l less did he regard
the discouraging suggestions of ignorant and designing pilots, whose
exaggerated accounts of the difficulties to be surmounted, when the
commander in chief had resolved on forcing the passage of the Sound,
represented the enterprise as more practicable, and less hazardous, by
the circuitous passage of the Great Belt. Though Lord Nelson's mind
could not be thus induced to fluctuate, and was decidedly for the
immediate passage of the Sound, when the Great Belt appeared to be
preferred--"Let us, then, go by the Great Belt!" said the hero.
Impatient for action, he was desirous of proceeding by any way which
might soonest lead to the object.

On the 26th, at day-break, the fleet got under weigh, and stood to the
westward; for the purpose, as was generally imagined, of passing the
Great Belt; and Captain Murray, of the Edgar, who had, the preceding
summer, surveyed that entrance to the Baltic with a degree of precision
hitherto unknown, tendered his services for the purpose. The facility
with which this passage might be effected, by the aid of so active and
intelligent an officer, where the Danes had only a single guard-ship,
left little room to doubt that it would be adopted. This, however, was
not done. Several vessels from the Baltic, on this and the following
day, passed the Sound, under Prussian colours; and they were permitted
to proceed, notwithstanding it was then sufficiently ascertained that
Prussia had also acceded to this confederacy against Great Britain.

On the 27th, Sir Hyde Parker, acting under his instructions, dispatched
a flag of truce, with the following note, to the Governor of Cronenberg
Castle,

"From the hostile transactions of the Court of Denmark, and sending
away his Britannic Majesty's Charge d'Affaires, the commander in
chief of his majesty's fleet is anxious to know what the
determination of the Danish Court is--and whether the commanding
officer of Cronenberg Castle has received orders to fire on the
British fleet as they pass into the Sound?--as he must deem the
firing; of the first gun a declaration of war on the part of
Denmark.

"Hyde Parker."

To these enquiries, this answer was returned by the Danish Governor.

"I have the honour to inform your excellency, that his Majesty, the
King of Denmark, did not send away the Charge d'Affaires; but that,
on his own demand, he obtained a passport. As a soldier,