon; having been previously charged with dispatches from Lord Hood, dated off Toulon, the 17th of August 1793, and addressed to Sir William Hamilton, Knight of the Bath, his Majesty"s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary at the Court of Naples.
It should seem that he had, also, some intermediate orders to execute; for, on his pa.s.sage to Naples, he met with Lord Hugh Conway, at sea, who had left Toulon in the possession of Lord Hood, and sent Sir William Hamilton a letter to that effect, dated the 31st of the same month.
There was, evidently, more to be transacted at the court of Naples, than a mere delivery of these dispatches from Lord Hood, or Captain Nelson would scarcely have been selected for the business. He went, no doubt, with confidential communications from the commander in chief to the British minister plenipotentiary, and objects of discretional discussion for mutual consideration, which were not possible to be transacted in writing, and consequently required the talents and address judiciously employed on the occasion. Lord Hood was no stranger to the superlative ability which he possessed for negotiation; and how much more rarely that quality is to be found in British naval officers, than the natural bravery which seems common to all, or even the great nautical skill which may justly be boasted by most of them.
It was not till the 11th of September, that Captain Nelson arrived, in the Agamemnon, at Naples; and so effectually did he accomplish the objects of his mission, that Sir William Hamilton, who immediately communicated the intelligence of Toulon"s being in possession of Lord Hood to General Acton, procured two thousand of his Sicilian majesty"s best troops to be embarked, the 16th, on board two line of battle ships, two frigates, two corvettes, and one Neapolitan transport vessel.
The next day, September 17, Sir William Hamilton sent intelligence of the above particulars to England, which appeared in the London Gazette, dated Whitehall, October 12, 1793: where it is added, that a Spanish frigate, returning to Toulon, had likewise taken some Neapolitan troops on board; that three more battalions were that night to embark at Gaeta, on board of two Neapolitan frigates, two brigantines, and nine large polacres; that, in a week or ten days, the Neapolitan government were to send off to Toulon the remaining ships, and two thousand more men, with thirty-two pieces of regimental artillery, and plenty of provisions; and that, should the wind remain as it then was, these succours might reach Toulon in five days, or sooner.
In the mean time, Captain Nelson had been introduced to the King and Queen of Naples, from whom he met with a most cordial and gracious reception: nor must his singular previous introduction, by Sir William, to Lady Hamilton, be pa.s.sed over, without particular notice; on the result of which, so much of the felicity of this exalted hero"s future life seems evidently to have in a superlative degree depended.
On Sir William Hamilton"s returning home, after having first beheld Captain Nelson, he told his lady that he was about to introduce a little man to her acquaintance, who could not boast of being very handsome: "but," added Sir William, "this man, who is an English naval officer, Captain Nelson, will become the greatest man that ever England produced.
I know it, from the few words of conversation I have already had with him. I p.r.o.nounce, that he will one day astonish the world. I have never entertained any officer at my house, but I am determined to bring him here. Let him be put in the room prepared for Prince Augustus."
Captain Nelson was, accordingly, introduced to her ladyship; and resided with Sir William Hamilton during his short stay at Naples: and thus commenced that fervid friendship between the parties, which continued to glow, with apparently increasing ardour, to the last moment of their respective existences whom it has been Lady Hamilton"s severe lot to survive.
The introductory compliment which had been paid by Sir William Hamilton, to Captain Nelson"s transcendent abilities, was not ill requited by one of the latter"s first salutations of the worthy envoy--"Sir William,"
said he, in consequence of the dispatch made use of in obtaining the Neapolitan troops, "you are a man after my own heart: you do business in my own way! I am, now, only a captain; but I will, if I live, be at the top of the tree."
These reciprocal good opinions of each other, which form the basis of all substantial friendships, could not fail to unite such excellent and enlightened minds in a sincere amity. It can never appear wonderful, then, that Lady Hamilton, herself a person of very considerable talents, and possessing a warm and affectionate heart, naturally attached to splendid abilities, should be forcibly struck with the pleasing manners, extreme goodness and generosity of mind, and evident proofs of comprehensive intellect, which she continually witnessed in the new friend of her intelligent husband, during the few days of his continuance at Naples.
The frank and friendly attentions of her ladyship, at the same time, it must necessarily be supposed, made no slight impression on the susceptible bosom of Captain Nelson; who was charmed with the characteristic sweetness of disposition which she so fascinatingly displayed for the promotion of his ease and comforts.