Those who had known him long, like Captain Troubridge, could not help noting, even now, the change that was coming over the Admiral. Formerly he was extremely reserved when dining in the presence of ladies, saying but little and drinking no wine until the King's health should be proposed, and always drinking such healths in bumpers. Now he took a little wine during dinner, not wishing, I think, to appear peculiar; and talked very much to My Lady, although he was sitting between her and the Queen. It was, as I have writ, My Lady's whim that I should sit upon her other hand that night, and so I had good opportunity for observing. Will sat on the other side of Captain Troubridge to interpret between him and Her Majesty, while My Lady interpreted for the Admiral. She spoke Italian, and also the Neapolitan dialect, like English; though she could not write her native tongue better than a clever child. Having so often heard the tradition of his taciturnity at the table, I own I was most astonished at his flow of table talk; for, though he paid My Lady compliments not a few, they were no more than any other officer in his fleet would have paid--certainly no more than such men as Captain Troubridge and Captain Hallowell, who had not his flow of other conversation. That the Admiral could express himself well, any one who has read his letters published from time to time could not fail to see. He was no maker of epigrams, but he said things so briefly, and so to the point, that one could remember them like epigrams; and, for a seaman, he had a remarkably well-stored mind. A full knowledge of history he considered essential to every commander who would understand his business; and I think that during those years on shore before the battle of St. Vincent, when he was living a sort of farmer's life in his father's parsonage, he must have had the run of a fairly-stocked library and mastered its contents, as it was his wont to master anything he put his mind to. He was likely talking his best, for was he not next to one of the world's most famous beauties in the first days of the friendship to which she had shown herself so well disposed? What I overheard of their conversation I cannot, as one of the Admiral's officers, bring myself to write; not that there was anything that I should blush to repeat on paper, but indeed I could rather write down a man's coarseness than his tenderness, for his tenderness is sacred to the person to whom it is addressed, and his coarseness is mere anathema. But I think I may say something of their appearance, which any one at the table, and servants, could see as well as I. The Admiral had on his battle look. As is well known, when battle was imminent, until the moment for deeds came, after making his dispositions, he would retire and write his last letters and his last wishes, and think of those he loved best, and pray for his country and them. He prayed till the last moment before his actual