completely successful, judged by the standards of
the time. "At this moment," wrote Nelson some few months later, "there
are nearly fifty sail employed in the trade between the Islands of St.
Kitts, Nevis, and America, which are truly British built, owned, and
navigated. Had I been an idle spectator, my firm belief is that not a
single vessel would have belonged to those islands in the foreign
trade." His own action was further endorsed by the ministry, which now
gave captains of ships-of-war much more extensive powers, thereby
justifying his contention that it was within their office to enforce
the Navigation Act. Nor was this increased activity of the executive
branch of the government the only result of Nelson's persistence. His
sagacious study of the whole question, under the local conditions of
the West Indies, led to his making several suggestions for more surely
carrying out the spirit of the Law; and these were embodied the next
year in a formal Act of the Legislature.

With so vivid a career as that of Nelson ahead, the delay imposed by
this wrangling episode is somewhat dreary; but it undeniably shows his
characteristics in the strongest light. Duty, not ease; honor, not
gain; the ideal, not the material,--such, not indeed without frailty
and blemish, were ever his motives. And, while he craved his reward in
the approval and recognition of those around and above him, he could
find consolation for the lack of them in his own sense of right-doing.
"That thing called Honour," he writes to a friend soon after the
"Boreas" cruise, "is now, alas! thought of no more. My integrity
cannot be mended, I hope; but my fortune, God knows, has grown worse
for the service; so much for serving my country. But I have invariably
laid down, and followed close, a plan of what ought to be uppermost in
the breast of an officer: that it is much better to serve an
ungrateful Country than to give up his own fame. Posterity will do him
justice; a uniform conduct of honour and integrity seldom fails of
bringing a man to the goal of fame at last."

This struggle with Sir Richard Hughes, in which Nelson took the
undesirable, and to a naval officer invidious, step of disobeying
orders, showed clearly, not only the loftiness of his motives, but the
distinguishing features which constituted the strength of his
character, both personal and military. There was an acute perception
of the right thing to do, an entire readiness to assume all the