XLIX. 1806. such a case, directly brought into collision: the prejudices, CHAP. the passions of the ruling multitude, soon prove insupportable to the inhabitants of the subject realm; the very spirit which the central empire has generated, becomes the expansive force which tears its colonial dependencies asunder. Whether the existing contest between the different classes of society in the British Islands terminates in the lasting ascendant of the multitude, or the establishment, by democratic support, of a centralised despotism, the result will be equally fatal to our supremacy in the East-in the first case, by terminating the steady rule of aristocratic foresight; in the last, by drying up the fountains of popular energy. 109. Great and lasting bene already pro affairs. But whatever may be the ultimate fate of the British empire in India, it will not fall without having left an imperishable name, and bequeathed enduring benefits to fits it has the human race. First of all the Christian family, duced in England has set its foot in the East, not to enslave but human to bless; alone of all the conquering nations in the world, she has erected, amidst Asiatic bondage, the glorious fabric of European justice. To assert that her dominion has tended only to social happiness, that equity has regulated all her measures, and integrity pervaded every part of her administration, would be to assert more than ever has been, or ever will be, produced by human nature. Doubtless many of her deeds have been cruel and ruthless-many of her designs selfish and oppressive. when interest has ceased to blind, or panegyric to mislead, the sober voice of truth will confess, that her sway in Hindostan has contributed in an extraordinary degree to correct the disorders of society; to extricate from hopeless oppression the labouring, to restrain by just administration the tyranny of the higher orders; and that public happiness was never so equally diffused, general prosperity never so thoroughly established among all ranks, as under the British rule, since the descendants of Shem first came to sojourn on the banks of the Ganges. But XLIX. 1806. CHAP. Already the fame of its equitable sway, and its thorough protection of all classes, has spread far and sunk deep into the mind of the East. Mahommedan prejudice has been shaken by the exhibition, amidst its severities, of Christian beneficence; and even the ancient fabric of Hindoo superstition has begun to yield to the ascendant of European enterprise. Whether the appointed season has yet arrived for the conversion of the worshippers of Brahma to the precepts of a purer faith, and for the vast plains of Hindostan to be peopled by the followers of the Cross, as yet lies buried in the womb of time. But, whatever may be the destiny of Asia, the British standard has not appeared on its plains in vain; the remembrance of the blessed days of its rule will never be forgotten; and more glorious even than the triumph of her arms, have been the seeds of future freedom which the justice and integrity of English government have sown in the regions of the sun. CHAPTER L. CONTINENTAL SYSTEM, AND IMPERIAL GOVERNMENT OF L. 1807. 1. Napoleon's the subjuga Eng WHEN the battle of Trafalgar annihilated the prospect CHAP. of invading England, and extinguished all his hopes of soon bringing the maritime war to a successful issue, Napoleon did not abandon the contest in despair. Quick Change in in perception, he saw at once that the vast preparations projects for in the Channel must go for nothing; that the flotilla at ton of Boulogne would be rotten before a fleet capable of land. protecting its passage could be assembled; and that every successive year would enable England more exclusively to engross the commerce of the world, and banish his flag more completely from the ocean. But he was not on that account discouraged. Fertile in resources, indomitable in resolution, implacable in hatred, he resolved to change the method, not the object of his hostility. He indulged the hope that he would succeed, through the extent and terror of his Continental victories, in achieving the destruction of England, by a process more slow indeed, but in the end, perhaps, still more certain. Ilis design toward this object consisted of two parts, both essential to the success of the general project, and to the prosecution of which his efforts, during the whole v. 8, 15. remainder of his reign, were directed.1 The first part of his plan was to combine all the Continental states into one great alliance against England, 1 Las Cas. L. 1807. 2. Plan of uniting all Europe in the Conti nental System. CHAP. and compel them to exclude, in the most rigid manner, the British flag and British merchandise from their harbours. This system had long obtained possession of his mind; he had made it the condition of every treaty between a maritime state and France, even before he ascended the consular throne. The adroit flattery which he applied to the mind of the Emperor Paul, and the skill with which he combined the northern powers into the maritime confederacy in 1800, were all directed to the same end; and accordingly the exclusion of the English flag from their harbours was the fundamental condition of that alliance. The proclamation of the principles of the armed neutrality by the northern powers at that crisis, filled him with confident expectations that the period had then arrived when this great object was to be attained. But the victory of Nelson at Copenhagen dissolved all these hopes, and threw him back to the system of ordinary warfare, afterwards so cruelly defeated by the battle of Trafalgar. The astonishing results of the battle of Jena, however, again revived his projects of excluding British commerce from the Continent; and thence the BERLIN DECREE, to be immediately considered, and the anxiety which he evinced at Tilsit to procure, by any sacrifices, the accession of Alexander to the confederacy. * The Directory had previously adopted the system of compelling the exclusion of English goods from all the European harbours; but the multiplied disasters of their administration prevented them from carrying it into any general execution. By a decree, issued on 18th January 1798, it was declared, Jan. 18, 1798. That all ships having for their cargoes, in whole or in part, any English merchandise, shall be held good prize, whoever is the proprietor of such merchandise, which should be held contraband from the single circumstance of its coming from England or any of its foreign settlements; that the harbours of France should be shut against all ships having touched at England, except in cases of distress-and that neutral sailors found on board English vessels should be put to death." Napoleon, soon after his accession to the consular Feb. 9, 1800. throne, issued a decree, revoking this and all other decrees passed during the Jan. 28, 1800. Revolution, and reverting to the old and humane laws of the monarchy in this particular; but in the exultation consequent on the battle of Jena, he very nearly returned to the violence and barbarity of the decree of the Directory. -See Ann. Reg. 1800, 54, 55; and 1807, 226, 227. L. 1807. 3. hold of and concentrat fleets in the Flemish The second part of the plan was to obtain possession, CHAP. by negotiation, force, or fraud, of all the fleets of Europe, and gradually bring them to the great central point near the English coast, from whence they might ultimately be And getting directed, with decisive effect, against the British shores. By the Continental System he hoped to weaken the ing their resources of England, to hamper its revenue, and, by the French and spread of commercial distress, break up the unanimity harbours. which then prevailed among its inhabitants. But he knew too well the spirit of the ruling part of the nation to expect that, by the spread of commercial distress alone, he would succeed in the contest. He was desirous of reducing its strength by a long previous blockade, but it was by an assault at last that he hoped to carry the day. In order to prepare for that grand event, he was at the utmost pains to increase his naval force. Amidst all the expenditure occasioned by his military campaigns, he proposed to construct, and to a certain extent actually did construct, from ten to twenty sail of the line every year; while vast sums were annually applied to the great naval harbours at Antwerp, Flushing, Cherbourg, and Brest. The first, from its admirable situation and close proximity to the British shores, he considered as the great outwork of the Continent against England; he regarded it, as he himself has told us, as "itself worth a kingdom;" and but for the invincible tenacity with which he held to this great acquisition, he might with ease have obtained peace in 1814, and have left his family at this moment seated 1 Las Cas.. 2 Ante, c. on the throne of France.1 But it was not with the fleets v. 8, 15. of France alone that he intended to engage in this mighty enterprise; those of all Europe were to be combined in the attempt. The navies of Denmark and Portugal, in virtue of the secret article in the treaty in Tilsit, were to xlvi. § 79. be demanded from their respective sovereigns, and seized by force, if not voluntarily surrendered; that of Russia was to come round from the Black Sea and the Baltic to Brest and Antwerp, and join in the general crusade; until at |