of the ports in the Bay, I shall join the
squadron off Ferrol, or off Ushant, as I think the case requires."
There will be observed here the same striking combination of rapidity,
circumspection, and purpose prepared by reflection for instant action
in emergencies, that characterized him usually, and especially in
these four months of chase. "The squadron is in the most perfect
health," he continues, "except some symptoms of scurvy, which I hope
to eradicate by bullocks and refreshments from Tetuan, to which I will
proceed to-morrow." The getting fresh beef at Tetuan, it will be
remembered, had been stopped by a fair wind on the 5th of May. Since
then, and in fact since a month earlier, no opportunity of obtaining
fresh provisions had offered during his rapid movements. "The fleet
received not the smallest refreshment, not even a cup of water in the
West Indies," he told the Queen of Naples. The admiral himself got
only a few sheep, in the nine days' round.

Even now, the intention to go to Tetuan, advisable as the step was,
was contingent upon the opportunity offering of reaching a position
whence he could move with facility. Nelson did not mean to be
back-strapped again within the Mediterranean, with a west wind, and a
current setting to leeward, if the enemy turned up in the Atlantic.
"If the wind is westerly," he wrote on the early morning of the 22d,
"I shall go to Tetuan: if easterly, out of the straits." At half-past
nine that day the fleet weighed, and at half-past seven in the evening
anchored at Tetuan, whither orders had already gone to prepare
bullocks and fresh vegetables for delivery. At noon of the 23d the
ships again lifted their anchors, and started. "The fleet is
complete," he wrote the First Lord that day, "and the first easterly
wind, I shall pass the Straits." Fortune apparently had made up her
mind now to balk him no more. Thirty-six hours later, at 3.30 A.M. of
July 25th, being then off Tarifa, a little west of Gibraltar, the
sloop-of-war "Termagant," one of his own Mediterranean cruisers, came
alongside, and brought him a newspaper, received from Lisbon,
containing an account of the report carried to England by the
"Curieux." "I know it's true," he wrote to the Admiralty, "from my
words being repeated, therefore I shall not lose a moment, after I
have communicated with Admiral Collingwood, in getting to the
northward to either Ferrol, Ireland, or Ushant; as information or
circumstances may point