"SIR,

"I have received your letters of January the 23d, February 6th,
10th, and 23d. Your situation as Joint-Minister at the Porte, makes
it absolutely necessary that I should know who writes to me:
therefore, I must direct you, whenever you have ministerial affairs
to communicate, that it is done jointly with your respectable
brother, and not mix naval business with the other; for, what may
be very proper language for a representative of majesty, may be
very subversive of that dicipline of respect from the different
ranks in our service. A representative may dictate to an admiral, a
captain of a man of war would be censured for the same thing:
therefore, you will see the propriety of my steering close between
the two situations. I have sent you my orders, which your abilities
as a sea-officer will lead you to punctually execute. Not a ship
more than the service requires shall be kept on any particular
station; and that number must be left to my judgment, as an admiral
commanding the squadron detached by the commander in chief to the
extent of the Black Sea. I shall, of course, keep up a proper
communication with the Turkish and Russian admirals, which net
captain of a man of war under my orders must, interfere in. I am,
Sir, your very humble servant,


"Nelson."

"Sir William Sidney Smith."

The above epistle, which was accompanied by a regular order, dated the