An object of
our admiration and affection, of our pride and of our hopes, was
suddenly taken from us, and it seemed as if we had never, till
then, known how deeply we loved and reverenced him.
"What the country had lost in its great naval hero--the greatest
of our own, and of all former times, was scarcely taken into the
account of grief. So perfectly, indeed, had he performed his part,
that the maritime war, after the battle of Trafalgar, was
considered at an end; the fleets of the enemy were not merely
defeated, but destroyed; new navies must be built, and a new race
of seamen reared for them, before the possibility of their
invading our shores could again be contemplated.
"It was not, therefore, from any selfish reflection upon the
magnitude of our loss that we mourned for him; the general sorrow
was of a higher character. The people of England grieved that
funeral ceremonies, public monuments and posthumous rewards, were
all which they could now bestow upon him whom the king, the
legislature, and the nation, would alike have delighted to honour;
whom every tongue would have blessed; whose presence in every
village through which he might have passed would have wakened the
church bells, have given schoolboys a holiday, have drawn children
from their sports to gaze upon him, and 'old men from the chimney
corner' to look upon Nelson ere they died.
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