the same day, February 15, his lordship wrote also to his Excellency
Abdul Cadir Bek, Vice-Admiral of the Turkish fleet, likewise at Corfu,
with a similar request for ships and troops. "Your excellency, without
doubt," writes his lordship, "has heard of the melancholy news from
Naples. The French, not content with having, by perfidy, declared Naples
a republic, have forced a great part of Calabria to erect a Tree of
_Terror_, which these unbelievers call of _Liberty_; and their
emissaries are sowing the seeds of anarchy into this island,
particularly at Messina." His lordship adds, that as he has several
ships in Egypt, for the Grand Signior, he earnestly requests such
Turkish ships and troops as can be spared, to prevent Messina's falling
into the hands of the French.

On the 24th of February, Lord Nelson had the satisfaction to distribute
the following sums of money, given by his Sicilian Majesty, among the
several persons who assisted in conveying the Royal Family from Naples:
one thousand ounces of silver to the officers, seamen, and marines, of
his Britannic Majesty's ship the Vanguard, as a mark of the king's
approbation of their conduct during the time he was on board; one
hundred ounces to each of the two barges crews who brought off the royal
family from the palace; one hundred ounces to the admiral's servants;
and one hundred ounces to the barge's crew of the Alcmene. The thousand
ounces for the several persons on board the Vanguard were thus
apportioned, by his lordship's directions--The wardroom, one hundred
ounces; twenty-seven gentlemen of the quarter-deck, and
warrant-officers, four ounces each; five hundred and seventy-nine seamen
and marines, one and one-third of an ounce each; twenty-six boys, half
an ounce each; and a surplus of seven ounces, to be expended for general
use.

While Lord Nelson was busily exerting himself for the security of
Messina, as the key to the island of Sicily, the masters of English
merchant vessels at Palermo were impatient for convoy, that they might
convey their cargoes to Leghorn. On the hazard of visiting a place so
critically situated, he felt it his duty strongly to remonstrate; and,
aware how often danger is disregarded, where the loss is to fall on
underwriters, he even suggested the impropriety of thus incurring risks
which could not possibly be in the contemplation of the parties at the
time of effecting the insurances, before he gave his reluctant consent
for the