which it was connected, had for the moment slipped his mind. Nelson's
mastery of his subject, however, and his warmth in it, soon roused the
attention of his hearer, who, being then pressed for time, asked to
see him again the next day, stipulating only that the interview should
be early, before office hours. "It cannot be too early for me,"
replied Nelson, whose habit, in his career as admiral, was to get
through his correspondence before eight o'clock,--"six o'clock, if
you please."

The arrangement was so made, and the consequent meeting lasted from
six to nine the next morning. Of its general nature and results we
have an authentic outline, given in later years to Nelson's
biographers by Rose, who became, and to the last remained, his warm
personal friend. The conversation ranged, apparently, over all the
chief occurrences in the West Indies during the cruise of the
"Boreas," including both the naval frauds and the contraband trade.
The breadth and acuteness of Nelson's intellect have been too much
overlooked, in the admiration excited by his unusually grand moral
endowments of resolution, dash, and fearlessness of responsibility.
Though scarcely what could be called an educated man, he was one of
close and constant observation, thereby gaining a great deal of
information; and to the use of this he brought a practical sagacity,
which coped with the civil or political questions placed before it,
_for action_, much as it did with military questions--for, after all,
good generalship, on its intellectual side, is simply the application,
to the solution of a military problem, of a mind naturally gifted
therefor, and stored with experience, either personal or of others. As
a strategist and tactician, Nelson made full proof of high native
endowments, of wisdom garnered through fruitful study and meditation,
and of clear insight into the determining conditions of the various