Identifier: nelsonhiscaptai00fitc (find matches)
Title: Nelson and his captains : sketches of famous seamen
Year: 1902 (1900s)
Authors: Fitchett, William Henry, 1845-1928
Subjects: Nelson, Horatio Nelson, Viscount, 1758-1805 Great Britain. Royal Navy
Publisher: London : G. Bell
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
839). Well, Hardy, how goes the battle ? How goes the day withus? . . . Kiss me, Hardy.—(Nelsons dying words.) HARDY stands imperishably linked to thememory of Nelson by the pathos of theimmortal scene in the cockpit of the Victory, andby the half womanly tenderness of the words onNelsons dying lips which we have quoted. WhenHardy was made a baronet, and had to choose a mottofor his coat-of-arms, he was urged to take the words,Anchor, Hardy, anchor, which Nelson spoke tohim when lying mortally wounded; and no coat-of-arms, ancient or modern, carries a cluster of syllablesround which gather such memories as these threewords. With characteristic modesty Hardy refusedto appropriate the words as a family motto; but hewill be held in unforgetting memory by the wholeEnglish-speaking race for the part he fills in thelast hour of Nelsons life. As long as the Englishlanguage is spoken, Nelsons last words will live,and Hardys name is enshrined for all time in those imperishable syllables. 296
Text Appearing After Image:
SIR THOMAS MASTERMAN HARDY, K.C.B.From an engraving after the portrait by R. Evans SIR THOMAS MASTERMAN HARDY 297 And of all Nelsons captains and comrades, Hardywas best entitled by right of fitness to stand byNelsons deathbed. Troubridge could not havefilled Hardys place, nor Collingwood, nor Berry,nor Foley, nor Saumarez. Collingwood was neverquite at ease with Nelson, and never quite under-stood him. Troubridge in later years drifted apartfrom Nelson, and was never quite forgiven for whatNelson looked upon as want of sympathy, andofficious intermeddling at the Admiralty Board.Berry was in his place in the mizzen chains of theSan Nicolas, leading the Victorys boarders; hewould have been helpless and clumsy beside Nelsonsdeathbed. Betwixt Nelson and Saumarez therewas a fatal lack of sympathy; Nelson, indeed, neverunderstood Saumarez, and looked on him rather asan ungenial, not to say priggish, critic, than as acomrade and a friend. Ball comes nearest to Hardyin the relationship in wh

Note About Images