Napoleon had pledged his word to save France from her host of enemies, and in May 1800 he took the field once more. Crossing the Great St. Bernard Pass, never before traversed by a large army, he succeeded in planting himself in the rear of the Austrians, and at the battle of Marengo achieved a brilliant victory. Later in the year the French general, Moreau, crushed another Austrian army at Hohenlinden, and then Austria sued for peace.
The Tsar Paul had already abandoned the allies, and now confessed to great admiration for Napoleon, who proceeded to form a league for the purpose of subduing Britain by striking at her trade. He persuaded the northern powers—Russia, Denmark, and Sweden—to mass their fleets and close all their ports against British ships. This was a deep-laid scheme, but it was doomed to failure.
On March 12, 1801, Nelson left Yarmouth Roads as second in command to Sir Hyde Parker, a man of unflinching bravery but of no original ideas. The fleet which these admirals commanded was detailed to destroy the ships of the allies which lay at Copenhagen, backed by formidable batteries. Parker was irresolute as to the route to be taken through the dangerous channels that led to the town. “Let it be by the Sound, by the Belt, or anyhow,” cried Nelson, “only lose not an hour.” We cannot stay to recount the progress of the terrible battle that followed. When twenty of the enemy’s ships were almost destroyed, Nelson offered a truce, which was gladly accepted, and
“All amidst her wrecks and her gore,
Proud Denmark blest our chief
That he gave her wounds relief;
And the sounds of joy and grief
Filled the shore.”
In the very height of the engagement, Parker, greatly alarmed for the safety of his fleet, battered furiously by incessant broadsides, made the signal to retreat. Nelson’s attention was drawn to it. “What does it mean?” asked a colonel of marines standing by. “Why, to leave off action,” said Nelson; “but hang me if I do! You know,” he went on, “I have only one eye. I have a right to be blind sometimes.” Putting his telescope to his blind eye, he exclaimed, “I really do not see the signal.” So he nailed his colours to the mast, and in the midst of the most terrible cannonade to which a British fleet has ever been subjected, Nelson’s signal for “Close action” streamed high aloft, as clear to every man’s sight as a star in the sky.
Napoleon had thus failed in his attack on the obstinate islanders, and he was now ready for a breathing-space in which to recruit his armies and build a navy powerful enough to beat Britain. Accordingly peace was signed, and Great Britain restored all the colonial conquests which she had made during the war, except Ceylon and Trinidad. This was all she gained from a struggle which had cost her thousands of lives, and had added two hundred and seventy millions to the National Debt.