impracticable. He estimated that at least two hundred boats would have to be collected about Boulogne, and as many in the Dunkirk district. But the total he actually found at Boulogne was about sixty, and these could not sail and seemed extremely unlikely to be able to row.
'The information respecting the number of troops assembled at Boulogne cannot be true.' . . .
'Whenever it [the invasion] comes forth it will be from Flanders; and what a forlorn undertaking! Consider cross-tides, etc. As for rowing, that is impossible. It is perfectly right to be prepared against a mad government; but with the active force your lordship has given me, I may pronounce it impracticable.'
'I am certain that in the towns of Boulogne and the surrounding hills the total number (of troops) could not exceed two thousand men. . . . The boats collected at Ostend and Blankenberg may amount to sixty or seventy; . . . they could not carry more than fifty or sixty men each. . . . Where, my dear lord, is your invasion to come from?'
So Nelson wrote about the invasion, and, having investigated, proved it to be an affair of quite a few thousand men at the most.
Following upon this he made an attempt upon such boats as there were at Boulogne: an attempt which proved a disaster, since they were all found to be specially protected against any possible attack. All of
