their vile knavery in pleading poverty when they were asked to carry
out an act of common humanity. All very well for him to groan over
what he had to endure, and to complain that the burden of it had
broken his spirit! Troubridge diagnosed the malady when he implored
Nelson to relinquish the infatuation which was leading him into
trouble. Why, instead of spending his time with Lady Hamilton and
fawning over the King and Queen, did he leave the right thing to be
done by Captain Ball (who took the bull by the horns)? All very well
for him to pour out his wrath to the Duke of Clarence, that his
"constant thought was down, down with the damned French villains"! and
that his "blood boiled at the name of a Frenchman"! But except that we
were at war with the French, were they in any degree such "damned
villains" as the Neapolitans and the whole crew of Court knaves, with
whom he was so blindly enamoured, who were, in reality, ready to sell
their own country and his to the French whenever they saw it was to
their material advantage to do so?

Captain Ball did not waste time in the use of adjectives about the
French and the daily "anxieties" that bore so heavily on himself and
others, "breaking his heart." He gave peremptory orders to his first
lieutenant to proceed off Messina and seize the ships that were lying
there loaded with corn, and bring them to Malta. He defied the
abominable Court of Sicily and their edicts prohibiting exportation,
and his instructions were carried out. He awaited the consequences to
himself with a manly consciousness that humanity must take precedence
of orders dictated by a sentimental fear lest the feelings of a set of
cowardly despots should be hurt. This single act of real courage and
decision saved the lives of thousands of starving people, and
prevented the siege from being removed. The Court of Naples dared not
utter a word of condemnation against Captain Ball, but the Governor of