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

THE ENGLISH ADMIRALS
that way. The best artist is not the man who fixes
his eye on posterity, but the one who loves the
practice of his art. And instead of having a taste
for being successful merchants and retiring at thirty,
some people have a taste for high and what we call
heroic forms of excitement. If the Admirals courted
war like a mistress ; if, as the drum beat to quarters,
the sailors came gaily out of the forecastle, — it is
because a fight is a period of multiplied and intense
experiences, and, by Nelson's computation, worth
' thousands ' to any one who has a heart under his
jacket. If the marines of the Wager gave three
cheers and cried ' God bless the king,' it was because
they liked to do things nobly for their own satisfac-
tion. They were giving their lives, there was no
help for that ; and they made it a point of self-
respect to give them handsomely. And there were
never four happier marines in God's world than these
four at that moment. If it was worth thousands
to be at the Baltic, I wish a Benthamite arithmetician
would calculate how much it was worth to be one
of these four marines ; or how much their story is
worth to each of us who read it. And mark you,
undemonstrative men would have spoiled the situa-
tion. The finest action is the better for a piece
of purple. If the soldiers of the Birkenhead had not
gone down in line, or these marines of the Wager
had walked away simply into the island, like plenty
of other brave fellows in the like circumstances, my
Benthamite arithmetician would assign a far lower
value to the two stories. We have to desire a
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