overpowering numbers, could not turn aside to crush the small antagonist, which one of her broadsides might have swept out of existence; yet even so, the frigate decided the issue, for she shot away the main and mizzen topmasts of the French vessel, permitting the remainder of the British to come up.  No ship was ever more gallantly fought than the “Guillaume Tell;” the scene would have been well worthy even of Nelson’s presence.  More could not be said, but Nelson was not there.  She had shaken off the “Penelope” and the “Lion,” sixty-four, when the “Foudroyant” drew up at six in the morning.  “At half-past six,” says the latter’s log, “shot away the [French] main and mizen-masts:  saw a man nail the French ensign to the stump of the mizen-mast.  Five minutes past eight, shot away the enemy’s foremast.  Ten minutes past eight, all her masts being gone by the board, the enemy struck his colours, and ceased firing.”  The last of the fleet in Aboukir Bay had surrendered to Nelson’s ship, but not to Nelson’s flag.

“I am sensible,” he wrote from Palermo to Sir Edward Berry, the captain of the “Foudroyant,” “of your kindness in wishing my presence at the finish of the Egyptian fleet, but I have no cause for sorrow.  The thing could not be better done, and I would not for all the world rob you of one particle of your well-earned laurels.”  In the matter of glory Nelson might well yield much to another, nor miss what he gave; but there is a fitness in things, and it was not fitting that the commander of the division should have been away from his post when such an event was likely to happen.  “My task is done, my health is lost, and the orders of the great Earl St. Vincent are completely fulfilled.”  “I have wrote to Lord Keith,” he tells Spencer, “for permission to return to England, when you will see a broken-hearted man.  My spirit cannot submit patiently.”  But by this time, if the forbearance of the First Lord was not exhausted, his patience very nearly was, and a letter had already been sent, which, while couched in terms of delicate consideration, nevertheless betrayed the profound disappointment that had succeeded to admiration for services so eminent, and for a spirit once so indomitable:  “To your letter of the 20th of March, all I shall say is, to express my extreme regret that your health should be such as to oblige you to quit your station off Malta, at a time when I should suppose there must be the finest prospect of its reduction.  I should be very sorry that you did not accomplish that business in person, as the Guillaume Tell is your due, and that ship ought not to strike to any other.  If the enemy should come into the Mediterranean, and whenever they do, it will be suddenly, I should be much concerned to hear that you learnt of their arrival in that sea, either on shore or in a transport at Palermo.”