the first, however,
Bonaparte seems to have had no such intention. The armament of the
flotilla itself proved of slight value, and he was resolved to
take no uncalled-for risks, on an unfamiliar element, with 100,000
men. An essential condition, which greatly complicated the whole
undertaking, became the concentration of naval forces in the Channel
sufficient to secure temporary control. "Let us be masters of the
Strait for 6 hours," Napoleon wrote to Latouche-Treville in command
of the Toulon fleet, "and we shall be masters of the world." In
less rhetorical moments he extended the necessary period to from
two to fifteen days.

Up to the spring of 1804 neither army nor flotilla was fully ready,
and thereafter the crossing was always definitely conditioned upon a
naval concentration. But the whole plan called for swift execution.
As time lapsed, difficulties multiplied. Harbors silted up, transports
were wrecked by storms, British defense measures on land and sea grew
more formidable, the Continental situation became more threatening.
The Boulogne army thus became more and more--what Napoleon perhaps
falsely declared later it had always been--an army concentrated
against Austria. To get a fleet into the Channel without a battle
was almost impossible, and once in, its position would be dangerous
in the extreme. Towards the end, in the opinion of the French student
Colonel Desbriere, Napoleon's chief motive in pressing for fleet
cooperation was the belief that it would lead to a decisive naval
action which, though a defeat, would shift from his own head the
odium of failure.

Whether this theory is fully accepted or not, the fact remains that
the only sure way of conquering England was by a naval contest.
Her first and main defense was the British fleet, which, spread out
to the limits of safety to watch French ships wherever harbored,
guarded not only against a concentration in the Channel, but against
incursions into other fields. The immediate defense of the coasts was
intrusted to flotillas of armed boats, over 700 in all, distributed
along the coast from Leith south-about to Glasgow, with 100 on the
coast of Ireland. Naval men looked upon these as of slight value,
a concession, according to Earl St. Vincent, to "the old women
in and out" (of both sexes) at home. The distribution of the main
battle squadrons varied, but in March, 1805, at the opening of the
Trafalgar campaign they were stationed as follows: Boulogn