Trivial though these incidents may seem, they are so merely because they belong to the day of small things.  To those accustomed to watch children, they will not appear unworthy of note.  Taken together, they illustrate, as really as do his greatest deeds, the two forms assumed at different times by the one incentive which always most powerfully determined Nelson’s action through life,—­the motive to which an appeal was never made in vain.  No material considerations, neither danger on the one hand, nor gain on the other, ever affected him as did that idealized conception which presented itself, now as duty, now as honor, according as it bore for the moment upon his relations to the state or to his own personality.  “In my mind’s eye,” said he to his friend Captain Hardy, who afterwards bent over him as his spirit was parting amid the tumult of his last victory, “I ever saw a radiant orb suspended which beckoned me onward to renown.”  Nelson did not often verge upon the poetical in words, but to the poetry of lofty aspiration his inmost being always answered true.

To the young naval officer of a century ago, especially if without political or social influence, it was a weighty advantage to be attached to some one commanding officer in active employment, who by favorable opportunity or through professional friendships could push the fortunes of those in whom he was interested.  Much of the promotion was then in the hands of the admirals on foreign stations; and this local power to reward distinguished service, though liable to abuse in many ways, conduced greatly to stimulate the zeal and efforts of officers who felt themselves immediately under the eye of one who could make or mar their future.  Each naval captain, also, could in his degree affect more or less the prospects of those dependent upon him.  Thus Suckling, though not going to sea himself, continued with intelligent solicitude his promised care of the young Nelson.  When the “Raisonnable” was paid off, he was transferred to the command of the “Triumph,” of seventy-four guns, stationed as guard-ship in the river Medway; and to her also he took with him his nephew, who was borne upon her books for the two following years, which were, however, far from being a period of inactive harbor life.  Having considerable professional interest, he saw to the lad’s being kept afloat, and obtained for him from time to time such service as seemed most desirable to his enterprising spirit.

The distinction between the merchant seaman and the man-of-war’s man, or even the naval officer, in those days of sailing ships and simple weapons was much less sharply marked than it has since become.  Skill in seamanship, from the use of the marlinespike and the sail-needle up to the full equipping of a ship and the handling of her under canvas, was in either service the prime essential.  In both alike, cannon and small arms were carried; and the ship’s company, in the peaceful trader as well as in the