There were in the harbours of Boulogne, Etaples, Wimereux, and Ambleteuse, some 2,000 flat-bottomed craft of all kinds, mostly armed with guns, and capable of carrying 131,000 men and 6,000 horses. In appearance the armament was a formidable one. But, in the first place, the vessels themselves, armed though they were, could not move without an overwhelming naval escort. Hastily built, useless in rough water, almost entirely without trained crews, one British ‘seventy-four’ was a match for scores of them. This Napoleon knew as well as anyone, and though sections of the great flotilla crept at times along the coast from harbour to harbour, they never ventured a couple of miles from land. The vast swarm of vessels was more than the harbours could contain. Enormous sums were spent on clearing and deepening them; but as fast as they were cleared they silted up again, and the task had to be begun anew. So packed were the harbours that not half the vessels could be floated out on one tide, even if the troops could have been embarked in time to take advantage of it. This, however, might have been expected. It is true that very different and highly-coloured accounts were spread abroad in Great Britain, and produced that extraordinary combination of panic and preparation which seems to be the normal condition of the British people in the face of a remote possibility of invasion. But the strangest circumstance to all who have been accustomed to believe in Napoleon’s overwhelming military superiority, is that while his transport was sufficient for 130,000 men, he had only 90,000, with less than 3,000 horses within reach at the critical moment. More than half his cavalry were without horses. Had he landed in England he would have been opposed by a regular force almost as large as his own, with 12,000 excellent cavalry against his 3,000, besides the local forces, some 400,000 strong. Many of these volunteers had been in training for nearly two years.