In fact, for all their guns, the French and British ships received better than they gave. The wooden sailing vessels of the allied fleet were unable to get close enough to the stone forts of the coastal bastions to cause them much damage (the blockade had done its job in this respect) but they could be set alight by the Russian guns, which were not so numerous but (because they were based on the land) much more accurate than the allies’ long-range cannonade.
