We often realize more of the real spirit of a fight from private accounts and comments than from the official reports; and we, therefore, add a few remarks and anecdotes from such sources. In the first place, the promptitude and decision of Admiral Duncan on meeting the Dutch fleet is especially to be noticed. “The British Admiral soon perceived that if he waited to form his line (the enemy drawing fast in with the land) there would be no action.” He, therefore, hoisted the signal to make all sail, break the line, and engage the enemy to leeward; and for close action, which last signal flew until it was shot away. This signal could not be mistaken, and, coupled with the gallant Admiral’s example, superseded all former ones. If further proof of the superior efficacy of such a mode of attack be wanting, it is to be found not only in the declaration of the brave Dutch Admiral, but also in the testimony of Lord Nelson, who, although not acquainted with Lord Duncan, wrote to him, after the battle of the Nile, to tell him how “he had profited by his example.” The Dutch Admiral De Winter said, “Your not waiting to form a line ruined me; if I had got nearer to the shore, and you had attacked, I should probably have drawn both fleets on, and it would have been a victory to me, being on my own coast.” It is a fact that many of the vessels of Admiral Duncan’s fleet were intended for Indiamen, and not so stoutly built as men-of-war usually are; and many of his ships were in bad condition, and had not had time to complete their stores when called away from Yarmouth Roads to encounter the enemy. Among other incidents of this action, it is recorded that, when the main-top-gallant mast of the Venerable was shot away, a seaman named Crawford went aloft with another flag, and hammer and nails, and nailed the flag to the topmast-head. Had Duncan’s fleet been of as good material as that of Lord St. Vincent, it is probable that every Dutch ship would have been taken. When the action ceased the English fleet were in only nine fathoms of water, and a severe gale was nearly upon them; and the wonder is that they saved themselves and so many of their prizes, in their battered condition. Captain Inglis, of the Belliqueux, of 64 guns, owing either to a long absence from active service, or an inaptitude to the subject, sometimes apparent in sea officers, had neglected to make himself a competent master of the signal-book, and on the morning of the day of the battle, when it became necessary to act with promptitude in obedience to signals, found himself more puzzled than enlightened by it, and, throwing it with contempt upon the deck, exclaimed, in broad Scotch: “D--n me, up wi’ the hellum, and gang intil the middle o’t!” In this manner he bravely anticipated the remedy in such cases provided by Nelson, who, in his celebrated “Memorandum,” observes that, “when a captain should be _at a loss_ he cannot do _very wrong_ if he lay his ship alongside of the enemy.”