The Life Of Nelson, Volume I.

cottage," attracts, indeed, with its sense of repose, -- "I shall not be very sorry to see England again. I am grown old and battered to pieces, and require some repairs " -- but the magnet fails to deflect the needle; not even a perceptible vibration of the will is produced.

Yet, while thus engrossed in the war, eager for personal distinction and for the military honor of his country, he apparently sees in it little object beyond a mere struggle for superiority, and has no conception of the broader and deeper issues at stake, the recognition of which intensified and sustained the resolution of the peace-loving minister, who then directed the policy of Great Britain. Of this he himself gives the proof in a curious anecdote. An Algerine official visiting the "Captain" off Leghorn, Nelson asked him why the Dey would not make peace with the Genoese and Neapolitans, for they would pay well for immunity, as the Americans at that period always did. His answer was: "If we make peace with every one, what is the Dey to do with his ships?" "What a reason for carrying on a naval war!" said Nelson, when writing the story to Jervis; "but has our minister a better one for the present?" Jervis, a traditional Whig, and opposed in Parliament to the war, probably sympathized with this view, and in any case the incident shows the close confidence existing between the two officers; but it also indicates how narrowly Nelson's genius and unquestionable acuteness of intellect confined themselves, at that time, to the sphere in which he was visibly acting. In this he presents a marked contrast to Bonaparte, whose restless intelligence and impetuous imagination reached out in many directions, and surveyed from a lofty height the bearing of all things, far and near, upon the destinies of France.