Seven score years and one passed, and the morning of Holy Thursday[14] saw a British fleet sailing slowly up the deep before Copenhagen, the deck of every ship bristling with guns, their crews at quarters, Lord Nelson’s signal to “close for action” flying from the top of the flag-ship _Elephant_. Between the fleet and the shore lay a line of dismantled hulks on which men with steady eyes and stout hearts were guarding Denmark’s honor. Once more it had been jeopardized by foolish counsel in high places. Danish statesmen had trifled and temporized while England, facing all Europe alone in the fight for her life, made ready to strike a decisive blow against the Armed Neutrality that threatened her supremacy on the sea. Once more the city had been caught unprepared, defenceless, and once more its people rose as one man to meet the danger. But it was too late. Outside, in the Sound, a fleet as great as that led by Nelson waited, should he fail, to finish his work. That was to destroy the Danish ships, if need be to bombard the city and so detach Denmark from the coalition of England’s foes. So she chose to consider such as were not her declared friends. Denmark had no fighting ships at home to pit against her. Her sailors were away serving in the merchant marine. She had no practised gunners, nothing but a huddle of dismantled vessels in her navy-yard, most of them half-rotten hulks without masts. Those that had standing rigging were even worse, for none of them had sails and the falling spars in battle lumbered up the decks and menaced the crew. But such as they were she made the most of them. Eighteen hulks were hauled into the channel and moored head and stern. Where they lay they could not be moved. Only the guns on one side were therefore of use, while the enemy could turn and manœuvre. They were manned by farm lads, mechanics, students, enlisted in haste, not one of whom had ever smelt powder, and these were matched against Nelson’s grim veterans. Even their commander, J. Olfert Fischer, had not been under fire before that day, for Denmark had had peace for eighty years. But his father had served as a midshipman with Tordenskjold and the son did not flinch, outnumbered though his force was, two to one, in men and guns.