saw her powerful influence over prominent men and women whom they
themselves bored. Some importance must be given to her husband's
position as British representative; his influence must have been
great, especially in Neapolitan circles. This would help her natural
gifts of fascination, even though her breeding and education did not
reach the standard of her blue-blooded critics. She had something that
stood her in greater stead than breeding and education: she had the
power of enslaving gallant hearts and holding them in thrall with many
artful devices. They liked her Bohemianism, her wit, her geniality,
her audacious slang, and her collection of droll epithets that
fittingly described her venomous critics of a self-appointed nobility.
When she could not reach the heights of such superior persons she
proceeded to ridicule them with a tongue that rattled out vivid
invective which outmatched anything they could say of _her_. It
probably made her more enemies, but it satisfied her temper and
pleased her admirers. She never appears to have been conscious of any
inferiority in herself. We are inclined to agree with the opinion
expressed by the naval lieutenant at Naples, who said "She was a very
handsome, vulgar woman." All her portraits confirm what the sailor
says about her beauty, and the most reliable records are confirmatory
so far as his view of her vulgarity is concerned.

But in any case, whatever may have been her physical dimensions, they
were not understated by the crowd who gave vent to their aversion in
this and in many other deplorable ways. There are only a few
evidences of Nelson being aware of and resenting some of the
disparaging remarks made about his "wife in the sight of Heaven," and
these do not seem to have diminished his infatuation for her. He was
accustomed to say in connection with his professional duties that
whenever he followed his own head he was in general much more correct