But it was of much greater importance, in Napoleon's eye, to prevent the commerce which he had expelled from Holland from shifting its residence to the trading towns of the north of Germany, composing what was called the Hanseatic League. A new appropriation of territory, therefore, united to France the whole sea-coast along the German Ocean, comprehending the mouths of the Scheldt, the Meuse, and the Rhine; the Ems, the Weser, and the Elbe. And it was the Emperor's proposal to unite these maritime territories to France by a canal, which was to join the Baltic ocean to the Seine. A considerable proportion of the kingdom of Westphalia, and of the Grand Duchy of Berg, both principalities of Napoleon's own creation, fell under this appropriation, and formed another example, had not that of Holland been sufficient, to show how little respect Napoleon was disposed to pay even to those rights which emanated from himself, when they interfered with fresher plans and wider prospects of ambition. Had Prussia retained her ancient influence as protector of the North, Hamburgh, Bremen, and Lubeck, would not have been thus unceremoniously melted down and confounded with the French Empire. But while these venerable and well-known free cities sunk without protection or resistance under a despotism which threatened to become universal, a petty state of far less consequence, scarce known as having an independent existence by any who was not intimate with the divisions of the north of Germany, found a patron, and a powerful one. This was Oldenburg, a dukedom, the present prince of which was related to the Emperor of Russia, as both were descended of the House of Holstein Gottorp, and was, moreover, Alexander's brother-in-law. This state of Oldenburg had been studiously excepted from the changes made in the North of Germany, after the treaty of Tilsit, which made the present confiscation of its territory an act of more marked slight towards the court of Russia. A formal expostulation being transmitted to Napoleon, he proposed to repair the injury of the Duke of Oldenburg, by assigning to him the town and territory of Erfurt, with the lordship of Blankenheim. But the duke felt himself too strongly supported to be under the necessity of surrendering his dominions, and receiving others in exchange. The offer of indemnity was haughtily rejected; France persevered in her purpose of usurping Oldenburg; and the Emperor Alexander, in a protest, gravely but temperately worded, a copy of which was delivered to every member of the diplomatic body, intimated that he did not acquiesce in the injury done to a prince of his family, although he continued to adhere to that great line of political interest which had occasioned the alliance between France and Russia.