and restoration of British property.

The answer arrived on the 16th: Nelson, meantime, had exchanged visits
with the governor, and the most friendly intercourse had subsisted
between the ships and the shore. Alexander's ministers, in their reply,
expressed their surprise at the arrival of a British fleet in a Russian
port, and their wish that it should return: they professed, on the part
of Russia, the most friendly disposition towards Great Britain; but
declined the personal visit of Lord Nelson, unless he came in a single
ship. There was a suspicion implied in this which stung Nelson; and he
said the Russian ministers would never have written thus if their fleet
had been at Revel. He wrote an immediate reply, expressing what he felt;
he told the court of Petersburgh, "That the word of a British admiral,
when given in explanation of any part of his conduct, was as sacred as
that of any sovereign's in Europe." And he repeated, "that, under other
circumstances, it would have been his anxious wish to have paid his
personal respects to the emperor, and signed with his own hand the act
of amity between the two countries." Having despatched this, he stood
out to sea immediately, leaving a brig to bring off the provisions which
had been contracted for, and to settle the accounts. "I hope all is
right," said he, writing to our ambassador at Berlin; "but seamen are
but bad negotiators; for we put to issue in five minutes what diplomatic
forms would be five months doing."

On his way down the Baltic, however, he met the Russian admiral,
Tchitchagof, whom the emperor, in reply to Sir Hyde's overtures, had
sent to communicate personally with the British commander-in-chief. The
reply was such as had been wished and expected; and these negotiators
going, seamen-like, straight to their object, satisfied each other of
the friendly intentions of their respective governments. Nelson then
anchored off Rostock; and there he received an answer to his last
despatch from Revel, in which the Russian court expressed their regret
that there should have been any misconception between them; informed
him that the British vessels which Paul had detained were ordered to
be liberated, and invited him to Petersburgh, in whatever mode might
be most agreeable to himself. Other honours awaited him: the Duke of
Mecklenburgh Strelitz, the queen's brother, came to visit him on
board his ship; and towns of the inland parts of Mecklenburgh sent
deputations