French spies sent to England to examine her ports, etc. subsisting between the two countries, Napoleon despatched to England a number of agents whose ostensible occupation was to watch over the interests of French trade and navigation, their real business and most important commission being to make inquiries into the commercial value of each port; the course of exchange; the state of the neighbouring manufactures and fairs; together with every detail necessary for establishing a rivalry in trade. These in themselves were legitimate and perhaps not unfriendly objects, but each agent was further required "to furnish a plan of the ports of his district," with "a specification of the soundings for mooring vessels." If no plan could be procured, then he was enjoined to point out, "with what wind vessels could come in and go out, and what was the greatest draught of water with which they could enter therein deeply laden."
From the earliest moment of his assumption of power Napoleon had conceived the idea that England, "a mere nation of shopkeepers," could be most effectually injured by directing his hostility against her trade, and certain it is that, with unintermitting pertinacity, he tried to carry out this design. It happened, however, that military men and engineers were selected to act as "commercial agents," the two most able and active of whom having actually commenced their duties in Guernsey and Dublin, while others arrived in London to receive final instructions from leaders who had been recognised by Lord Hawkesbury, the English Commissary-general of the commercial relations with the French republic in London. The English
