ar, and over 700 armed boats, of all
sizes.[273]

Our regular troops and militia mustered 180,000 strong; while the
volunteers, including 120,000 men armed with pikes or similar weapons,
numbered 410,000. Of course little could be hoped from these last in a
conflict with French veterans; and even the regulars, in the absence
of any great generals--for Wellesley was then in India--might have
offered but a poor resistance to Napoleon's military machine.
Preparations were, however, made for a desperate resistance. Plans
were quietly framed for the transfer of the Queen and the royal family
to Worcester, along with the public treasure, which was to be lodged
in the cathedral; while the artillery and stores from Woolwich arsenal
were to be conveyed into the Midlands by the Grand Junction
Canal.[274]

The scheme of coast-defence which General Dundas had drawn up in 1796
was now again set in action. It included, not only the disposition of
the armed forces, but plans for the systematic removal of all
provisions, stores, animals, and fodder from the districts threatened
by the invader; and it is clear that the country was far better
prepared than French writers have been willing to admit. Indeed, so
great was the expense of these defensive preparations that, when
Nelson's return from the West Indies disconcerted the enemy's plans,
Fox merged the statesman in the partisan by the curious assertion that
the invasion scare had been got up by the Pitt Ministry for party
purposes.[275] Few persons shared that opinion. The nation was
animated by a patriotism such as had never yet stirred the sluggish
veins of Georgian England. The Jacobinism, which Dundas in 1796 had
lamented as paralyzing the nation's energy, had wholly vanished; and
the fatality which dogged the steps of Napoleon was already
discernible. The mingled hatred and fear which he inspired outside
France was beginning to solidify the national resistance: after
uniting rich and poor, English and Scots in a firm phalanx in the
United Kingdom, the national principle was in turn to vivify Spain,
Russia, and Germany, and thus to assure his overthrow.

Reserving for consideration in another chapter the later developments
of the naval war, it will be convenient now to turn to important
events in the history of the Bonaparte family.

The loves and intrigues of the Bonapartes have furnished material enough
to fill several volumes devoted to light gossip, and naturally so. Give