Seeing the flags of truce flying, from the two castles and the “Seahorse,” and being under the impression that has been stated as to the terms of an armistice, which he called “infamous,” Nelson immediately made a signal annulling the truce, “being determined,” he wrote to Keith, “never to give my approbation to any terms with Rebels, but that of unconditional submission.”  As the execution of the capitulation depended upon the embarkation of the garrisons in the transports which were to be provided, Nelson was entirely master of the situation, so far as force went.  Next morning, June 25th, he moved his fleet of eighteen sail nearer in, mooring it in a close line of battle before the city, and at the same time sent for twenty-two gun and mortar vessels, then lying at the islands, with which he flanked the ships-of-the-line.  In this imposing array, significant at once of inexorable purpose and irresistible power, he sent to Ruffo his “opinion of the infamous terms entered into with the rebels,” and also two papers, to be by him forwarded to the insurgents and to the French.  From the latter, who had not treated, was required simply an unconditional surrender; but the message to the insurgents, sent, singularly enough, not from the representative of the King of Naples but from the British admiral, ran as follows:—­

    His Britannic Majesty’s Ship Foudroyant, Naples Bay, 25th June,
    1799.

Rear Admiral Lord Nelson, K.B., Commander of His Britannic Majesty’s Fleet in the Bay of Naples, acquaints the Rebellious Subjects of His Sicilian Majesty in the Castles of Uovo and Nuovo, that he will not permit them to embark or quit those places.  They must surrender themselves to His Majesty’s royal mercy.

    NELSON.

Ruffo refused to send the papers in, and said decisively that, if Nelson saw fit to break the armistice then existing, between the signature of the capitulation and its execution, he would aid neither with men nor guns.  Finally, he went on board the “Foudroyant;” but after an animated discussion, which rose nearly to an altercation, neither party yielded his ground.  “I used every argument in my power,” wrote Nelson, “to convince him that the Treaty and Armistice was at an end by the arrival of the fleet", and this therefore may be taken to summarize his own position.  He then gave the Cardinal a written opinion that the treaty was one that “ought not to be carried out without the approbation of His Sicilian Majesty.”  Neither his powers nor Ruffo’s, he argued, extended to granting such a capitulation.  Ruffo, indeed, had been expressly forbidden to do so; a fact which rendered the paper void from the first.  “Under this opinion,” reported Nelson to Keith, “the Rebels came out of the Castles;” “as they ought,” he wrote to his friend Davison, “and as I hope all those who are false to their King and Country will, to be hanged, or otherwise disposed of, as their sovereign thought proper.”  They were then placed in transports, which were anchored under the guns of the fleet; and in the end many of them were put to death.