On the 26th Nelson communicated with Cagliari, and learned that no landing had been attempted in Sardinia.  The same day the frigate “Phoebe” rejoined, with information that a French eighty-gun ship had anchored in Ajaccio on the evening of the 19th, dismasted and crippled.  Putting these facts together, and in connection with his own movements, he inferred conclusively that either the French had gone back to Toulon in consequence of injuries, or that they had given him the slip, had got round Sicily, and proceeded to the eastward.  The latter was improbable, because the westerly gales, as he had noted, could scarcely have allowed them to weather Maritimo[86]; it was not, however, impossible.  A return to Toulon was, antecedently, equally improbable, although it proved to be the alternative adopted by Villeneuve.  “Although I knew one of the French ships was crippled, yet I considered the character of Bonaparte; and that the orders given by him, on the banks of the Seine, would not take into consideration winds or weather; nor indeed could the accident of three or four ships alter, in my opinion,[87] a destination of importance:  therefore such an accident did not weigh in my mind, and I went first to the Morea and then to Egypt.”  This quotation is especially interesting, as it proves how closely Nelson scanned every known element in a problem, even to the temperament of his opponent; and it also shows the substantial agreement in judgment between him and Napoleon.  The latter, Thiers writes, “was sensibly displeased on hearing of this resultless sortie.  ‘What is to be done,’ he said, ’with admirals who allow their spirits to sink, and determine to hasten home at the first damage they receive?  All the captains ought to have had sealed orders to meet off the Canary Islands.  The damages should have been repaired en route.  A few topmasts carried away, some casualties in a gale of wind, were every-day occurrences.  But the great evil of our Navy is, that the men who command it are unused to all the risks of command.’”

Still without definite tidings, compelled to act upon his own inferences—­for merely doing nothing was action under such circumstances—­Nelson reasoned that, if the French had returned, he could not overtake them, and if they had gone east, he had no time to lose before following.  He fell back therefore from his windward position to the Straits of Messina, through which the whole squadron beat on the 31st of January—­“a thing unprecedented in nautical history,” he wrote to the Admiralty, “but although the danger from the rapidity of the current was great, yet so was the object of my pursuit; and I relied with confidence on the zeal and ability of the fleet under my command.”  The same day, knowing now that Sicily and Naples were not threatened, he despatched six cruisers for intelligence, “in all directions from Tunis to Toulon;” three of them being frigates, which were to rendezvous off the latter port and resume the watch of the French,