On the 22nd of that same month the penalties of rivalry were ended for Lady Hamilton by the arrival, in the _Foudroyant_, of the Lord Admiral, who came to transport his mistress to Naples, as Her Majesty’s deputy in the latest Reign of Terror inaugurated in that capital. A fortnight later the king himself, taking me with him as his simpler and nerve-doctor, and leaving the amiable English Ambassador behind to play dry-nurse to his queen in Palermo--followed in the _Sea Horse_, which, after a short fair passage, anchored in the bay. Thence, rather to my annoyance, we were transhipped no farther than to the _Foudroyant_--his mightiness being timid for the moment of venturing into his distracted city--and, there, were scarcely on board before my services were called into requisition in an odd enough connection. The king--Nelson and his _cara sposa_ being gone ashore--was looking idly out seawards over the taffrail of the quarter-deck, and chattering desultorily with members of his suite behind him, when he broke off abruptly to stare under his palm at some object in the water, which, first seen at a distance, grew rapidly nearer, drifting with the tide upon the ship. Then, in an instant, he gave a hoarse scream; and, seeing him pointing and articulating confusedly, we all ran to the side, and followed with our eyes the direction of his hand. “_Vátene!_” he shrieked: “_è Caracciolo!_” and he shuddered down, so that nothing but his nose and goggle eyes were peeping over the railing. I held my breath, staring fascinated, while the others echoed his cry: “_Caracciolo! è Caracciolo! O me miserábile, Caracciolo!_” in a dozen accents of terror. I had heard of the poor scapegoat admiral,[2] whom Nelson--always bearing a grudge against him for his better seamanship--had caused ten days before to be hanged with every refinement of savagery, and afterwards flung into the water. Now risen, it seemed, from its first sleep on the floor of the bay, the sopt and dreary spectre was come riding to sear the eyeballs of the master, whom it had failed to serve only through being deeper pledged to humanity. Fouling our hawser, the body swung upright, bobbing and reeling as if it were treading water. Its hair and long beard swayed on its cheeks; its dead stiff eyes stared unwinking in the spray; its arms were flung wide, as if inviting its destroyer to a mocking embrace. Turning a moment, it drifted loose, and went dancing towards the shore, where the poor fishermen of Santa Lucia, who had loved the man, were to find and give it Christian burial. The king staggered back. “Mother of saints!” he sobbed, “what does the creature want?” “Sire,” whispered a voice, “he asks for a consecrated grave.” “Give it him, give it him!” gasped His Majesty, and signed to me to follow him below, where, however, I was not long in laying his “horrors.” “_Enfin, mon père_,” I said, “the man, by his appearance, was only asking your forgiveness.”