it: so narrow he could almost leap it; so broad that now after years
of trying he was baffled still.

Could his Admirals only stop the Westward end of that narrow lane for
six hours, that he and his two-hundred-thousand might take the moon-road
unmolested, he was Master of the World.

But--they could not.

In his hand, fiercely crumpled, lay the despatch that told him
Villeneuve was back in Vigo, shepherded home again.

And by whom?

That little one-eyed one-armed seaman, who for ten years now had stood
between him and his destiny.

One man, the man of Aboukir Bay. [Footnote: On August 1, 1798, Nelson
destroyed the French fleet in Aboukir Bay at the Battle of the Nile.]




BOOK I

_THE LITTLE TREMENDOUS_