382 LAISSEZ FAIRE AD. 1778 In so far then as trade was a source of profit and power "to France, it appeared that, though we had destroyed her shipping, we had not cut off her commerce. It was not only carried on by neutral vessels to her own ports, but it reached her through the neutral markets of Hamburg, Altona, Emden, Copenhagen, Gottenburg and Lisbon. The rivers and canals of Germany and Flanders carried produce and East Indian fabrics in all directions from these centres, so as to affect not only our commerce but our manufactures. “They supplant, or rival the British planter and merchant, throughout the continent of Europe, and in all the ports of the Mediterranean. They supplant even the manufacturers of Manchester, Bir- mingham and Yorkshire ; for the looms and forges of Germany are put in action by the colonial produce of our enemies, and are rivalling us, by the ample supplies they send under the neutral flag, to every part of the New World.” Under these circumstances, the British Government determined to attempt, not only to destroy French shipping, but to cut off k'rench trade, by putting a stop to “the frauds of the 720 Bris neutral flags.” The firs definite action in the matter was sgainst baken in 1806, when England endeavoured to strike at the i 5 neutral trading, by declaring a blockade along the whole of the Channel from Brest to the Elbe. This was merely declaratory, as the blockade was only enforced at the mouth of the Seine? and in the narrow seas, but it gave Napoleon the opportunity of posing as a champion who would redress she wrongs of neutral powers. France had assumed the rdle of the deliverer of the European peoples from privileged tyranny, and it suited Napoleon to come forward as the maintainer of national rights against the economic and com- a mercial tyranny of Great Britain. In the Berlin Decree of November 1806, he represented the Orders in Council as an infraction of the recognised principles of International Law, lo the dis- vdvantage of British traders. which in fact he can obtain in war, by no other title than by the success of one belligerent against the other and at the expense of that very belligerent under whose success he sets up his title; and such I take to be the colonial trade generally speaking.” Judgment of Sir William Scott, quoted in War in Disguise, 13. + War tn Disguise, 73, 71. 1 According to the doctrine which Napoleon maintained, the restrictions in regard to blockade only applied to places actually invested; England claimed to ‘nterrupt commerce at ports which she had not invested.