to fear that Bonaparte was about to employ the time of peace merely to strengthen himself for further attacks upon their own and other countries. He annexed Piedmont and occupied Switzerland. It is probable, however, that these things would have been passed over in England, if the Ministry had not conceived suspicions that he intended to re-occupy Egypt. They therefore refused to give up Malta to the Knights as they were bound by the treaty to do, first on the ground that no guarantee of its independence could be obtained from the great Powers (see p. 846), and then on the ground that, whatever they might be bound to by treaty, they needed Malta as a security against the danger of a French conquest of Egypt. Bonaparte claimed the execution of the treaty, and on one occasion used most violent language to Lord Whitworth, the English ambassador. He was himself irritated, not merely on the subject of Malta, but because the English Ministers refused to suppress without trial the virulent attacks on himself which were published by the French refugees in England. One of these, named Peltier, was indeed convicted of libel by a jury, but he escaped punishment because France and England were again at war before judgment was pronounced against him. As no com promise about Malta acceptable to both sides could be found, war was recommenced before the end of May 1803.

27. The last Months of the Addington Ministry. 1803-1804. On the outbreak of hostilities, Bonaparte gave reasonable offence to the British nation by throwing into prison about 10,000 British travellers, though it had always been the custom to give time to such persons to leave the country after a declaration of war. As he had no other war on his hands than that with Great Britain, he seized Hanover and assembled a large army at Boulogne to invade England. At once a volunteer army stepped forward to aid the regular army in the defence of the country. From one end of the country to the other some 300,000 volunteers of all classes were busily drilling. Public opinion soon demanded a stronger ministry than the existing one. On May 10, 1804, Addington resigned. General opinion called for Pitt as Prime Minister at the head of a ministry taken from both parties, so that all disposable talent might be employed in the defence of the nation. The King insisted that Pitt should promise never to support Catholic Emancipation, and should exclude Fox from the new ministry. Fox at once consented to be passed over, but Lord Grenville refused to join if Fox was excluded. "I will teach that proud man," said Pitt, "that I can do without him," and on May 18 Pitt again became Prime Minister, though with but a poor staff of ministers to support him.

1. The Napoleonic Empire. 1804.-There was scarcely an Englishman living in 1804 who did not regard Napoleon as a wicked and unprincipled villain whom it was the duty of every honest man to resist to the death. This conception of his character was certainly not without foundation. He had no notion of allowing moral scruples to interfere with his designs, and whenever his personal interests were concerned he knew no rule except that of his own will. Having nearly been the victim of an attempt at assassination by a party of Royalists, he avenged himself by kidnapping the Duke of Enghien on the neutral territory of Baden and having him shot, simply because he was a kinsman of the Bourbon Princes, the brothers of the late King. In his dealings with foreign states he took whatever seemed good to him to take, and his seizure of Piedmont was but the forerunner of other annexations. Yet, regardless of morality as he was, Napoleon was not more regardless of it than the statesmen who had partitioned Poland, and he had at least an intellectual preference for good government. He gave to France an excellent administration, and also gave his sanction to the code of law drawn up by the jurists of the Republic, which was now to be known as the Code Napoleon. He also took care that there should be good justice in his courts between man and man. Hence, exasperating as his annexations were to the great sovereigns of Europe, they were not popular grievances. A country annexed to France, or even merely brought, as most of the German

states now were, under the influence of France, found its gain in being better governed. On May 18 Napoleon was declared here

ditary Emperor of the French. His power was neither more nor less absolute than it had been before.

The King in the House of Lords, 1804: from Modern London.

1804-1805

THE ARMY AT BOULOGNE

851

2. A Threatened Invasion. 1804-1805.-Neither the French Revolution nor the French Empire was to be resisted by governments acting without a popular force behind them; and in 1804 it was only in England that the government had a popular force behind it, and could therefore oppose to Napoleon a national resistance. Every day that saw a French army encamped at Boulogne strengthened that resistance. Napoleon was, indeed, so certain of success that he ordered the preparation of a medal falsely stating itself to have been struck in London, as if the conquest of England had been already effected. Strong as Pitt became in the country, he was weak in Parliament. Before the end of 1804 he was reconciled to Addington, who entered the ministry as Viscount Sidmouth. On April 6 a vote was carried which led to the impeachment, on a charge of peculation, of his old friend

Napoleon's medal struck to commemorate the invasion of England: from a cast in the British Museum.

Henry Dundas, now Lord Melville and First Lord of the Admiralty. Ultimately Melville was acquitted, and there is no reason to think that he was guilty of more than neglect of the forms needed for guarding against embezzlement; but Melville's necessary resignation was a sad blow to Pitt.

3. The Trafalgar Campaign. 1805.-Napoleon's plan for the invasion of England was most skilful. He was aware that boats laden with troops could not cross the Channel unless their passage could be guarded against British ships of war, but as the king of Spain was now on his side against England, he had three fleets at his disposal, two French ones at Toulon and Brest, and a Spanish one at Cadiz. He thought that, though not one of these was separately a match for a British fleet, yet that the three combined would at least be strong enough to hold the Channel