e hand, calling him his deliverer and preserver. From all the boats
around he was saluted with the same appellations: the multitude who
surrounded him when he landed repeated the same enthusiastic cries;
and the lazzaroni displayed their joy by holding up birds in cages, and
giving them their liberty as he passed.

His birth-day, which occurred a week after his arrival, was celebrated
with one of the most splendid fetes ever beheld at Naples. But,
notwithstanding the splendour with which he was encircled, and the
flattering honours with which all ranks welcomed him, Nelson was fully
sensible of the depravity, as well as weakness, of those by whom he was
surrounded. "What precious moments," said he, "the courts of Naples and
Vienna are losing! Three months would liberate Italy! but this court is
so enervated that the happy moment will be lost. I am very unwell; and
their miserable conduct is not likely to cool my irritable temper. It is
a country of fiddlers and poets, whores and scoundrels." This sense of
their ruinous weakness he always retained; nor was he ever blind to
the mingled folly and treachery of the Neapolitan ministers, and the
complication in iniquities under which the country groaned; but he
insensibly, under the influence of Lady Hamilton, formed an affection
for the court, to whose misgovernment the miserable condition of the
country was so greatly to be imputed. By the kindness of her nature,
as well as by her attractions, she had won his heart. Earl St. Vincent,
writing to her at this time, says, "Pray do not let your fascinating
Neapolitan dames approach too near our invaluable friend Nelson, for he
is made of flesh and blood, and cannot resist their temptations." But
this was addressed to the very person from whom he was in danger.

The state of Naples may be described in few words. The king was one of
the Spanish Bourbons. As the Caesars have shown us to what wickedness
the moral nature of princes may be perverted, so in this family, the
degradation to which their intellectual nature can be reduced has been
not less conspicuously evinced. Ferdinand, like the rest of his race,
was passionately fond of field sports, and cared for nothing else.
His queen had all the vices of the house of Austria, with little to
mitigate, and nothing to ennoble them--provided she could have her
pleasures, and the king his sports, they cared not in what manner the
revenue was raised or administered. Of course a system of