were six marshals of France with nearly 400,000 troops in the
Peninsula. The great efforts which these figures indicate were
unsuccessful, and the intruders were driven from the country. Yet
they were the comrades of the victors of Austerlitz, of Jena,
and of Wagram, and part of that mighty organisation which had
planted its victorious standards in Berlin and Vienna, held down
Prussia like a conquered province, and shattered into fragments
the holy Roman Empire.

In 1812 the British Navy was at the zenith of its glory. It had
not only defeated all its opponents; it had also swept the seas of
the fleets of the historic maritime powers--of Spain, of France,
which had absorbed the Italian maritime states, of the Netherlands,
of Denmark. Warfare, nearly continuous for eighteen, and
uninterrupted for nine years, had transformed the British Navy
into an organisation more nearly resembling a permanently maintained
force than it had been throughout its previous history. Its long
employment in serious hostilities had saved it from some of the
failings which the narrow spirit inherent in a close profession
is only too sure to foster. It had, however, a confidence--not
unjustified by its previous exploits--in its own invincibility.
This confidence did not diminish, and was not less ostentatiously
exhibited, as its great achievements receded more and more into
the past. The new enemy who now appeared on the farther side of
the Atlantic was not considered formidable. In the British Navy
there were 145,000 men. In the United States Navy the number
of officers, seamen, and marines available for ocean service
was less than 4500--an insignificant numerical addition to the
enemies with whom we were already contending. The subsequent
and rapid increase in the American _personnel_ to 18,000 shows