from Leghorn with
the fleet, in company with which he remained from that time until the
following July, when he was sent to the Riviera of Genoa on special
detached service. He thus shared the severe cruising of that winter,
as well as the abortive actions of the spring and early summer, where
the admiral again contrived to lose opportunities of settling the sea
campaign, and with it, not improbably, that of the land also. There
were plain indications in the port of Toulon that a maritime
enterprise of some importance was in contemplation. In the outer road
lay fifteen sail-of-the-line, the British having then fourteen; but
more significant of the enemy's purpose was the presence at Marseilles
of fifty large transports, said to be ready. "I have no doubt," wrote
Nelson, "but Porto Especia is their object." This was a mistake,
interesting as indicating the slight weight that Nelson at that time
attributed to the deterrent effect of the British fleet "in being"
upon such an enterprise, involving an open-sea passage of over a
hundred miles, though he neither expressed nor entertained any
uncertainty as to the result of a meeting, if the enemy were
encountered. The French Government, not yet appreciating the
inefficiency to which its navy had been reduced by many concurrent
circumstances, was ready to dispute the control of the Mediterranean,
and it contemplated, among other things, a demonstration at Leghorn,
similar to that successfully practised at Naples in 1792, which might
compel the Court of Tuscany to renounce the formally hostile attitude
it had assumed at the bidding of Great Britain; but it does not appear
that there was any serious purpose of exposing a large detachment, in
the attempt to hold upon the Continent a position, such as Spezia,
with which secure communication by land could not be had.

Though none too careful to proportion its projects to the force at its
disposal, the Directory sufficiently understood that a detachment at
Spezia could not be self-dependent, nor could, with any certainty,
combine its operations with those of the army in the Riviera; and also
that, to be properly supported at all, there must be reasonably secure
and unbroken communication, either by land or water, neither of which
was possible until the British fleet was neutralized. The same
consideration dictated to it the necessity of a naval victory, before
sending out the expedition, of whose assembling the British were now
hear