n of
Copenhagen Vice-admiral T. Macnamara Russell and Captain Lord Falkland
captured the small Danish island of Heligoland. All Europe exclaimed
loudly against the apparent outrage that had been committed, whence
his Britannic majesty ordered a declaration to be published, in
justification of the motives which induced this expedition. In this
declaration it was stated, "that the king had received positive
information of the determination made by the ruler of France to occupy
with a military force the territory of Holland, for the purpose of
excluding Great Britain from her accustomed channels of continental
communication; of inducing or compelling the court of Denmark to close
the passage of the Sound against British navigation; and availing
himself of the aid of the Danish marine for the invasion of Great
Britain and Ireland." Further, that Holstein once occupied, Zealand would
be at the mercy of France, and the navy of Denmark at her disposal.
Looking on the surface of the matter, the justice of the expedition
appears to be of an equivocal nature; but when it is recollected that
Denmark would have formed one of the most formidable sections of the
projected northern confederation, it must be confessed that it was a
justifiable precaution on the part of the British government.

During the month of December the Danish West India islands of St.
Thomas, St. John's, and Santa Croce surrendered to a squadron commanded
by Sir Alexander Cochrane, and a small military force under General
Bowyer. A great many merchant vessels carrying the Danish flag were also
captured.

HOSTILITIES AGAINST TURKEY.

Another armament dispatched by the Grenville ad-ministration led to
no very honourable result. Towards the end of November, 1806, when our
diplomatists at the Ottoman Porte had been circumvented by the French,
and had failed in their endeavours to prevent the sultan from engaging
in a war with the czar Admiral Louis appeared off Tenedos and the coast
of Troy with three line-of-battle ships and four frigates. It was an
ancient rule, that no ships of war were to pass either the straits of
the Dardanelles or the straits of the Bosphorus; but, nevertheless,
Admiral Louis sent a ship of the line and a frigate through the former,
and the Turks, wishing to avoid hostilities with the English, let them
pass their tremendous batteries without firing at them. They came to
anchor off Constantinople, and while there some attempts at nego