CHAPTER XXI
Napoleon’s Commercial War with Great Britain (1807)
From the terms of the secret understanding between Napoleon and Alexander at Tilsit, it is obvious that the former had made up his mind to stand or fall in a last desperate encounter with Great Britain. Secure in her island home, that Power alone had been successful in thwarting Napoleon. Her ships and her money were constant menaces to the accomplishment of his over-lordship of the Continent. England’s wooden walls barricaded the principal harbours; by her gold she largely helped to provide the sinews of war which enabled her allies to resist the oppressor. To make war on the sea, to drive it home to the coasts of the enemy, was not possible in the shattered condition of the French marine.
How then was her downfall to be brought about? Before his war with Prussia, Napoleon had taken a preliminary step by compelling Frederick William III. to forbid British vessels the use of the ports of his Kingdom and of Hanover. On the 21st November 1806 he augmented his plan by the stringent regulations of the Berlin Decree, so called because it was issued from that city. His powerful rival was to be cut off from all further intercourse with Europe. No letters were to pass, all commerce was to cease, every British subject in France or any country allied to her, or occupied by French troops, was liable to be declared a prisoner of war.
In theory the United Kingdom was in a state of blockade. By excluding her goods, the sale of which amounted to an enormous sum every year, from the countries of his allies and those directly under his control, Napoleon hoped that she would be forced to give up the unequal contest. Great Britain had retaliated speedily and effectually upon Prussia by seizing several hundred of her ships then lying in British harbours, by blockading her coasts, and by declaring war. She met the Berlin Decree by turning the tables on France, proclaiming France and her allies to be in a state of blockade, and providing that any ship which had not set out from, or touched at, a British harbour should be considered a lawful prize. Napoleon retorted by his Milan Decree of the 7th December 1807, whereby ships that had issued from or touched at British ports were put at the mercy of the French privateers which scoured the seas; “all ships going to or coming from any harbour in Great Britain or her colonies, or any country occupied by British troops, should be made a prize.”
The banning of British goods and the fostering of home manufactures were the main planks of the great Continental System. Started with the ostensible purpose of ruining Great Britain, it contributed largely to Napoleon’s downfall. In order to make Europe self-contained it was necessary to add conquest to conquest, and an interminable war does not contribute to happiness or make for prosperity. Eventually the French themselves lost their zest for strife, and the real meaning of nationality began to make itself felt in countries whose inhabitants groaned under the intolerable burden of a foreign task-master. The System, which Bourrienne calls “an act of tyranny and madness” which was “worthy only of the dark and barbarous ages,” was applied to France, Italy, Switzerland, Holland, Austria, Russia, Prussia, the Rhenish Confederation, Denmark, Spain and Portugal. If you glance at the map of Europe you will see that there were few States to which the Napoleonic rule in some way or other did not apply. The people who benefited chiefly by this cutting off of England were the smugglers, who plied a magnificent trade both on sea and land. Thousands of persons were engaged in the business of contraband, conveying goods into French territories and assisting the sending of Continental productions to Great Britain. The cost of many articles went up to an extravagant figure. For instance, in France cotton stockings ranged from six shillings to seven shillings per pair; sugar varied from five shillings to six shillings per pound, while the same quantity of coffee sold at from ten shillings to eleven shillings. When we compare the last commodity with the price which obtained in England the difference is astounding. In 1812 coffee could be purchased in Liverpool for one-fifteenth of the price paid in Paris.
“Take especial care,” the Emperor wrote to Junot, “that the ladies of your establishment use Swiss tea. It is as good as that of China. Coffee made from chicory is not at all inferior to that of Arabia. Let them make use of these substitutes in their drawing-rooms, instead of amusing themselves with talking politics like Madame de Staël. Let them take care, also, that no part of their dress is made of English merchandise. If the wives of my chief officers do not set the example, whom can I expect to follow it? It is a contest of life or death between France and England. I must look for the most cordial support in all those by whom I am surrounded.”
Napoleon’s tariff reform, instead of materially benefiting the manufacturers, tended to decrease the consumption of raw materials, because they could not be obtained. When uniforms were required for the French troops in the Eylau campaign they had to be purchased in England! Gradually the barriers began to break down, and by the sale of licenses for the bringing in of hitherto forbidden goods with the proviso that French manufactured goods must be taken in exchange, Napoleon replenished his war chests preparatory to the next campaign. It was the Czar’s abandonment of the Continental System which led to the Emperor’s disastrous Russian campaign. After that mammoth catastrophe, the whole scheme gradually fell to pieces, but not before all concerned, including Great Britain, had suffered very considerably.
On the Emperor’s return to Paris from Tilsit in July 1807, he gave his attention for a short time to home affairs. He had been away for ten months, and the keenest enthusiasm for him was shown on all sides. The Great Nation was indeed worthy of the name which had been given to the French long before Napoleon and his armies had proved their right to it, and his subjects shared in the glamour of victory if not in the spoil. They furnished him with troops, were the props which supported his throne, and if they gave their sons to be victims of war they did not show on festive occasions that they regarded this as aught but a cruel necessity. The French love glory above everything, and to have a son serving with the eagles was a matter of pride to every true Frenchman.