s accompanied to the ship by Mr. Canning and Mr. Rose, intimate
associates of Mr. Pitt, and they remained on board to dine. Nelson
noted that just twenty-five days had been passed ashore, "from dinner
to dinner." The next morning, Sunday, September 15th, at 8 A.M., the
"Victory" got under way and left St. Helen's, where she had been lying
at single anchor, waiting to start. Three other line-of-battle ships
belonging to his fleet, and which followed him in time for Trafalgar,
were then at Spithead, but not yet ready. The "Victory" therefore
sailed without them, accompanied only by Blackwood's frigate, the
"Euryalus." The wind outside, being west-southwest, was dead foul, and
it was not till the 17th that the ship was off Plymouth. There it fell
nearly calm, and she was joined by two seventy-fours from the harbor.
The little squadron continued its course, the wind still ahead, until
the 20th of the month, when it had not yet gained a hundred miles
southwest from Scilly. Here Nelson met his former long-tried second in
the Mediterranean, Sir Richard Bickerton, going home ill; having
endured the protracted drudgery off Toulon only to lose, by a hair's
breadth, his share in the approaching triumph.

On the 25th the "Victory" was off Lisbon. "We have had only one day's
real fair wind," wrote Nelson to Lady Hamilton, "but by perseverance
we have done much." The admiral sent in letters to the British consul
and naval officers, urging them to secure as many men as possible for
the fleet, but enjoining profound secrecy about his coming, conscious
that his presence would be a deterrent to the enemy and might prevent
the attempt to leave Cadiz, upon which he based his hopes of a speedy
issue, and a speedy return home for needed repose. His departure from
England, indeed, could not remain long unknown in Paris; but
communications by land were slow in those times, and a few days'
ignorance of his arrival, and of the reinforcement he brought, might
induce Villeneuve to dare the hazard which he otherwise might fear.
"Day by day," he wrote to Davison, "I am expecting the allied fleet to
put to sea--every day, hour, and moment." "I am convinced," he tells
Blackwood, who took charge of the inshore lookout, "that you estimate,
as I do, the importance of not letting these rogues escape us without
a fair fight, which I pant for by day, and dream of by night." For the
same reasons of secrecy he sent a frigate ahead to Collingwood, with
orders