Chapter VI

.

[49] Chevalier, Mar. Fran. sous le Consulat, p. 43.

[50] Collingwood's Correspondence, p. 48. (First American from fourth London edition.)

[51] Nelson's Dispatches, vol. vi. p. 480.

[52] Collingwood's Correspondence, pp. 265, 266.

[53] Collingwood's Correspondence, p. 208.

[54] Brenton's Naval History, vol. i. p. 415. (Ed. 1823.)

[55] Brenton's Naval History, vol. i. p. 455.

[56] James' Nav. Hist. vol. i. p. 53 (ed. 1878). This system had been adopted in France a century before by Colbert (Revue Mar. et Coloniale, September, 1887, p. 567).

[57] Brenton's Nav. Hist., vol. ii. p. 105.

[58] James' Nav. Hist., vol. i. pp. 57, 58.

[59] Guerres Mar., vol. i. p. 49 (1st ed.).

[60] James, vol. i. p. 55.

[61] Guerres Mar., vol. i. p. 164 (note).

[62] Nels. Disp. i. 309-311.

[63] Nels. Disp., i. p. 312.

[64] Ibid., ii. pp. 70, 77, 241.

[65] Life of Sir Jahleel Brenton.

[66] James' Nav. Hist., vol. i. p. 54. (Ed. 1878).

[67] For example, that any captain surrendering to a force less than double his own should suffer death; and if of a ship-of-the-line, to any number of enemies unless the vessel was actually sinking. The same fate awaited him who, in a fleet action, allowed the line to be broken. So also the decree not to give quarter. See Chevalier, Mar. Fran. sous la Rép., p. 128; Guérin, Hist. de la Mar., vol. iii. p. 395.

[68] The Peninsular War, so brilliant in many of its features and in the end so triumphantly successful, has some analogies to the smaller expeditions here criticised, and may be thought to refute the remarks in the text. The analogy, however, fails in some very decisive points. The landing and base of operations at Lisbon were in the territory of an ally of long standing; the projected advance was into a country in general insurrection against foreign rule; above all, the position of Lisbon and its distance from France imposed upon the French, in case they advanced against it in great force as they did in 1810, a long and very difficult line of communication, while the British had the sea open. Toulon, in 1793, was disadvantageous to the British as compared with Lisbon in 1809, because farther from England and in France. For remarks on Peninsular War see note at end of this chapter.

[69] For the strategic discussion of the British naval dispositions on the occasion of the Irish Expedition of 1796, see