loft and broke in
a curve of stars in the black sky. It was one of Nelson's repeating
frigates signalling to the British fleet, far off to the south-west,
Villeneuve's movements. Nelson for more than a week had been trying to
daintily coax Villeneuve out of Cadiz, as an angler might try to coax a
much-experienced trout from the cool depths of some deep pool. He kept
the main body of his fleet sixty leagues distant--west of Cape St.
Mary--but kept a chain of frigates within signalling distance of each
other betwixt Cadiz and himself. He allowed the news that he had
detached five of his line-of-battle ships on convoy duty to the eastward
to leak through to the French admiral, but succeeded in keeping him in
ignorance of the fact that he had called in under his flag five ships of
equal force from the westward.

On October 19, Villeneuve, partly driven by hunger, and by the news that
a successor was on the road from Paris to displace him, and partly
tempted by the belief that he had before him a British fleet of only
twenty-one ships of the line, crept out of Cadiz with thirty-three ships
of the line--of which three were three-deckers--and seven frigates.
Nelson had twenty-seven sail of the line with four frigates. The wind
was light, and all through the 20th, Villeneuve's fleet, formed in seven
columns--the _Santissima Trinidad_ towering like a giant amongst
them--moved slowly eastward. Nelson would not alarm his foe by making
too early an appearance over the sky-line. His frigates signalled to him
every few minutes, through sixty miles of sea-air, the enemy's movements;
but Nelson himself held aloof till Villeneuve was too far from Cadiz to
make a dash back to it and safety. All through the night of the 20th,
Villeneuve's great fleet--a procession of mighty phantoms--was dimly
visible against the Spanish coast, and the British frigates sent the news
in alternate pulses of sound and flame to Nelson, by this time eagerly
bearing up from Cape St. Mary.

The morning of the 21st broke misty, yet bright. The sea was almost like
a floor of glass. The faintest of sea-airs blew. A lazy Atlantic swell
rolled at long intervals towards the Straits, and the two fleets at last
were visible to each other. Villeneuve's ships stretched a waving and
slightly curved line, running north and south, with no regularity of
order. The British fleet, in two compact and parallel columns, half a
mile apart, came majestically on from th