Whilst she was animating with her exertions and sympathy the miserable flock of refugees huddled in the Admiral's state-room, Sir William sat in his wife's cabin, with a loaded pistol in each hand. When she first came upon him in this extraordinary attitude, she gave such a wild shriek of alarm as the fiercest of the storm could not draw from her. But Sir William, in a cold voice and with an impassioned face, bade her not be alarmed. He had no designs upon any other life than his own, and not even on that until it should be certain that they were going down without hope of rescue. He was merely resolved not to die with the guggle-guggle-guggle of such an unpleasant fluid as sea-water in his throat, and was therefore prepared to shoot himself as soon as he felt the ship to be sinking. It is not certain whether he sat on like a statue, in the same position for the whole two days; but in the laughing time after the retaking of Naples, when all the dreadful memories of the storm were lost in one long _festa_, My Lady used to vow that, often as she went into the cabin, she never found him to have moved a muscle from the original position. I should mention that, from the moment we were in sight of Palermo, His Sicilian Majesty's royal standard was hoisted at the maintop-gallant masthead of the _Vanguard_, and was kept flying from that until His Majesty got into the _Vanguard's_ barge, when it was struck in the ship and hoisted in the barge, and every proper honour paid to it by the ship. As soon as His Majesty set foot on the shore it was struck from the barge. The King did not leave the ship till 9 a.m., thinking a proper reception of importance. It is not often that men whose trade is war are impressed with the beauties of peace, as I was on that December morning, the 26th, of 1798. The day before had been a tempest so awful, that not only had the little Prince died of sea-sickness, but among all those hundreds of people, for the most part without ceasing praying or shrieking out their religion, not one that I heard recalled that it was the day on which the little Christ was born to be the Saviour of the world. Agonised appeals to His Virgin Mother I heard in plenty; but so frightened were all these shriekers, that they did not remember to invoke her aid for the sake of the man-child, which it was the hope of every Jewish woman to bring into the world, in case he should be the prophesied Messiah, whose advent was the comfort of the long captivity by the waters of Babylon.