Nelson's Lady Hamilton by Meynell, Esther (surface ebook reader txt) 📕

Nelson was very far from satisfied with this result, and describing it to Lord St. Vincent, he wrote—

" Captain Troubridge returned with information, that the French fleet were off Malta on

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the 8th, going to attack it, that Naples was at peace with the French republic, therefore could afford us no assistance in ships, but that, under the rose, they would give us the use of their ports, and sincerely wished us well, but did not give me the smallest information of what was, or likely to be, the future destination of the French armaments.'*

The admiral had all the scorn of a man of instant action for the paltry hesitations of those who dared not when they would. It was his temper to say—

" that we would do

We should do when we would; for this * would' changes, And hath abatements and delays as many As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents."

And there were two women in Naples who held the same faith, and who had nothing but contempt for enforced treaties. While the council was taking place at Acton's house, Emma, who guessed how little it was really likely to effect, went in haste to the Queen, who was still in bed. Then ensued one of the dramatic scenes in which Emma delighted. She told the Queen that all would be lost if Nelson's fleet was not freely supplied, and thus enabled to follow the French. She fell on her knees and implored Maria Carolina not to wait on the hesitating action of the King or the Prime Minister, but to act for herself, and give an order in her own name "to all

Governors of the Two Sicilies to receive with hospitality the British fleet to water, victual, and aid them."

It is a little difficult to believe that the Queen of Naples needed all this dramatic persuasion to do what her own interests and inclinations dictated. However, that is how Lady Hamilton tells the story. The Queen consented, the order was written, and Emma departed, all joy and exultation. Troubridge and Hardy had landed at six o'clock in the morning; at eight the council broke up, and Emma joined them. On their way back together to the Palazzo Sessa she told them what she had done, " producing the order, to their astonishment and delight. They embraced me with patriotic joy. * It will/ said the gallant Troubridge, ' cheer to extacy our valiant friend, Nelson. Otherwise we must have gone for Gibraltar/ "

On the same day Lady Hamilton wrote to Nelson—

" MY DEAR ADMIRAL, —I write in a hurry as Captain T. Carrol stays on Monarch. God bless you, and send you victorious, and that I may see you bring back Buonaparte with you. Pray send Captain Hardy out to us, for I shall have a fever with anxiety. The Queen desires me to say everything that's kind, and bids me say with her whole heart and soul she wishes you victory.

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God bless you, my dear Sir. I will not say how glad I shall be to see you. Indeed I cannot describe to you my feelings on your being so near us.—Ever, Ever, dear Sir, Your affte. and gratefull. EMMA HAMILTON "

Following this note to Nelson came another hurried line, evidently of the same date—

" DEAR SIR, —I send you a letter I have received this moment from the Queen. Kiss it, and send it back by Bowen, as I am bound not to give any of her letters.—Ever your EMMA."

To Mr. Walter Sichel belongs the credit of having unravelled a tangle of misconjecture, and brought forward Nelson's well-known letter as the immediate answer to this note of Lady Hamilton's. The two fit together with exactitude—

" MY DEAR LADY HAMILTON, —I have kissed the Queen's letter. Pray say I hope for the honor of kissing her hand when no fears will intervene, assure her Majesty that no person has her felicity more than myself at heart and that the sufferings of her family will be a Tower of Strength on the day of Battle, fear not the event, God is with us, God Bless you and Sir William, pray say I cannot stay to answer his letter.— Ever yours faithfully. HORATIO NELSON"

On this letter Emma afterwards wrote, " This letter I received after I had sent the Queen's letter for receiving our ships into their ports, for the Queen had decided to act in opposition to the King, who would not then break with France, and our Fleet must have gone down to Gibraltar to have watered, and the battle of the Nile would not have been fought, for the French fleet would have got back to Toulon."

The natural conclusion to draw from these documents is that the Queen's letter, forwarded to Nelson by Emma, contained promises of further letters to the Governors of Sicilian ports —not simply the Queen's general order which Emma had obtained for him already, but something which was not sent to him till later. In the Codicil to his Will, Nelson says—

" The British fleet under my command could never have returned a second time to Egypt had not Lady Hamilton's influence with the Queen of Naples caused letters to be wrote to the Governor of Syracuse, that he was to encourage the fleet to be supplied with everything, should they put into any port in Sicily. We put into Syracuse, and received every supply ; went to Egypt and destroyed the French fleet."

But before he went to Egypt that second triumphant time he had a futile voyage to Alexandria, bringing him nothing but mental distress

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and disappointment. He longed to