nd details which
perplexed men's attention, and bringing into clear relief the one
field upon which the contest was finally to be fought out, and the
one foe, the British sea-power, upon whose strength and constancy
would hinge the issues of the struggle. The British Navy, in the
slight person of its indomitable champion, was gradually rising to the
appreciation of its own might, and gathering together its energies to
endure single-handed the gigantic strife, with a spirit unequalled in
its past history, glorious as that had often been. From 1796 began the
rapid ascent to that short noontide of unparalleled brilliancy, in
which Nelson's fame outshone all others, and which may be said to have
begun with the Spanish declaration of war, succeeded though that was
by the retreat in apparent discomfiture from the Mediterranean, now at
hand.

The approach of this extraordinary outburst of maritime vigor is aptly
foretokened in the complete change, gradual yet rapid, that passed
over Nelson's opinions, from the time when rumors of a Spanish war
first assumed probability, up to the moment when the fact became
tangible by the appearance of the Spanish fleet in the waters of
Corsica. Accentuated thus in a man of singular perceptions and heroic
instincts, it further affords an interesting illustration of the
manner in which a combative race--for Nelson was through and through a
child of his people--however at first averse to war, from motives of
well-understood interest, gradually warms to the idea, and finally
grows even to welcome the fierce joy which warriors feel, as the clash
of arms draws near. "If all the states of Italy make peace," he writes
on the 20th of May, "we have nothing to look to but Corsica; which in
the present state of the inhabitants, is not, in my opinion, an object
to keep us in the Mediterranean: we shall, I hope, quit it, and employ
our fleet more to our advantage." "Reports here," on the 20th of June,
"are full of a Spanish war. If that should be the case, we shall
probably draw towards Gibraltar and receive large reinforcements."

On the 15th of August, however, he writes to Jervis, betraying the
incipient revulsion, as yet not realized, against abandoning the
Mediterranean, which was already affecting the current of his
thoughts. "I hope we shall have settled Leghorn before the Dons, if
they intend it, arrive. I have still my doubts as to a Spanish war;
and if there should be one, with your management