Nelson, however, writing in May, 1804, says: "I had wrote a memoir, many months ago, upon the propriety of a flotilla.

I had that command at the end of the last war, and I know the necessity of it, even had you, and which you ought to have, thirty or forty sail of the line in the Downs and North Sea, besides frigates &c.; but having failed so entirely in submitting my mind upon three points I was disheartened." This Memoir has not been preserved, but it will be noticed that, in expressing his difference from St.Vincent in the words quoted, he assumes, what did not at any time exist, thirty or forty sail-of-the-line for the North Sea and the Downs.

St.Vincent's stand was taken on the position that the flotilla could not be manned without diminishing the cruisers in commission, which were far short of the ideal number named by Nelson.

It may be believed, or at least hoped, that if forced to choose between the two, as St.Vincent was, his choice would have been that of the great Earl.

It seems clear, however, that in 1804 he believed it possible that the Army of Invasion _might_ get as far as the shores of England--a question which has been much argued.