The spirit of England, on the other hand, was effectually stirred. Her fleets, to the amount of not less than 500 ships of war, traversed the seas in all directions, blockaded the harbours of the countries in which the power of the Consul was predominant, and from time to time made inroads into the French ports, cutting out and destroying the shipping, and crippling the flotillas. At home the army, both regular and irregular, was recruited and strengthened to an unexampled extent. Camps were formed along the English coasts opposite to France, and the King in person was continually to be seen in the middle of them. By night beacons blazed on every hill-top throughout the island; and the high resolution of the citizen-soldiery was attested, on numberless occasions of false alarm, by the alacrity with which they marched on the points of supposed danger.[47] There never was a time in which the national enthusiasm was more ardent and concentrated; and the return of Pitt to the prime-ministry (March, 1804) was considered as the last and best pledge that the councils of the sovereign were to exhibit vigour commensurate with the nature of the crisis. The regular army in Britain amounted, ere long, to 100,000; the militia to 80,000; and of volunteer troops there were not less than 350,000 in arms. Soult, Ney, Davoust, and Victor were in command of the army designed to invade England, and the Chief Consul personally repaired to Boulogne, and inspected both the troops and the flotilla. He constantly gave out that it was his fixed purpose to make his attempt by means of the flotilla alone; but while he thus endeavoured to inspire his enemy with false security (for Nelson had declared this scheme of a boat invasion to be _mad_, and staked his whole reputation on its miserable and immediate failure, if attempted), the Consul was in fact providing indefatigably a fleet of men-of-war, designed to protect and cover the voyage. These ships were preparing in different ports of France and Spain, to the number of fifty; Buonaparte intended them to steal out to sea individually or in small squadrons, rendezvous at Martinico, and, returning thence in a body, sweep the Channel free of the English for such a space of time at least as might suffice for the execution of his great purpose. These designs, however, were from day to day thwarted by the watchful zeal of Nelson and the other English admirals; who observed Brest, Toulon, Genoa, and the harbours of Spain so closely, that no squadron, nor hardly a single vessel, could force a passage to the Atlantic.