Produced by Steven Gibbs and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net THE LIFE OF NELSON THE EMBODIMENT OF THE SEA POWER OF GREAT BRITAIN BY CAPTAIN A.T. MAHAN, D.C.L., LL.D. UNITED STATES NAVY AUTHOR OF "THE INFLUENCE OF SEA POWER UPON HISTORY, 1660-1783," "THE INFLUENCE OF SEA POWER UPON THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND EMPIRE," AND OF A "LIFE OF ADMIRAL FARRAGUT" IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I. LONDON SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, & COMPANY, _LIMITED_ 1897 PREFACE. The Life of Nelson has been written so often, that an explanation--almost an apology--seems due for any renewal of the attempt; but, not to mention the attractiveness of the theme in itself, it is essential to the completeness and rounding off of the author's discussion of the Influence of Sea Power, that he present a study, from his own point of view, of the one man who in himself summed up and embodied the greatness of the possibilities which Sea Power comprehends,--the man for whom genius and opportunity worked together, to make him the personification of the Navy of Great Britain, the dominant factor in the periods hitherto treated. In the century and a half embraced in those periods, the tide of influence and of power has swelled higher and higher, floating upward before the eyes of mankind many a distinguished name; but it is not until their close that one arises in whom all the promises of the past find their finished realization, their perfect fulfilment. Thenceforward the name of Nelson is enrolled among those few presented to us by History, the simple mention of which suggests, not merely a personality or a career, but a great force or a great era concrete in a single man, who is its standard-bearer before the nations.