Of his frames of mind during this period of neglect and disfavor, his biographers give a very strongly colored picture, for which, it is to be presumed, they drew upon contemporary witnesses that were to them still accessible.  “With a mortified and dejected spirit, he looked forward to a continuance of inactivity and neglect....  During this interval of disappointment and mortification, his latent ambition would at times burst forth, and despise all restraint.  At others, a sudden melancholy seemed to overshadow his noble faculties, and to affect his temper; at those moments the remonstrances of his wife and venerable father alone could calm the tempest of his passions.”  That Nelson keenly felt the cold indifference he now underwent, is thoroughly in keeping with the sensitiveness to censure, expressed or implied, which his correspondence frequently betrays, while his frail organization and uncertain health would naturally entail periods of depression or nervous exasperation; but the general tenor of his letters, few as they at this time were, shows rather dignified acceptance of a treatment he had not merited, and a steady resolve not to waver in his readiness to serve his country, nor to cease asking an opportunity to do so.  Many years later, at a time of still more sickening suspense, he wrote:  “I am in truth half dead, but what man can do shall be done,—­I am not made to despair;” and now, according to a not improbable story, he closed an application for employment with the words, “If your Lordships should be pleased to appoint me to a cockle boat, I shall feel grateful.”  Hood, whose pupil he in a sense was, and who shared his genius, said of himself, when under a condition of enforced inactivity:  “This proves very strongly the different frames of men’s minds; some are full of anxiety, impatience, and apprehension, while others, under similar circumstances, are perfectly cool, tranquil, and indifferent.”

The latter half of the year 1792 was marked by the rapid progress in France of the political distemper, which was so soon to culminate in the worst excesses of the Revolution.  The quick succession of symptoms, each more alarming than the other,—­the suspension of the royal power at the tumultuous bidding of a mob, the September massacres, the abolition of royalty, the aggressive character of the National Convention shown by the decrees of November 19 and December 15,—­roused the apprehensions of most thoughtful men throughout Europe; and their concern was increased by the growing popular effervescence in other countries than France.  The British cabinet, as was natural, shifted more slowly than did the irresponsible members of the community; nor could Pitt lightly surrender his strong instinctive prepossessions in favor of peace, with the continuance of which was identified the exercise of his own best powers.