Collected works > Edinburgh edition, 1894-98 - Works of Robert Louis Stevenson > Volume 11, 1895 - Miscellanies, Volume III

THE ENGLISH ADMIRALS
could not lie still in his bunk after he had lost his
leg ; he must be on deck in a basket to direct and
animate the fight. I said they loved war like a
mistress ; yet I think there are not many mistresses
we should continue to woo under similar circum-
stances. Trowbridge went ashore with the Culloden,
and was able to take no part in the battle of the
Nile. ' The merits of that ship and her gallant
captain,' wrote Nelson to the Admiralty, 'are too
well known to benefit by anything I could say.
Her misfortune was great in getting aground, while
her more fortunate companio7is were in the full tide
of happiness.' This is a notable expression, and
depicts the whole great-hearted, big-spoken stock
of the English Admirals to a hair. It was to be ' in
the full tide of happiness ' for Nelson to destroy five
thousand five hundred and twenty-five of his fellow-
creatures, and have his own scalp torn open by a
piece of langridge shot. Hear him again at Copen-
hagen : ' A shot through the mainmast knocked the
splinters about; and he observed to one of his
officers with a smile, "It is warm work, and this
may be the last to any of us at any moment " ; and
then, stopping short at the gangway, added, with
emotion, " But, mark you — / would not he elsewhere
for thousands." '
I must tell one more story, which has lately been
made familiar to us all, and that in one of the noblest
ballads in the Enghsh language. I had written my
tame prose abstract, I shall beg the reader to believe,
when I had no notion that the sacred bard designed
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