The Redoubtable, after her first broadside, had closed her
lower-deck ports, lest the English should board her through them. She
did not fire another great gun during the action. But her tops, like
those of her consorts, were filled with riflemen, whose balls swept the
decks of the assailing ships. One of these, fired from the mizzen-top of
the Redoubtable, not fifteen yards from where Nelson stood, struck him
on the left shoulder, piercing the epaulette. It was about quarter after
one, in the heat of the action. He fell upon his face.
"They have done for me, at last, Hardy," he said, as his captain ran to
his assistance.
"I hope not!" cried Hardy.
"Yes," he replied, "my backbone is shot through."
A thorough sailor to the last, he saw, as they were carrying him below,
that the tiller ropes which had been shot away were not replaced, and
ordered that this should be immediately attended to. Then, that he might
not be seen by the crew, he spread his handkerchief over his face and
his stars. But for his needless risk in revealing them before, he might
have lived.
The cockpit was crowded with the wounded and dying men. Over their
bodies he was carried, and laid upon a pallet in the midshipmen's berth.
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