The Life Of Nelson, Volume II.

enchanter wove his spells to rouse the demon of fear, their one effect was to bring up once more, over against him, the defiant form of his arch-subverter. Both the Prime Minister, Addington, and the First Lord of the Admiralty assured Nelson that his presence in charge of the dispositions for defense, and that only, could quiet the public mind. "I have seen Lord St. Vincent," he wrote the former, "and submit to your and his partiality. Whilst my health will allow, I can only say, that every exertion of mine shall be used to merit the continuance of your esteem." St. Vincent, writing to him a fortnight later, avowed frankly the weight attached to his very name by both friend and foe. "Our negotiation is drawing near its close, and must terminate one way or another in a few days, and, I need not add, how very important it is that the enemy should know that you are constantly opposed to him."

The purpose of Bonaparte in 1801 is not to be gauged by the same measure as that of 1803-1805. In 1798 he had told the then government of France that to make a descent upon England, without being master of the sea, would be the boldest and most difficult operation ever attempted. Conditions had not changed since then, nor had he now the time or the money to embark in the extensive preparations, which afterwards gave assurance that he was in earnest in his threats. An adept in making false demonstrations, perfectly appreciative of the power of a great name, he counted upon his own renown, and his amazing achievement of the apparently impossible in the past, to overawe the imagination of a nation, whose will, rather than whose strength, he hoped to subdue. Boulogne and the small neighboring ports, whose nearness clearly indicated them as the only suitable base from which an invasion could start, were in that year in no state to receive the boats necessary to carry an army. This the British could see with their own eyes; but who could be sure