ar against Great Britain.

It may be said without exaggeration that from this time, and until the
breach between Napoleon and Russia in 1812, the maritime interest of the
war between Great Britain and France centred in the Baltic. Elsewhere
the effective but monotonous blockade of the continental ports
controlled by the French Emperor absorbed the attention of the British
fleets. Of great battles there were none after Trafalgar. To Saumarez,
therefore, fell the most distinctive, and probably also the most
decisive, field of work open to the British navy. The importance of the
Baltic was twofold. It was then the greatest source of materials
essential to ship-building--commonly called naval stores; and further,
the Russian part of its coast line, being independent of Napoleon's
direct regulation, was the chief means of approach by which Great
Britain maintained commercial intercourse with the Continent, to exclude
her from which had become the leading object with the Emperor. The
contravention of his policy in this way, in disregard, as he claimed, of
the agreements existing between him and the Czar, led eventually to the
Russian war, and so finally to his own overthrow and the deliverance of
the Continent from his domination.

The historical significance of the position now occupied by Saumarez,
and its importance to the great issues of the future, are thus manifest.
It was a post that he was eminently qualified to fill. Firm, yet calm,
sagacious, and moderate, he met with rare efficiency the varied and
varying demands of those changeful times. The unremitting and well
directed efforts of his cruisers broke up reciprocal commerce between
the countries surrounding the narrow inland sea, so essential to their
welfare while submitting to Napoleon; while the main fleet sustained the
foreign trade with Russia and Sweden, carried on through neutral ships
for the advantage of Great Britain. Two instances will illustrate his
activities better than many words. In the year 1809 four hundred and
thirty local vessels were captured, averaging the small size of sixty
tons each, three hundred and forty of which belonged to Denmark, then
under Napoleon's absolute sway. At the close of the open season of 1810,
the merchant ships for England, which ordinarily were despatched under
convoy in bodies of five hundred, numbered, according to Saumarez's
flag-lieutenant and biographer, no less than one thousand vessels,
gathered in one mass.