plans were better, and it was winked at; but had any of them
miscarried, the memory of St. Vincent and the Nile would not have
lived long.

When he arrived with the Hamiltons in London after his long absence
and victorious record, the mob, as usual, took the horses from the
carriage and dragged him along Cheapside amid tumultuous cheers.
Whenever he appeared in public the same thing happened. At Court,
things were different. His reception was offensively cold, and George
III ran some risk when he affronted his most popular subject by
turning his back on him. Whatever private indiscretions Nelson may
have been guilty of, nothing could justify so ungrateful an act of
ill-mannered snobbery. The King should have known how to distinguish
between private weakness, however unconventional, and matchless public
service. But for the fine genius and patriotism of this noble fellow,
he might have lost his crown. The temper of a capricious public in an
era of revolution should not be tested by freaks of royal
self-righteousness, while its imagination is being stirred by the
deeds of a national hero. His action might have brought the dignity of
George's kingliness into the gutter of ridicule, which would have been
a public misfortune.

The King's treatment of Nelson was worse than tactless; it was an
impertinence. King Edward VII, whose wisdom and tact could always be
trusted, might have disapproved, as strongly as did George III,
Nelson's disregard of social conventions, but he would have received
him on grounds of high public service, and have let his private
faults, if he knew of them, pass unnoticed, instead of giving him an
inarticulate snub. Still, a genius of naval distinction, or any other,
has no right to claim exemption from a law that governs a large