The alleged rape of his half-sister was discovered to be a theatric staged by his father Sir Hugo to gain unlimited access to a positive shower of guineas from the Lewrie side of the family, but Sir Hugo was diddled in return by Alan's grandmother who obstinately refused to go toes-up at the proper moment, and Alan Lewrie ended up smelling like Hungary Water with two hundred pounds per annum remittance. Since this last involves so much stupendously boresome legal mustification, we hope the reader will appreciate the chronicler cutting that short, as he goes bleary pondering the matter himself.

Acknowledgments

It would be impossible for me to begin an Alan Lewrie adventure without the assistance of the U.S. Naval Institute and its reference books-such as John Harland's Seamanship in the Age of Sail, to mention one of many-and the staff of the History Department of the U.S. Naval Academy. To them, my many thanks.

For details about Turk's Island and Horatio Nelson I am grateful to Mr. Iain MacKenzie of the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England, who was kind enough to dig up lieutenants' journals and material from contemporary accounts, such as Schomberg's Naval Chronology and Beatson's Naval and Military Memoirs.

I would also like to thank Derek Rooke of Memphis, Tennessee, who culled a lot of material for me. I had to repay him by being his only crew when he wanted to race his thirty-three foot sloop, which is the sort of long, painful and humiliating tale I'd rather not go into, ever, even if we did come in seventh in a class of twenty-eight boats.

Clenell Wilkinson's biography, Nelson, provided good insight into the famous admiral's personality. Thanks also to Mr. Herbert Sadler of Grand Turk Island, The Turks and Caicos, who serves as historian to the islands.