On the voyage back from Alexandria be had busied himself with
vindications of his course in going there, manifesting again that
over-sensitiveness to the judgment of others, which contrasts so
singularly with his high resolve and self-dependence when assuming the
greatest responsibilities. To Ball, to the Admiralty, and to the First
Lord privately, he sent explanations of his action, accompanied by a
summary of his reasons. As the latter have been given, one by one, as
each step was taken, it is not necessary here to say more than that,
in the author's judgment, each successive movement was made upon good;
grounds, and rightly timed. This is true, although Nelson was entirely
misled as to Bonaparte's object. The ruse of the latter, as put into
effect by Villeneuve, not only deceived the British admiral, but, in
its issue, confounded the French. The critical moment of decision, for
the whole fruitless campaign, was when Nelson determined to go first
off Messina, then to the Morea, and finally to Egypt, upon the
inference that by this time one of three things must have happened.
Either (1) he must have met the French fleet, personally or by his
lookouts, or (2) it had returned to Toulon, or (3) it had gone on to
Egypt. The first being eliminated, the choice he made between the
others, wide as was the flight for which it called, was perfectly
accurate. It is difficult to know which most to admire,--the sagacity
which divined the actual, though not the intended, movements of the
enemy, the fiery eagerness which gave assurance of a fierce and
decisive battle, or the great self-restraint which, in all his fever
of impatience, withheld him from precipitating action before every
means of information was exhausted. There will be occasion to note
again the same traits in the yet sharper trial he was soon to undergo.

His conclusion upon the whole matter, therefore, though erroneous as
to the fact, may be accepted as entirely justified by all the
indications; and it must be added that, with the dispositions he took,
nothing could have saved the French fleet but its prompt retreat to
Toulon. "Had they not been crippled," he wrote Davison, "nothing could
have hindered our meeting them on January 21st, off the south end of
Sardinia." "I have not the smallest doubt," he concluded his letter to
the Admiralty, "but that the destination of the French armament which
left the coast of France on the 18th of January, was Alexandria; and,