couragement. A small outpost that withstood their
progress was by him intrepidly stormed, sword in hand, by sudden
assault; and upon reaching Fort San Juan he urgently recommended the
same summary method to the officer commanding the troops. The latter,
however, was not one of the men who recognize the necessity for
exceptional action. Regular approaches, though the slower, were the
surer way of reducing a fortified place, and entailed less bloodshed.
Professional rule commonly demanded them, and to professional rule he
submitted. Nelson argued that through delays, which, however incurred,
were now past discussion, the expedition had reached its destination
in April, at the end of the healthy, dry season, instead of shortly
after its beginning, in January. Consequently, owing to the fall of
the water, much additional trouble had been experienced in the
advance, the men were proportionately weakened by toil and exposure,
and the wet months, with their dire train of tropical diseases, were
at hand. Therefore, though more might fall by the enemy's weapons in a
direct attack, the ultimate loss would be less than by the protracted
and sickly labors of the spade; while with San Juan subdued, the force
could receive all the care possible in such a climate, and under the
best conditions await the return of good weather for further progress.

In military enterprises there will frequently arise the question, Is
time or life in this case of the greater value? Those regularly
ordered and careful procedures which most economize the blood of the
soldier may, by their inevitable delays, seriously imperil the objects
of the campaign as a whole; or they may even, while less sanguinary,
entail indirectly a greater loss of men than do prompter measures. In
such doubtful matters Nelson's judgment was usually sound; and his
instinct, which ever inclined to instant and vigorous action, was
commonly by itself alone an accurate guide, in a profession whose
prizes are bestowed upon quick resolve more often than upon deliberate
consultation. The same intuition that in his prime dictated his
instant, unhesitating onslaught at the Nile, depriving the French of
all opportunity for further preparation,--that caused him in the
maturity of his renown, before Copenhagen, to write, "every hour's
delay makes the enemy stronger; we shall never be so good a match for
them as at this moment,"--that induced him at Trafalgar to modify his
deliberately prepare