changed by the hour of battle to fair to take him north; but it is
only just to notice also that he himself never trifled with a fair
wind, nor with time.

The Orders for Battle, the process of framing which Stewart narrates,
have been preserved in full;[30] but they require a little study and
analysis to detect Nelson's thought, and their tactical merit, which
in matters of detail is unique among his works. At the Nile and
Trafalgar he contented himself with general plans, to meet cases which
he could only foresee in broad outlines; the method of application he
reserved to the moment of battle, when again he signified the general
direction of the attack, and left the details to his subordinates.
Here at Copenhagen he had been able to study the hostile dispositions.
Consequently, although he could not mark with precision the situations
of the smaller floating batteries, those of the principal blockships
were known, and upon that knowledge lie based very particular
instructions for the position each ship-of-the-line was to occupy. The
smaller British vessels also had specific orders.

Taking the Trekroner as a point of reference for the Danish order,
there were north of it, on the Danish left flank, two blockships.
South of it were seven blockships, with a number of miscellaneous
floating batteries, which raised that wing of the defence to
eighteen--the grand total being therefore twenty. This was also
Nelson's count, except that he put one small vessel on the north wing,
reducing the southern to seventeen--an immaterial difference. South of
the Trekroner, the Danes had disposed their seven blockships--which
were mastless ships-of-the-line--as follows. Two were on the right
flank, supporting each other, two on the left, the three others spaced
between these extremes; the distance from the Trekroner to the