stations, when associated with a powerful mobile navy, are sources of
maritime strength in proportion to the services they can render, and to
their convenience of geographical position. In the hands of an inferior
naval power, they may be used, as was Mauritius in 1809-1810, as points
from which to carry on operations against commerce; but unless situated
near to trade routes, which must be followed in war, they are probably
less useful for this purpose than in sailing days, since convoys can now
be more effectively protected, and steamers have considerable latitude
of courses. Isolated ports dependent on sea-borne resources, and without
strong bodies of organized fighting men at their backs are now, as
always, hostages offered to the power which obtains command of the sea.
(G. S. C.)

COALITION (Lat. _coalitio_, the verbal substantive of _coalescere_, to
grow together), a combination of bodies or parts into one body or
whole. The word is used, especially in a political sense, of an alliance
or temporary union for joint action of various powers or states, such as
the coalition of the European powers against France, during the wars of
the French Revolution; and also of the union in a single government of
distinct parties or members of distinct parties. Of the various
coalition ministries in English history, those of Fox and North in 1782,
of the Whigs and the Peelites, under Lord Aberdeen in 1852-1853, and of
the Liberal Unionists and Conservatives in Lord Salisbury's third
ministry in 1895, may be instanced.

COAL-TAR, the black, viscous, sometimes semi-solid, fluid of peculiar
smell, which is condensed together with aqueous "gas liquor" when the
volatile products of the destructive distillation of coal are cooled
down. It is also called "gas-tar," because it was formerly exclusively,
and even now is mostly, obtained as a by-product in the manufacture of
coal-gas, but the tar obtained from the modern coke-ovens, although not
entirely identical with gas-tar, resembles it to such an extent that it
is worked up with the latter, without making any distinction in practice
between the two kinds. Some descriptions of gas-tar indeed differ very
much more than coke-oven tar from pure coal-tar, viz. those which are
formed when bituminous shale or other materials, considerably deviating
in their nature from coal, are mixed with the latter for the purpose of
obtaining gas of higher illuminating power.

It may be