spicion of aristocracy
was accompanied in the navy by a more fatal suspicion of skill. In
January, 1794, the regiments of marine infantry and artillery, as
well as the corps of seamen-gunners, were abolished on the ground
that no body of men should have "the exclusive privilege of fighting
the enemy at sea," and their places were filled by battalions of
the national guard. Figures show that as a result, French gunnery
was far less efficient than in the preceding war.

The strong forces that restored discipline in the army had more
difficulty in reaching the navy; and Napoleon's gift for discovering
ability and lifting it to command was marked by its absence in
his choice of leaders for the fleets. Usually he fell back on
pessimistic veterans of the old regime like Brueys, Missiessy, and
Villeneuve. An exception, Allemand, showed by his cruise out of
Rochefort in 1805 what youth, energy, and daring could accomplish
even with inferior means. Considering the importance of leadership
as a factor in success, we may well believe that, had a French
Nelson, or even a Suffren, been discovered in this epoch, history
would tell a different tale. If further reasons for the decadence
of the navy are needed, they may be found in the extreme difficulty
of securing naval stores and timber from the Baltic, and in the
fact that, though France had nearly three times the population of
the British Isles, her wealth, man-power, and genius were absorbed
in the war on land.

Aside from repulsion at the violence of the French revolution and
fear of its contagion, England had a concrete motive for war in
the French occupation of the Austrian Netherlands and the Scheldt,
the possession of which by an ambitious maritime nation England has
always regarded as a menace to her safety and commercial prosperity.
"This government," declared the British Ministry in December, 1792,
"will never view with indifference that France shall make herself,
directly or indirectly, sovereign of the Low Countries or general
arbitress of the rights and liberties of Europe."

In prosecuting the war, Great Britain fought chiefly with her main
weapon, the navy, leaving the land war to her allies. A contemporary
critic remarked that she "worked with her navy and played with her
army"; though the latter did useful service in colonial conquests
and in Egypt, the two expeditionary forces to the Low Countries in
1793 and 1799 were ill-managed and ineffective. The tasks of