140 King William the Fourth. [Auo. 



Yankee traders there, ordered them to show their papers ; the evidence 

 was sufficient: they were pronounced foreigners, to the great astonish- 

 ment of Jonathan, and to his still greater astonishment, they were pro- 

 nounced legal prizes. The owners made a prodigious clamour, and 

 applied to the admiral on the station, who, not liking to involve himself 

 in law, was on the point of giving way to the demand. But Nelson 

 interfered, his civil boldness was no more to be terrified by the lawyers 

 than his military spirit by the enemy. He insisted on his being in the 

 right, and he finally secured the prizes. The transaction attracted the 

 notice of government, who highly approved of the decisive and clear 

 conduct of the navy on the occasion, returning its thanks, however, 

 to the wrong quarter, the admiral. But the facts were not to be con- 

 cealed, and Nelson gained, on the spot, all the credit that he had 

 deserved. 



This conduct particularly attracted the notice of Mr. Herbert, the 

 president of Nevis, whose niece, Mrs. Nesbitt, Nelson afterwards 

 married. Prince William was also so much struck with him, that he 

 sought the first opportunity of being introduced, and continued to take 

 all opportunities of being with him during his service on the station. 



The prince after serving the regular time in each rank, received his 

 flag in 1790, as rear admiral of the blue; a more rapid promotion, of 

 course, than can be expected to fall to the lot of naval officers in general, 

 but still not violating the regulations of the navy. He had about a 

 year and a half earlier been made Duke of Clarence, and St. Andrew's, 

 and Earl of Munster, thus taking a title from each quarter of the 

 British Isles. 



From this period his Royal Highness had no command, a neglect 

 against which he very frequently and strongly remonstrated. The ground 

 of ministerial objection was never declared; and whether it was from an 

 unwillingness to hazard a prince, who from the determined celibacy, 

 as it was then supposed, of the Prince of Wales ; and the casualties that 

 might threaten the life of the Duke of York, then commencing his 

 military service ; might be presumed destined to succeed to the throne, a 

 conjecture to which the fact has given testimony : or whether the objec- 

 tion might arise from the fear of royal etiquette embarrassing the con- 

 duct of a fleet ; or from a dread of the duke's inexperience in command 

 on a large scale, where the loss of a battle might lay open the shores of 

 England to the combined fleets of Europe under the revolutionary flag ; 

 his Royal Highness lived from that period in retirement. 



Of his fitness as a captain of a frigate, we have high testimony. 

 Nelson in a letter to his friend Captain Locker, from the West Indies, 

 says 



" You must have heard, long before this readies you, that Prince 

 William is under my command. I shall endeavour to take care that 

 he is not a loser by that circumstance. He has his foibles as well as 

 private men, but they are far overbalanced by his virtues. In his 

 professional line, he is far superior to near two-thirds, I am sure, of the 

 list ; and in attention to orders, and respect to his superior officers, I 

 hardly know his equal. His Royal Highness keeps up strict discipline 

 in his ship, and without paying him any compliment, she is one of the 

 finest ordered frigates I have seen." 



Of the private career of the prince, we have no desire to enter deeply 

 into detail ; the unhappy law which prohibits the marriage of the 



