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his mournful "The Spirit's Song," a difficult piece in a high register. She asked him to set to music a poem by one of her English hangers-on, the impecunious would-be writer Cornelia Knight, and he did so in two days and named it “The Nelson Aria.” He also revised part of a piece he had already written to create “The Nelson Mass.” A beaming Nelson gave Haydn his watch in exchange for the pen used to create the composition. Pretty girls with good singing voices often accosted Haydn, and he was frequently called upon to entertain the prince's musically inclined female visitors. His interest in Emma was different: he found something original in her approach to performance. Just as Romney had been delighted by her plasticity, her imagination, and her willingness to try new creative experiments, so Haydn relished her open expressiveness. Fine ladies were almost always stolid singers: they refused to alter the usual rendition of a performance and were particularly nervous about expressing fervent emotion, running the risk of being accused of exciting the passions of the men in the audience. Emma threw her emotions into her performances and sang madness, anger, fear, and love as if she was really feeling them.

One Hungarian newspaper was bowled over by “her clear, strong voice with which, accompanied by the famous Haydn, she filled the audience with such enthusiasm that they almost became ecstatic. Many were reminded of pictures of the ‘goddesses Dido and Calypso.’”5 Haydn came to her inn to wish her a fond farewell as they prepared to leave Vienna at the end of September. He gave Emma her own copy of “The Spirit's Song” and presented Nelson with a copy of “The Nelson Aria.” The Princess Esterházy wrote to Emma “you will always exist in my heart and in my memory, and that I shall never forget your kind friendship to me.” She cherished “the flattering hope of seeing you here again in the spring.” They all thought they would be on their way back to Italy in the New Year.

Now that Emma was leaving, Maria Carolina was terribly sorry to see her go. “At all times and places and under all circumstances, Emma, dear, dear Emma shall be my friend and sister,” she effused. She paid her the compliment of begging her to return to Naples with her, and wrote a letter to give to Queen Charlotte, which Emma presumed was a letter of recommendation guaranteeing her entry to the English court.

In Prague, crowds draped in Nelson regalia mobbed them as soon as they arrived. Weary after their two-hundred-mile journey from Vienna, Nelson and Emma were thrilled to find that their hotel was covered in illuminations to celebrate their arrival. They were later somewhat startled to see the cost of the lights charged to their bill. Without Maria Carolina to cover the travel expenses, both Nelson and Sir William were living well beyond their means. Charles Greville's blood pressure shot up as he read about their extravagance in the English newspapers. "I had prepared a plan for cheap residence but this establishment confounds all," he fumed, almost weeping to see his long-desired inheritance squandered on turning the tria into megastars.6 The party's expenses were mounting well past £4,000 ($380,000). Still, in Prague, it was Nelson's birthday, and it was no time to economize—after a large dinner at the palace of the Archduke Charles, where Emma sang a version of "God Save the King," adding a final stanza commemorating Nelson, they invited their fellow guests back to their hotel for a second dinner and more singing.

At Dresden, celebrity spotters, autograph hunters, and ordinary people craving a glimpse of Nelson surrounded the hotel. According to the newspapers, the Electress of Saxony refused to receive them on account of Emma's rakish past, although the truth was that the elector was worried about antagonizing Napoleon. Nelson did not care, blustering cheerfully that if there was "any difficulty of that sort, Lady Hamilton will knock the Elector down," socializing instead with the recently appointed British envoy, Hugh Elliot, his wife, and their guest,