the
continent but bought scarcely anything. The speculation in licences was
carried to a scandalous extent only to enrich a few, and to satisfy the
short-sighted views of the contrivers of the system.

This system proves what is written in the annals of the human heart and
mind, that the cupidity of the one is insatiable, and the errors of the
other incorrigible. Of this I will cite an example, though it refers to
a period posterior to the origin of the Continental system. In Hamburg,
in 1811, under Davoust's government, a poor man had well-nigh been shot
for having introduced into the department of the Elbe a small loaf of
sugar for the use of his family, while at the same moment Napoleon was
perhaps signing a licence for the importation of a million of
sugar-loaves.

--[In this same year (1811) Murat, as King of Naples, not only
winked at the infringement of the Continental system, but almost
openly broke the law himself. His troops in Calabria and all round
his immense line sea coast, carried on an active trade with Sicilian
and English smugglers. This was so much the case that an officer
never set out from Naples to join, without, being, requested by his
wife, his relations or friends, to bring them some English muslins,
some sugar and coffee, together with a few needles, pen-knives, and
razors. Some of the Neapolitan officers embarked in really large
commercial operations, going shares with the custom house people who
were there to enforce the law, and making their soldiers load and
unload the contraband vessels. The Comte de -----, a French officer
on Murat's staff, was very noble, but very poor, and excessively
extravagant. After making several vain efforts to set him up in the
world, the King told him one day he would give him the command of
the troops round the Gulf of Salerno; adding that the devil was in
it if he could not make a fortune in such a capital smuggling
district, in a couple of years.--The Count took the hint, and did
make a fortune.--Editor 1836 edition.]--

Smuggling on a small scale was punished with death, whilst the Government
themselves carried it on extensively. The same cause filled the Treasury
with money, and the prisons with victims:

The custom-house laws of this period, which waged open war against
rhubarb, and armed the coasts of the Continent against the introduction
of senna, did not save the Continental system from destr