We need not waste time or space in dilating on what would have happened to Nelson had he put at defiance the authority that controlled him and the irreparable disaster that would have followed.  Villeneuve has been belauded for his gallantry in the fight at Trafalgar; indeed, we learn, from sources that may be relied upon, that his bravery, dispositions in battle, and art of enthusing his followers could not be surpassed.  His signals to the fleet were almost identical with Nelson’s.  Here is one:  “Celui qui ne serait pas dans le feu ne serait pas a son poste”; the literal translation of which is:  “He who would not be in the fire would not be at his post”; or, “The man who would hold his post must stand fire,” which is quite an inspiring signal.  But I wonder what the eulogists of Villeneuve would have written of him had he been the victor instead of the defeated.  It is generous to give praise to the unfortunate Admiral for whom Nelson had such an aversion and who was constantly threatened by him with vigorous chastisement when he caught him; but generosity was not the motive—­it was only part of the loose-lipped, unclean policy of decrying Napoleon.  It is horrible, ungrateful, and foul brutishness of the Corsican tyrant to court-martial so amiable and brave a man as Villeneuve because he proceeded out of Cadiz against orders and suffered a crushing defeat!  It is quite permissible for a French admiral to put authority at defiance if doing so complies with the sentiments of anti-Napoleon writers, who were either ill-informed, purblind critics or eaten up with insincerity or moral malaria!  But it is the maintenance of discipline to have men like Sir John Byng court-martialled and shot after being tried, it is said, by a not entirely impartial court, on the supposition that he had neglected his duty in an engagement with the French off Minorca on the 20th May, 1756, and committed an error of judgment.  A rather remarkable method of enforcing discipline, to shoot an admiral for an error of judgment!

Take another case of high-ordered, solemn devotion to discipline:  Sir Robert Calder, who had gained an important victory over the French at Finisterre, was court-martialled, condemned and ruined, ostensibly because he did not achieve a greater victory.  The decisions of both cases were crimes, not desire for the maintenance of discipline.  It was, and ever will be, a stain on the name of justice.  I need not carry this further, except to say that according to the solemn logic of some writers, it was murder for Napoleon or some of his ministers to have the Duc d’Enghien shot for having conspired with others for the overthrow of the established French Government, but it is the saintly enforcement of discipline to have a British admiral shot and another ruined for no other reason than an error of judgment on the one hand and an insufficient victory on the other.  Sir Robert Calder’s heart was broken by cruelty.  Villeneuve lost his fleet and killed himself, not