They argued that our manufactured goods must find their way into the Continent in spite of the Berlin Decrees; and they could point to the curious fact that Bourrienne, Napoleon's agent at Hamburg, when charged to procure 50,000 overcoats for the French army during the Eylau campaign, was obliged to buy them from England.[181] The incident certainly proves the folly of the Continental System.

And if we had had to consult our manufacturing interests alone, a policy of _laisser faire_ would doubtless have been the best.

England, however, prided herself on her merchant service: to that she looked as the nursery for the royal navy: and the abandonment of the world's carrying trade to neutrals would have seemed an act of high treason.
Her acts of retaliation against the Berlin Decrees and the policy of Tilsit were harsh and high-handed.

But they were adopted during a pitiless commercial strife; and, in warfare of so novel and desperate a kind, acts must unfortunately be judged by their efficacy to harm the foe rather than by the standards of morality that hold good during peace.

Outwardly, it seemed as if England were doomed.