"Aye, to be sure. . . . Read, Tylney. Don't sit there clearing your
throat, but read, man alive!" And yet it appeared that while the
Secretary was willing enough to read, the First Lord had no capacity,
as yet, to listen. Into the very first sentence he broke with--

"No, wait a minute. 'Dead,' d'ye say? . . . My God! . . .
Lieutenant, pour yourself a glass of wine and tell us first how it
happened."

Lieutenant Lapenotiere could not tell very clearly. He had twice
been summoned to board the _Royal Sovereign_--he first time to
receive the command to hold himself ready. It was then that, coming
alongside the great ship, he had read in all the officers' faces an
anxiety hard to reconcile with the evident tokens of victory around
them. At once it had occurred to him that the Admiral had fallen,
and he put the question to one of the lieutenants--to be told that
Lord Nelson had indeed been mortally wounded and could not live long;
but that he must be alive yet, and conscious, since the _Victory_ was
still signalling orders to the Fleet.

"I think, my lord," said he, "that Admiral Collingwood must have been
doubtful, just then, what responsibility had fallen upon him, or how
soon it might fall. He had sent for me to 'stand by' so to speak.
He was good enough to tell me the news as it had reached him--"

Here Lieutenant Lapenotiere, obeying the order to fill his glass, let
spill some of the wine on the table. The sight of the dark trickle
on the mahogany touched some nerve of the brain: he saw it widen into
a pool of blood, from which, as they picked up a shattered seaman and
bore him below, a lazy stream crept across the deck of the flag-ship