His letters were acknowledged, and the intention expressed to investigate the matter, but nothing more was then done.

October, however, the Prussian troops occupied Amsterdam, reinstating the Stadtholder in all his privileges, and restoring to power the partisans of Great Britain; while France remained passive, her power for external action paralyzed by the dying convulsions of the monarchy.

The curtain had just risen upon the opening scene in the great drama of the Revolution,--the first Assembly of Notables.

Warlike preparations consequently ceased, and on the 30th of November, 1787, the cruise of the "Boreas" came to an end.
It was during this last month of servitude, and immediately before quitting the ship, that Nelson is said to have used the vehement expressions of discontent with "an ungrateful service," recorded by his biographers, concluding with his resolve to go at once to London and resign his commission.

In the absence of the faintest trace, in his letters, of dissatisfaction with the duty to which the ship was assigned, it is reasonable to attribute this exasperation to his soreness under the numerous reprimands he had received,--a feeling which plainly transpires in some of his replies, despite the forms of official respect that he scrupulously observed.