y the
enemy, and by the neutrals whose lucrative trade was summarily
interrupted. The traffic in vessels of any considerable size,
sea-going vessels, soon ceased, and Nelson entertained at first great
hopes of decisive results from the course adopted by him. "We have
much power here at present to do great things, if we know how to apply
it," he wrote, after being ten days on the ground; and at the end of a
month, "The strong orders which I judged it proper to give on my first
arrival, have had an extraordinary good effect; the French army is now
supplied with almost daily bread from Marseilles; not a single boat
has passed with corn." The enemy themselves admitted the stringency of
their situation. But Nelson had yet to learn how ingenuity and
enterprise could find a way of eluding his care. The coasting-trade
soon began to take on a large development. The Spaniards, now at peace
with France, supplied Marseilles, and from both that port and Genoa
grain was carried by small boats, that could be moved by oar as well
as sail, could hug closely the rocky shore, and run readily under the
batteries with which the French had covered the small bays of the
western Riviera, whither the cruisers could not follow. The operations
of the latter, dependent only upon their canvas, could not always be
extended to within easy gunshot of the beach, along which the
blockade-runners kept, usually under cover of night.

Hence, although seriously inconvenienced, the French did not find
their position untenable. There were two ways by which the pressure
might be increased. A flotilla of small vessels, similar to the
coasters themselves, but armed and heavily manned, might keep close in
with the points which the latter had to round, and prevent their
passage; but the British had no such vessels at their disposal, and,
even if they had, the operations would be exposed to danger from the
weather upon a hostile, iron-bound coast, whose shelter was forbidden
them by the enemy's guns. The Neapolitans had such a flotilla, and it
seems probable that its co-operation was asked, for Nelson speaks of
it as a desirable aid on the 23d of August; but it did not actually
join him until the 15th of September, when the season for its acting
was almost past. "Had I the flotilla," wrote he, "nothing should be on
this coast. A few weeks more and they will not stay a night at sea to
save an empire." Prior to its arrival the British attempted to harass
the traffic