judgment; and if, under all circumstances, it is decided that I am
wrong, I ought, for the sake of our country, to be superseded; for at
this moment, when I know the French are not in Alexandria, I hold the
same opinion as off Cape Passaro--that, under all circumstances, I was
right in steering for Alexandria; and by that opinion I must stand or
fall." Captain Ball, to whom he showed this paper, told him he should
recommend a friend never to begin a defence of his conduct before he
was accused of error: he might give the fullest reasons for what he had
done, expressed in such terms as would evince that he had acted from the
strongest conviction of being right; and of course he must expect that
the public would view it in the same light. Captain Ball judged rightly
of the public, whose first impulses, though, from want of sufficient
information, they must frequently be erroneous, are generally founded
upon just feelings. But the public are easily misled, and there are
always persons ready to mislead them. Nelson had not yet attained that
fame which compels envy to be silent; and when it was known in England
that he had returned after an unsuccessful pursuit, it was said that
he deserved impeachment; and Earl St. Vincent was severely censured for
having sent so young an officer upon so important a service.

Baffled in his pursuit, he returned to Sicily. The Neapolitan ministry
had determined to give his squadron no assistance, being resolved to
do nothing which could possibly endanger their peace with the French
Directory; by means, however, of Lady Hamilton's influence at court, he
procured secret orders to the Sicilian governors; and under those
orders obtained everything which he wanted at Syracuse--a timely supply;
without which, he always said, he could not have recommenced his pursuit
with any hope of success. "It is an old saying," said he in his letter,
"that the devil's children have the devil's luck. I cannot to this
moment learn, beyond vague conjecture, where the French fleet have gone