This loosely sketched drawing shows figures standing below palm trees, which are swirlingly indicated, on the left. It provided Pocock with a solution for representing the Battle of the Nile in his oil painting (BHC0513) of 1808 and its subsequent engraving for Clarke and McArthur's ‘Life of Nelson’ (1809). Like many of his other preliminary sketches it adopts what is in effect a low aerial viewpoint using the trees and foreground landscape as a framing device. This sketch is particularly close to another variant looking in the same (north-westerly) direction (PAD8736). However PAD8736 clearly captures the middle of the action, with the French 'L'Orient' exploding at about 10.30 pm, which occurred in darkness. Instead Pocock, in this drawing, chooses the start of the battle with Nelson's fleet bearing down from seaward on the anchored French line, but not yet closely engaged, in the early evening with the sun setting in the west above Aboukir fort, centre right. The ship under sail near the fort, at the far end of the anchored but only slightly indicated French line, is (as in the oil version) Thomas Foley's 'Goliath'. The vessel is doubling round the head of the enemy in the manoeuvre that proved the key to Nelson's victory. The French frigates are more clearly shown anchored between their battle line and the shore. Exhibited: NMM Pocock exhib. (1975) no. 85 as 'Compositional Study for the Painting'.