No sooner had the carriage pulled up at the great door, than there flew out the most beautiful woman I ever saw, gracefully dressed in a cool muslin robe of the Turkish fashion, and with a jewelled chaplet bearing the inscription "Nelson and Victory" in the curly hair, so full of auburn lights that at times it looked of the gold colour Mr. Romney was so fond of painting. I needed not to remark the perfect oval of the dimpled face, nor its fairness and rosiness, so marvellously blent that people refused to believe it genuine till her fondness for sea-bathing parties set it beyond doubt, nor the most exquisite smile ever preserved on canvas, to know that it was My Lady Hamilton; for no sooner had she seen the Admiral than her laughing eyes grew moist and tender, and the corners of her mouth began to droop pitifully, and in a moment she had her arm round the Admiral's back and under his right shoulder, with such a gentle, sympathetic touch that he moved from the carriage into the door almost without pain. Behind My Lady was a tall, somewhat bent, elderly gentleman, wearing his Order of the Bath and sundry Neapolitan decorations, like the Admiral, in full Court dress. This was, of course, Sir William Hamilton, K.C.B., his Britannic Majesty's Ambassador and Plenipotentiary at the Court of the Two Sicilies. It has often seemed to me, since, mighty significant that the reception of the Admiral into the palace of the Hamiltons should have been conducted with so much ceremony. You can hardly imagine the procession of coaches and servants sent to bring us up from the albergo, and the army of servants drawn up by the gate and courtyard and grand staircase of the palace; for seldom has the entry of a conqueror into a fallen city been attended with results that have led to more writing. I must say that, as she supported the Admiral from his coach to the suite prepared for him on that day she might have been a goddess: she was so far beyond any woman that I had seen in beauty and graciousness and tenderness, and soft, floating movement.