It is to the furtherance of these objects, all closely allied, and in his apprehension mutually dependent, that his occasional letters are directed.  His sphere of operations he plainly conceives to be from Malta, eastward, to Syria inclusive.  “I detest this voyage to Naples,” he wrote to St. Vincent, two days before reaching the port.  “Nothing but absolute necessity could force me to the measure.  Syracuse in future, whilst my operations lie on the eastern side of Sicily, is my port, where every refreshment may be had for a fleet.”  The present necessity was that of refit and repair, to which Syracuse was inadequate.  “For myself,” he sent word to Sir William Hamilton, “I hope not to be more than four or five days at Naples, for these times are not for idleness.”  Not long after his arrival this conviction as to the movements requiring his personal presence underwent an entire change; and thenceforth, till he left for England two years later, it was only the presence of clear emergency, appealing to his martial instincts and calling forth the sense of duty which lay at the root of his character, that could persuade him his proper place was elsewhere than at the Court of Naples.  It is only fair to add that, upon the receipt of the news of his great victory, the Admiralty designated to St. Vincent, as first in order among the cares of the squadron within the Mediterranean, “the protection of the coasts of Sicily, Naples, and the Adriatic, and, in the event of war being renewed in Italy, an active co-operation with the Austrian and Neapolitan armies.”  Long before these instructions were received, the very day indeed that they were written, Nelson had become urgently instrumental in precipitating Naples into war.  Next in order of interest, by the Admiralty’s letters, were, successively, the isolation of Egypt and of Malta, and co-operation with the Russian and Turkish squadrons which, it was expected, would be sent into the Archipelago, and which actually did attack and capture Corfu.  The letter thus summarized may be taken to indicate the general extent of Nelson’s charge during the two following years.

It may be said, then, without error, that Nelson’s opinion as to the direction of his personal supervision underwent a decisive change after his arrival in Naples.  Before it, he is urgent with that Court to support with active naval assistance the operations against Malta, and to send bomb-vessels, the absence of which he continually deplores, to shell the transports in the harbor of Alexandria.  He hopes, indeed, to find on his arrival that the Emperor and many other powers are at war with the French, but his attention is concentrated upon Bonaparte’s army.  To the British minister in Turkey he is yet more insistent as to what the Sultan should undertake.  If he will but send a few ships-of-the-line, and some bombs, he will destroy all their transports in Alexandria; and an army of ten thousand men may retake Alexandria immediately, as the French have only four thousand