At last the French grew weary of this horrible bloodshed; but, as they could not manage themselves, a soldier named Napoleon Bonaparte, by his great cleverness and the victories he gained over other nations, succeeded in getting all the power.  His victories were wonderful.  He beat the Germans, the Italians, the Russians, and conquered wherever he went.  There was only one nation he never could beat, and that was the English; though he very much wanted to have come over here with a great fleet and army, and have conquered our island.  All over England people got ready.  All the men learnt something of how to be soldiers, and made themselves into regiments of volunteers; and careful watch was kept against the quantities of flat-bottomed boats that Bonaparte had made ready to bring his troops across the English Channel.  But no one had ships and sailors like the English; and, besides, they had the greatest sea-captain who ever lived, whose name was Horatio Nelson.  When the French went under Napoleon to try to conquer Egypt and all the East, Nelson went after them with his ships, and beat the whole French fleet, though it was a great deal larger than his own, at the mouth of the Nile, blowing up the Admiral’s ship, and taking or burning many more.  Afterward, when the King of Denmark was being made to take part against England, Nelson’s fleet sailed to Copenhagen, fought a sharp battle, and took all the Danish ships.  And lastly, when Spain had made friends with France, and both their fleets had joined together against England, Lord Nelson fought them both off Cape Trafalgar, and gained the greatest of all his victories; but it was his last, for a Frenchman on the mast-head shot him through the backbone, and he died the same night.  No one should ever forget the order he gave to all his sailors in all the ships before the battle—­ “England expects every man to do his duty.”

After the battle of Trafalgar the sea was cleared of the enemy’s ships, and there was no more talk of invading England.  Indeed, though Bonaparte overran nearly all the Continent of Europe, the smallest strip of sea was enough to stop him, for his ships could not stand before the English ones.

All this time English affairs were managed by Mr. Pitt, Lord Chatham’s son; but he died the very same year as Lord Nelson was killed, 1805, and then his great rival, Mr. Fox, was minister in his stead:  but he, too, died very soon, and affairs were managed by less clever men, but who were able to go on in the line that Pitt had marked out for them:  and that was, of standing up with all their might against Bonaparte—­ though he now called himself the Emperor, Napoleon I., and was treading down every country in Europe.

The war time was a hard one at home in England, for everything was very dear and the taxes were high; but everyone felt that the only way to keep the French away was to go on fighting with them, and trying to help the people in the countries they seized upon.  So the whole country stood up bravely against them.