On the 18th of July, Cape Spartel was sighted.  “No French fleet,” wrote the admiral in his diary, “nor any information about them:  how sorrowful this makes me, but I cannot help myself!” “I am, my dear Mr. Marsden,” he wrote to the Secretary of the Admiralty, “as completely miserable as my greatest enemy could wish me; but I blame neither fortune or my own judgment.  Oh, General Brereton!  General Brereton!” To his friend Davison he revealed yet more frankly the bitterness of his spirit, now that the last hope was dashed, and it was even possible that the mis-step of going to Trinidad had caused him to incur a further mistake, by leaving the allies in the West Indies.  “But for General Brereton’s damned information, Nelson,” he said, half prophetically, “would have been, living or dead, the greatest man in his profession that England ever saw.  Now alas!  I am nothing—­perhaps shall incur censure for misfortunes which may happen, and have happened.”

But if he himself were disappointed, and foreboded the discontent of others, the greatness of what he had done was quickly apparent, and received due recognition from thoughtful men.  “Either the distances between the different quarters of the globe are diminished,” wrote Mr. Elliot from Naples, “or you have extended the powers of human action.  After an unremitting cruise of two long years in the stormy Gulf of Lyons, to have proceeded without going into port to Alexandria, from Alexandria to the West Indies, from the West Indies back again to Gibraltar; to have kept your ships afloat, your rigging standing, and your crews in health and spirits—­is an effort such as never was realised in former times, nor, I doubt, will ever again be repeated by any other admiral.  You have protected us for two long years, and you saved the West Indies by only a few days.”  Thus truly summarized, such achievements are seen to possess claims to admiration, not to be exceeded even by the glory of Trafalgar.

Although no French fleet was visible, as Nelson approached the Straits, there were a half-dozen British ships-of-the-line, under the command of his old friend Collingwood, blockading Cadiz.  When Orde was driven off that station by Villeneuve on the 9th of April, and retired upon Brest, he had already sent in an application to be relieved from a duty which he himself had sought, and had held for so short a time; alleging a bundle of grievances which show clearly enough the impracticable touchiness of the man.  His request was at once granted.  Early in May, Collingwood was sent from England with eight sail-of-the-line for the West Indies; but learning on the way that Nelson had gone thither, he detached to him two of his swiftest seventy-fours, and, with great good judgment, himself took position off Cadiz, where he covered the entrance of the Mediterranean, and effectually prevented any ships from either Cartagena or Ferrol concentrating in the neighborhood of the Straits.