Volume II Part 3 (1/2)
”Palermo, 9th Feb. 1799.
”MY DEAR FRIEND,
”I well know, your own goodness of heart will make all due allowances for my present situation; in which, truly, I have not the time, or power, to answer all the letters I receive, at the moment. But you, my old friend, after twenty-seven years acquaintance, know that nothing can alter my attachment and grat.i.tude to you. I have been your scholar. It was you who taught me to board a Frenchman, by your conduct when in the Experiment. It is you who always hold--”Lay a Frenchman close, and you will beat him!” And my only merit in my profession is, being a good scholar.
Our friends.h.i.+p will never end, but with my life: but, you have always been too partial to me.
”Pray tell Kingsmill, that it was impossible I could attend to his recommendation. Indeed, I had, not being a commander in chief, no power to name an agent. Remember me kindly to him.
”The Vesuvian republic being fixed, I have now to look out for Sicily: but revolutionary principles are so prevalent in the world, that no monarchical government is safe, or sure of lasting ten years.
”I beg you will make my kindest remembrances to Miss Locker, and all your good sons; and believe me, ever, your faithful and affectionate friend,
”Nelson.”
”Lieutenant-Governor Locker, Royal Hospital, Greenwich.”
As the Vesuvian republic had been now formed on the ruins of the Neapolitan monarchy, under the protection of the French, and was consequently at war with Great Britain, Lord Nelson gave directions for the property of all persons who had not left this new state to be seized as lawful prize. Application was again made to the emperor; a survey taken of the island, for the purpose of ascertaining it's strength and security; and every endeavour used to obtain, during the war, a truce with Tunis and Tripoli. The opinion of Lord Nelson, with regard to the safety of Sicily, is conveyed in the following letter to Sir John Acton, Bart, expressly on that subject.
”Palermo, Feb. 11, 1799.
”MY DEAR SIR,
”I have to thank your excellency for the honour of your letter; and for sending, for my perusal, the report of various officers on the situation of this island, and of it's means of defence. Respecting an invasion of the French, _in propria persona_, I own, I have no alarms; for, if this island is true to itself, no harm can happen: but, I own my fears, that revolutionary principles may be sown here; and, the seasons being propitious to the growth, will produce fruit. If the emperor will not move, and save--(himself, for his throne must fall if the late measures of his councils are persisted in)--the good King, Queen, and Family of Naples, in the possession of their kingdoms; we may lament, but what must follow is certain.
Having thus openly declared my general opinion, it is perfectly proper, no doubt, to be prepared for defence; and, if Calabria is occupied by the French, the first object is the preservation of Messina and the Torre del Faro. As to the other ports of the island, if the inhabitants are loyal, the French may be defied; they will not venture their carcases. But, indeed, my dear Sir, it is on the fidelity of the islanders we must depend for it's defence. When Captain Troubridge returns from Egypt, I shall have the power of having more s.h.i.+ps on the east coast: as to Palermo, it shall never be without a proper defence in s.h.i.+pping from all attacks by sea; that is, from what the French have at present in the Mediterranean. In all other things, I beg that your excellency will have the goodness to a.s.sure his Sicilian Majesty, that nothing shall be wanting, on my part, for the defence of his kingdoms, and whatever can administer to his comforts; and I beg your excellency will believe with what great respect I am your most faithful and obedient servant,
”Nelson.”
The safety of Messina appearing to be the first object for the preservation of Sicily from the French, five hundred troops were immediately ordered thither by the Portuguese s.h.i.+ps; and his lords.h.i.+p also urged his Excellency, the Vice-Admiral Theodore Uschakoff, who commanded the Russian fleet then before Corfu, to send as many s.h.i.+ps and troops as possible to Messina, for the promotion of the common cause, and the good of his Sicilian Majesty in particular.
On the same day, February 15, his lords.h.i.+p wrote also to his Excellency Abdul Cadir Bek, Vice-Admiral of the Turkish fleet, likewise at Corfu, with a similar request for s.h.i.+ps and troops. ”Your excellency, without doubt,” writes his lords.h.i.+p, ”has heard of the melancholy news from Naples. The French, not content with having, by perfidy, declared Naples a republic, have forced a great part of Calabria to erect a Tree of _Terror_, which these unbelievers call of _Liberty_; and their emissaries are sowing the seeds of anarchy into this island, particularly at Messina.” His lords.h.i.+p adds, that as he has several s.h.i.+ps in Egypt, for the Grand Signior, he earnestly requests such Turkish s.h.i.+ps and troops as can be spared, to prevent Messina's falling into the hands of the French.
On the 24th of February, Lord Nelson had the satisfaction to distribute the following sums of money, given by his Sicilian Majesty, among the several persons who a.s.sisted in conveying the Royal Family from Naples: one thousand ounces of silver to the officers, seamen, and marines, of his Britannic Majesty's s.h.i.+p the Vanguard, as a mark of the king's approbation of their conduct during the time he was on board; one hundred ounces to each of the two barges crews who brought off the royal family from the palace; one hundred ounces to the admiral's servants; and one hundred ounces to the barge's crew of the Alcmene. The thousand ounces for the several persons on board the Vanguard were thus apportioned, by his lords.h.i.+p's directions--The wardroom, one hundred ounces; twenty-seven gentlemen of the quarter-deck, and warrant-officers, four ounces each; five hundred and seventy-nine seamen and marines, one and one-third of an ounce each; twenty-six boys, half an ounce each; and a surplus of seven ounces, to be expended for general use.
While Lord Nelson was busily exerting himself for the security of Messina, as the key to the island of Sicily, the masters of English merchant vessels at Palermo were impatient for convoy, that they might convey their cargoes to Leghorn. On the hazard of visiting a place so critically situated, he felt it his duty strongly to remonstrate; and, aware how often danger is disregarded, where the loss is to fall on underwriters, he even suggested the impropriety of thus incurring risks which could not possibly be in the contemplation of the parties at the time of effecting the insurances, before he gave his reluctant consent for their departure.
This great man was indifferent to nothing by which either national or individual honour might be affected. A just sense of Lord Nelson's services, in this respect, has probably contributed, in no slight degree, to the extreme popularity of that most laudable inst.i.tution for the relief of suffering seamen and marines, and their distressed families, so happily commenced and continued by the Committee at Lloyd's. Nor is, perhaps, the idea very chimerical, when we reflect on the magnitude of the contributions, which looks forward to a possible permanent establishment, at no distant day, on this very basis; in which the voluntary subscriptions of benevolent and opulent individuals shall almost vie, in the extent of it's charity to this meritorious cla.s.s of society, whose services can alone preserve the united kingdom and it's extended commerce in full security, with the grand and munificent public endowment which so n.o.bly adorns our country at Greenwich: to which, also, some national augmentation might, with much propriety, be at the same time made; not only to keep pace with the increase of our navy, but to afford an equally needful asylum for those deserving and greatly exposed auxiliaries, the unfortunate and superannuated Royal Marines. A sight of such n.o.ble inst.i.tutions, with suitable pictures and statues of naval heroes and their glorious atchievements, in which Lord Nelson and his transcendent actions must for ever stand pre-eminently conspicuous, would far surpa.s.s, in genuine grandeur, perhaps, and certainly in rational and philosophical contemplation, the loftiest and most stupendous pillar or pyramid ever raised by human art and industry, for little other purpose than to attract the gaze of profitless admiration, with the vain attempt of mocking the powers of tempests and of time, by which the proudest of these trophied monuments must necessarily be bowed to subjection, and finally crumbled into dust. The solitary hermitage, which shelters a single h.o.a.ry head, is more interesting to the feeling heart than the proudest display of barren pomp that neither rises over the tomb of departed worth nor affords any living mortal a comfortable habitation. The grand naval pillar, to commemorate the battle off the Nile, for which a large sum was some years since subscribed, without any previously decided plan, and which is said to be still undisposed of, if employed in erecting a respectable edifice for the residence of those brave veterans by whom that battle was fought, and such of their successors, for ever, as should live to find such a residence desirable, might be so constructed and endowed, with the money contributed, as to afford a higher satisfaction to the subscribers; a superior, and perpetually renewable, memorial of the event; and a far more gratifying object of contemplation, even for such of the brave heroes who may never need such a sanctuary; than the loftiest and most embellished obelisk that human ingenuity can ever devise, or human industry execute. This is a subject on which the author could with pleasure dilate; and the promotion of which he would gladly a.s.sist, in every way, with all his slender abilities: but, at present, it is an agreeable reverie, in which he feels that he must no longer indulge.
He will, however, transcribe one of Lord Nelson's letters written on the subject which led to this digression, as a satisfactory proof of his lords.h.i.+p's attention to the mercantile interests of his country in that respect, and at this particular period.
”Palermo, 25th Feb. 1799.
”GENTLEMEN,
”I have received your letter of the 23d. I can a.s.sure you, I have always the greatest pleasure in paying attention to the representations of the masters of merchant s.h.i.+ps; who, at this distance, act for their owners in Great Britain. I can have no difficulty in granting you a convoy to Leghorn; but it is my duty to again point out to you the expressions of Mr. Windham's several letters, and the request of the English factory at Leghorn to Captain Louis: and, at the same time, you must be sensible that an English man of war cannot always lay in the neutral port; and I expect, that the Minotaur is now on her pa.s.sage to join me. If, under all these circ.u.mstances, you still persist in going to Leghorn, I will grant a convoy to that port as soon as possible.