k possession of the abandoned ships, but it
was at the same time the parley appeared." The Danish commander,
speaking of the general contest between the two lines, says: "The
Crown-battery did not come at all into action." An English writer says
distinctly: "The works (fortifications) of Copenhagen were absolutely
untouched at the close of the action." Colonel Mitchel, the English
historian, says: "Lord Nelson never fired a shot at the town or
fortifications of Copenhagen; he destroyed a line of block-ships,
prames, and floating batteries that defended the sea approach to the
town; and the Crown Prince, seeing his capital exposed, was willing to
finish by armistice a war, the object of which was neither very popular
nor well understood. What the result of the action between Copenhagen
and the British fleet might ultimately have been, is therefore
altogether uncertain. THE BOMBARDMENT OF COPENHAGEN BY NELSON, as it is
generally styled, is therefore, like most other oracular phrases of the
day, a mere combination of words, without the slightest meaning."

The British lost in killed and wounded nine hundred and forty-three men;
and the loss of the Danes, according to their own account, which is
confirmed by the French, was but very little higher. The English,
however, say it amounted to sixteen or eighteen hundred; but let the
loss be what it may, it was almost exclusively confined to the floating
defences, and can in no way determine the relative accuracy of aim of
the guns ashore and guns afloat.

The facts and testimony we have adduced, prove incontestably--

1st. That of the fleet of fifty-two sail and seventeen hundred guns sent
by the English to the attack upon Copenhagen, two ships carrying one
hundred and forty-eight guns were grounded or wrecked; seven ships of
the line, and thirty-six smaller vessels, carrying over one thousand
guns, were actually brought into the action; while the remainder were
held as a reserve to act upon the first favorable opportunity.

2d. That the Danish line of floating defences, consisting mostly of
hulls, sloops, rafts, &c., carried only six hundred and twenty-eight
guns of all descriptions; that the fixed batteries supporting this line
did not carry over eighty or ninety guns at most; and that both these
land and floating batteries were mostly manned and the guns served by
_volunteers_.

3d. That the fixed batteries in the system of defence were either so
completely masked, or so