It is not enough to seize British ships; the hated wares get in under American, Swedish, Spanish, and Portuguese, _even under French flags_.
Of the 2,000 ships that entered the Baltic in 1810, not one was really a neutral: they were all charged with English goods, with false papers and _forged certificates of origin manufactured in London_.[246] Any other unit among earth's millions would have been convinced of the futility of the whole enterprise, now that his own special devices were being turned against him.

It was not enough to conquer and enchain the Continent.

Every customs officer must be an expert in manufactures, groceries, documents, and the water-marks of paper, if he was to detect the new "frauds of the neutral flags." But Napoleon knew not the word impossible--"a word that exists only in the dictionary of fools." In fact, his mind, naturally unbending, was now working more and more in self-made grooves.

Of these the deepest was his commercial warfare; and he pushed on, reckless of Europe and reckless of the Czar.

In the middle of December he annexed the North Sea coast of Germany, including Oldenburg.