ve been done. The Corniche coast route into Italy,
the only one at first open to the French, was exposed at many points
to fire from ships at sea, and much of the French army supplies as
well as their heavy artillery had to be transported in boats along
the coast. "The British fleet could have prevented the invasion
of Italy," wrote Nelson five years later, "if our friend Hotham
[who had succeeded Hood as commander in chief in the Mediterranean]
had kept his fleet on that coast."[1] Hotham felt, perhaps rightly,
that the necessity of watching the French ships at Toulon made this
impossible. But had the Toulon fleet been destroyed or effectually
crippled at either of the two opportunities which offered in 1795, no
such need would have existed; the British fleet would have dominated
the Mediterranean, and exercised a controlling influence on the
wavering sympathies of the Italian states and Spain. At the first
of these opportunities, on the 13th and 14th of March, Hotham said
they had done well enough in capturing two French ships-of-the-line.
"Now," remarked Nelson, whose aggressive pursuit had led to the
capture, "had we taken 10 sail and allowed the 11th to escape,
when it had been possible to have got at her, I should not have
called it well done." And again of the second encounter: "To say how
much we wanted Lord Hood on the 13th of July, is to say, 'Will you
have all the French fleet, or no action?'" History, and especially
naval history, is full of might-have-beens. Aggressive action
establishing naval predominance might have prevented Napoleon's
brilliant invasion and conquest of Italy; Spain would then have
steered clear of the French alliance; and the Egyptian campaign
would have been impossible.

[Footnote 1: DISPATCHES, June 6, 1800.]

The succession of Sir John Jervis to the Mediterranean command
in November, 1795, instituted at once a new order of things, in
which inspiring leadership, strict discipline, and closest attention
to the health of crews, up-keep vessels, and every detail of ship
and fleet organization soon brought the naval forces under him to
what has been judged the highest efficiency attained by any fleet
during the war. Jervis had able subordinates--Nelson, Collingwood
and Troubridge, to carry the list no further; but he may claim a
kind of paternal share in molding the military character of these
men.

Between Jervis and Nelson in particular there existed ever the
warmest mutual confide