r Sidney Smith's letters, luckily blending his
naval and ministerial characters, so outraged Lord Nelson's nice sense
of propriety, that it renewed all those keen sensations of inquietude
which had been so recently tranquilized in our hero's breast.

This circumstance produced the following letter to Sir Sidney Smith;
which serves to shew that his lordship, though displeased on the
occasion, was not altogether unjust in requiring better future
discrimination.

"Vanguard, Palermo,
8th March 1799.

"SIR,

"I have received your letters of January the 23d, February 6th,
10th, and 23d. Your situation as Joint-Minister at the Porte, makes
it absolutely necessary that I should know who writes to me:
therefore, I must direct you, whenever you have ministerial affairs
to communicate, that it is done jointly with your respectable
brother, and not mix naval business with the other; for, what may
be very proper language for a representative of majesty, may be
very subversive of that dicipline of respect from the different
ranks in our service. A representative may dictate to an admiral, a
captain of a man of war would be censured for the same thing:
therefore, you will see the propriety of my steering close between
the two situations. I have sent you my orders, which your abilities
as a sea-officer will lead you to punctually execute. Not a ship
more than the service requires shall be kept on any particular
station; and that number must be left to my judgment, as an admiral
commanding the squadron detached by the commander in chief to the
extent of the Black Sea. I shall, of course, keep up a proper
communication with the Turkish and Russian admirals, which net
captain of a man of war under my orders must, interfere in. I am,
Sir, your very humble servant,

"Nelson."

"Sir William Sidney Smith."

The above epistle, which was accompanied by a regular order, dated the
preceding day, for Sir William Sidney Smith, captain of his majesty's
ship Le Tigre, to put himself under Lord Nelson's command may certainly
be considered as sufficiently severe; and, it is probable, his lordship
was of that opinion: but he judged it necessary, for his own comfort
thus plainly to deliver his sentiments, however painful the task, that
he might escape any repetitions of what must continue to excite
unpleasant feelings