The Influence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire 1793-1812, Vol II
different from Kioge Bay, over four hundred miles from Revel.
Four days later, orders were issued relieving Parker and leaving Nelson in command. Taken as this step was, only a week after the news of a victory, it can scarcely be construed otherwise than as an implied censure. To this view an expression of Nelson's lends color. "They are not Sir Hyde Parker's real friends who wish for an inquiry," he wrote to a confidential correspondent. "His friends in the fleet wish everything of this fleet to be forgot, for we all respect and love Sir Hyde; but the dearer his friends, the more uneasy they have been at his idleness, for that is the truth—no criminality." 35 The orders were received on May 5. Nelson's first signal was to hoist the boats aboard and prepare to weigh. "If Sir Hyde were gone," he wrote the same afternoon, "I would now be under sail." On the 7th the fleet left Kioge Bay and on the 12th appeared off Revel. The Russian division had sailed three days before and was now safe under the guns of Cronstadt. From Revel Nelson dispatched very complimentary letters to the Russian minister of foreign affairs, but received in reply the message that "the only proof of the loyalty of his intentions that the czar could accept was the prompt withdrawal of his fleet; and that until then no negotiation could proceed." "I do not believe he would have written such a letter," said Nelson, "if the Russian fleet had been in Revel;" 36 but the bird was flown, and with a civil explanation he withdrew from the port. He still remained in the Baltic, awaiting the issue of the negotiations; but Russia meant peace, and on the 17th of May the czar ordered the release of the embargoed British ships. On the 4th of June Great Britain also released the Danes and Swedes detained in her ports. Russia and Prussia had already agreed, on the 27th of April, that hostile measures against England should cease, Hamburg and Hanover be evacuated, and the free navigation of the rivers restored.
On the 17th of June was signed at St. Petersburg a convention between Russia and Great Britain, settling the points that had been in dispute. The question of Malta was tacitly dropped. As regards neutral claims Russia conceded that the neutral flag should not cover enemy's goods; and while she obtained the formal admission that articles of hostile origin which had become bonâ fide neutral property were exempt from seizure, she yielded the very important exception of colonial produce. This, no matter who the owner, could not by a neutral be carried direct from the colony to the mother country of a nation at war. 37 Great Britain, on the other hand, conceded the right of neutrals to carry on the coasting trade of a belligerent; and that naval stores should not be classed as contraband of war. The latter was an important concession, the former probably not, coasting trade being ordinarily done by small craft especially adapted to the local conditions. As regards searching merchant vessels under convoy of a ship of war, Russia yielded the principle and Great Britain accepted methods which would make the process less offensive. Privateers in such case could not search. The question was unimportant; for neutral merchant ships will not lightly submit to the restraint and delays of convoy, and so lose the chief advantage, that of speed, which they have over belligerents. When a neutral sees necessary to convoy her merchantmen, the very fact shows relations already strained.
Sweden and Denmark necessarily followed the course of Russia and acceded to all the terms of the convention between that court and Great Britain; Sweden on the 23d of October, 1801, and Denmark on the 30th of the following March. The claim to carry colonial produce to Europe, thus abandoned, was of importance to them, though not to Russia. At the same time the Baltic states renewed among themselves the engagements, which they had relinquished in their convention with Great Britain, that the neutral flag should cover enemy's property on board and that the convoy of a ship of war should exempt merchant vessels from search. These principles were in point of fact modifications sought to be introduced into international law, and not prescriptive rights, as commonly implied by French historians 38 dealing with this question. For this reason both the United States and the Baltic powers, while favoring the new rule, were little disposed to attempt by arms to compel the surrender by Great Britain of a claim sanctioned by long custom.
Thus had fallen resultless, as far as the objects of the first consul were concerned, the vast combination against Great Britain which he had fostered in the North. During its short existence he had actively pursued in the south of Europe, against Naples and Portugal, other measures intended further to embarrass, isolate, and cripple the great Sea Power, and to facilitate throwing much needed supplies and re-enforcements into Egypt. "The ambassador of the republic," he wrote in February, 1801, "will make the Spanish ministry understand that we must at whatsoever cost become masters of the Mediterranean.... France will have fifteen ships-of-the-line in the Mediterranean before the equinox; and, if Spain will join to them fifteen others, the English, who are about to have the ports of Lisbon, Sicily, and Naples closed to them, will not be able to keep thirty ships in the Mediterranean. That being so, I doubt not they will evacuate Mahon, being unable to remain in that sea." 39
For the closure of the ports Bonaparte relied with good reason upon his armies; but in the concurrent expectation of uniting thirty French and Spanish ships he reckoned without his host, as he did also upon the Russian Black Sea fleet, and the numbers the British must keep in the Baltic and off Brest. After the armistice with Austria in Italy, a corps under Murat was pushed toward Naples; and on the same day that the treaty of Lunéville was concluded, February 9, a truce for thirty days was signed with the Two Sicilies. This was followed on the 28th of March by a definitive treaty of peace. Naples engaged to exclude from all her ports, including those of Sicily, the ships both of war and commerce belonging to Great Britain and Turkey; while those of France and her allies, as well as of the Northern powers, should have free access. She also suffered some slight territorial loss; but the most significant article was kept secret. The boot of Italy was to be occupied by a division of twelve or fifteen thousand French, whom Naples was to pay and support, and to whom were to be delivered all the maritime fortresses south of the river Ofanto and east of the Bradano, including the ports of Taranto and Brindisi. "This occupation," wrote Bonaparte to his war-minister, "is only in order to facilitate the communications of the army of Egypt with France." 40 The Neapolitan ports became a refuge for French squadrons; while the army of occupation stood ready to embark, if any body of ships found their way to those shores. Unfortunately, the combined British and Turkish armies had already landed in Egypt, and had won the battle of Alexandria a week before the treaty with Naples was signed. As a speedy result the French in Egypt were divided; part being forced back upon Cairo and part shut up in Alexandria,—while the fleet of Admiral Keith cruised off the coast.
No French squadron succeeded in carrying to Egypt the desired re-enforcements, notwithstanding the numerous efforts made by the first consul. The failure arose from two causes: the penury of the French arsenals, and the difficulty of a large body of ships escaping together, or of several small bodies effecting a combination, in face of the watchfulness of the British. Both troubles were due mainly to the rigid and methodical system introduced by Earl St. Vincent; who, fortunately for Great Britain, assumed command of the Channel fleet at the same time that Bonaparte sought to impress upon the French navy a more sagacious direction and greater energy of action. His instructions to Admiral Bruix in February, 1800, 41 were to sail from Brest with over thirty French and Spanish sail-of-the-line, to drive the British blockaders from before the port, to relieve Malta, send a light squadron to Egypt, and then bring his fleet to Toulon, where it would be favorably placed to control the Mediterranean. Delay ensuing, owing to lack of supplies and the unwillingness of the Spaniards, he wrote again at the end of March, "If the equinox passes without the British fleet dispersing, then, great as is our interest in raising the blockade of Malta and carrying help to Egypt, they must be abandoned;" 42 and throughout the summer months he confined his action to the unremitting efforts, already noticed, to keep a stream of small vessels constantly moving towards Egypt.
After the autumn equinox Bonaparte again prepared for a grand naval operation. Admiral Ganteaume was detailed to sail from Brest with seven ships-of-the-line, carrying besides their crews four thousand troops and an immense amount of material. "Admiral Ganteaume," wrote he to Menou, commander-in-chief in Egypt, "brings to