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78 authors, and issued letters of marque against the commerce of the armed neutrals, which soon was utterly ruined. So great a pressure did this exercise over the Russian proprietors, that it was the chief cause of the revolution, in which the Emperor Paul was strangled, and his successor Alexander obliged to sue for peace with England in the following year. On this occasion. Lord Nelson made a speech in which he stigmatised the maxim that the neutral flag should cover enemies' merchandize, and that ships under convoy should not be searched: "A principle so monstrous in itself, so contrary to the law of nations, and so injurious to the maritime interests of the country, that if it had been persisted in, we ought not to have concluded the war with those powers whilst a single man, a single shilling, or a single drop of blood remained in the country." Pitt made use of stronger language still: "sooner than yield the principle he would wind