“A FELLOW has now no chance of promotion unless he jumps into the muzzle
of a gun and crawls out of the touch-hole.”
He who, a hundred years ago, more or less, pronounced the above words in
the uneasiness of his heart, thirsting for professional distinction, was
a young naval officer. Of his life, career, achievements, and end
nothing is preserved for the edification of his young successors in the
fleet of to-day—nothing but this phrase, which, sailor-like in the
simplicity of personal sentiment and strength of graphic expression,
embodies the spirit of the epoch. This obscure but vigorous testimony
has its price, its significance, and its lesson. It comes to us from a
worthy ancestor. We do not know whether he lived long enough for a
chance of that promotion whose way was so arduous. He belongs to the
great array of the unknown—who are great, indeed, by the sum total of the
devoted effort put out, and the colossal scale of success attained by
their insatiable and steadfast ambition. We do not know his name; we
only know of him what is material for us to know—that he was never
backward on occasions of desperate service. We have this on the
authority of a distinguished seaman of Nelson’s time. Departing this
life as Admiral of the Fleet on the eve of the Crimean War, Sir Thomas
Byam Martin has recorded for us amongst his all too short
autobiographical notes these few characteristic words uttered by one
young man of the many who must have felt that particular inconvenience of
a heroic age.
The distinguished Admiral had lived through it himself, and was a good
judge of what was expected in those days from men and ships. A brilliant
frigate captain, a man of sound judgment, of dashing bravery and of
serene mind, scrupulously concerned for the welfare and honour of the
navy, he missed a larger fame only by the chances of the service. We may
well quote on this day the words written of Nelson, in the decline of a
well-spent life, by Sir T. B. Martin, who died just fifty years ago on
the very anniversary of Trafalgar.
“Nelson’s nobleness of mind was a prominent and beautiful part of his
character. His foibles—faults if you like—will never be dwelt upon in
any memorandum of mine,” he declares, and goes on—“he whose splendid and
matchless achievements will be remembered with admiration while there is
gratitude in the hearts of Britons, or while a ship floats upon the
ocean; he whose example on the breaking out of the war gave so chivalrous
an impulse to the younger men of the service that all rushed into rivalry
of daring which disdained every warning of prudence, and led to acts of
heroic enterprise which tended greatly to exalt the glory of our nation.”
These are his words, and they are true. The dashing young frigate
captain, the man who in middle age was nothing loth to give chase
single-handed in his seventy-four to a whole fleet, the man of enterprise
and consummate judgment, the old Admiral of the Fleet, the good and
trusted servant of his country under two kings and a queen, had felt
correctly Nelson’s influence, and expressed himself with precision out of
the fulness of his seaman’s heart.
“Exalted,” he wrote, not “augmented.” And therein his feeling and his
pen captured the very truth. Other men there were ready and able to add
to the treasure of victories the British navy has given to the nation.
It was the lot of Lord Nelson to exalt all this glory. Exalt! the word
seems to be created for the man.