"I have directed the frigates to pursue them, even should they chase into Sardinia, and to take or destroy them, and also the Corsican troops; for if I wait till the island is taken I should feel deserving of reprobation.

Of course, they will say we have broken the neutrality, if we attack them in the ports of Sardinia before their conquest, and if we do not I shall be laughed at for a fool.
_Prevention is better than cure_." With his usual long-headed circumspection, however, even when most bent on an extreme step, he warns the Prime Minister, to whom he is writing, to mention his purpose to the Russian ambassador--that the latter may understand the apparent breach of neutrality; for Russia has constituted herself a champion of the Sardinian monarch.

"I mention my intention that idle reports may not be attended to." As the winter of 1803-4 approached, and it became evident that Spain was to persevere in her neutrality, Nelson removed his fleet to a rendezvous about thirty miles south of Cape San Sebastian, on the Spanish coast--the Number 97 continually mentioned in his official letters to captains.

There the highlands of Spain afford some shelter from the furious northerly gales, which, sweeping over France from the Atlantic, are compressed as in a funnel between the Pyrenees and the Alps, to fall with redoubled violence on the Gulf of Lyons.

Only the utmost care and the most skilful seamanship could preserve the rickety ships, upon whose efficiency so much depended, and which, if damaged, there was none to replace.