In theory the United Kingdom was in a state of blockade. By excluding her goods, the sale of which amounted to an enormous sum every year, from the countries of his allies and those directly under his control, Napoleon hoped that she would be forced to give up the unequal contest. Great Britain had retaliated speedily and effectually upon Prussia by seizing several hundred of her ships then lying in British harbours, by blockading her coasts, and by declaring war. She met the Berlin Decree by turning the tables on France, proclaiming France and her allies to be in a state of blockade, and providing that any ship which had not set out from, or touched at, a British harbour should be considered a lawful prize. Napoleon retorted by his Milan Decree of the 7th December 1807, whereby ships that had issued from or touched at British ports were put at the mercy of the French privateers which scoured the seas; “all ships going to or coming from any harbour in Great Britain or her colonies, or any country occupied by British troops, should be made a prize.”
The banning of British goods and the fostering of home manufactures were the main planks of the great Continental System. Started with the ostensible purpose of ruining Great Britain, it contributed largely to Napoleon’s downfall. In order to make Europe self-contained it was necessary to add conquest to conquest, and an interminable war does not contribute to happiness or make for prosperity. Eventually the French themselves lost their zest for strife, and the real meaning of nationality began to make itself felt in countries whose inhabitants groaned under the intolerable burden of a foreign task-master. The System, which Bourrienne calls “an act of tyranny and madness” which was “worthy only of the dark and barbarous ages,” was applied to France, Italy, Switzerland, Holland, Austria, Russia, Prussia, the Rhenish Confederation, Denmark, Spain and Portugal. If you glance at the map of Europe you will see that there were few States to which the Napoleonic rule in some way or other did not apply. The people who benefited chiefly by this cutting off of England were the smugglers, who plied a magnificent trade both on sea and land. Thousands of persons were engaged in the business of contraband, conveying goods into French territories and assisting the sending of Continental productions to Great Britain. The cost of many articles went up to an extravagant figure. For instance, in France cotton stockings ranged from six shillings to seven shillings per pair; sugar varied from five shillings to six shillings per pound, while the same quantity of coffee sold at from ten shillings to eleven shillings. When we compare the last commodity with the price which obtained in England the difference is astounding. In 1812 coffee could be purchased in Liverpool for one-fifteenth of the price paid in Paris.
