e force arrives which their Lordships have judged necessary;
but I trust that I shall be considered to have done right as a man,
and to a brother officer in affliction--my heart could not stand it,
and so the thing must rest. I shall submit to the wisdom of the Board
to censure me or not, as to them may seem best for the Service; I
shall bow with all due respect to their decision."

From the military point of view this step was indefensible, but it is
in singular keeping with Nelson's kindness of heart, his generosity of
temper, and with a certain recklessness of consequences,--when
supported by inward conviction of right, or swayed by natural
impulses,--which formed no small part of his greatness as a warrior.
"Numbers only can annihilate;" yet to spare the feelings of an unhappy
man, whom he believed to have been his enemy, he parted with one of
the best units from his numbers, although, even with her present, he
was inferior to the allies. He felt keenly, however, the
responsibility he assumed, not only towards the Admiralty, but towards
his own success and reputation. At one time he seems, with unusual
vacillation, even to have returned upon his decision, and to have
notified Calder that the ship could not be spared; for on the 12th of
October the latter wrote him: "The contents of your Lordship's letter
have cut me to the soul. If I am to be turned out of my ship, after
all that has passed, I have only to request I may be allowed to take
my Captain, and such officers as I find necessary for the
justification of my conduct as an officer, and that I may be permitted
to go without a moment's further loss of time. My heart is broken."
This appeal broke down all Nelson's power of resistance. He deprived
himself on the eve of battle of a first-rate ship, taking only the
precaution of sending his entire correspondence with Calder, public
and private, to explain his course, though scarcely to justify it. The
significance of this act is enhanced by the known importance which he
himself attached to the presence or absence of even a third-rate
ship-of-the-line. When the expedition to the Baltic was on the eve of
starting, a seventy-four went aground, in leaving the Downs.
Lieutenant Layman having been conspicuously instrumental in getting
her off, Nelson told him that he had in consequence written in his
favor to the Admiralty; and upon Layman's remarking that what he had
done scarcely deserved so much, the admiral replied, "