And all his battles read like fairy tales, for this long-legged, red-haired Scot, rivaled Lord Nelson himself in genius and daring. At war he was the hero and idol of the fleet, but in peace a demon, restless, fractious, fiendish in humor, deadly in rage, playing schoolboy jokes on the admiralty and the parliament. He could not be happy without making swarms of powerful enemies, and those enemies waited their chance. In February, 1814, a French officer landed at Dover with tidings that the Emperor Napoleon had been slain by Cossacks. The messenger’s progress became a triumphal procession, and amid public rejoicings he entered London to deliver his papers at the admiralty. Bells pealed, cannon thundered, the stock exchange went mad with the rise of prices, while the messenger--a Mr. Berenger--sneaked to the lodgings of an acquaintance, Lord Cochrane, and borrowed civilian clothes. His news was false, his despatch a forgery, he had been hired by Cochrane’s uncle, a stock-exchange speculator, to contrive the whole blackguardly hoax. Cochrane knew nothing of the plot, but for the mere lending of that suit of clothes, he was sentenced to the pillory, a year’s imprisonment, and a fine of a thousand pounds. He was struck from the rolls of the navy, expelled from the house of commons, his banner as a Knight of the Bath torn down and thrown from the doors of Henry VII’s Chapel at Westminster. In the end he was driven to disgraceful exile and hopeless ruin. Four years later Cochrane, commanding the Chilian navy, sailed from Valparaiso to fight the Spanish fleet. Running away from his mother, a son of his--Tom Cochrane, junior--aged five, contrived to sail with the admiral, and in his first engagement, was spattered with the blood and brains of a marine. “I’m not hurt, papa,” said the imp, “the shot didn’t touch me. Jack says that the ball is not made that will hurt mama’s boy.” Jack proved to be right, but it was in that engagement that Cochrane earned his Spanish title, “The Devil.” Three times he attempted to take Callao from the Spaniards, then in disgusted failure dispersed his useless squadron, and went off with his flag ship to Valdivia. For lack of officers, he kept the deck himself until he dropped. When he went below for a nap, the lieutenant left a middy in command, but the middy went to sleep and the ship was cast away. Cochrane got her afloat; then, with all his gunpowder wet, went off with his sinking wreck to attack Valdivia. The place was a Spanish stronghold with fifteen forts and one hundred and fifteen guns. Cochrane, preferring to depend on cold steel, left the muskets behind, wrecked his boats in the surf, let his men swim, led them straight at the Spaniards, stormed the batteries, and seized the city. So he found some nice new ships, and an arsenal to equip them, for his next attack on Callao.