lled for a large reserve of ships to relieve those sent in for
repairs, or to refresh the crews.

The problem would be greatly simplified if the blockading fleet could
find a convenient anchorage on the flank of the route the enemy must
take, as Nelson in 1804 and 1805 used Maddalena Bay in Sardinia when
watching the Toulon fleet,--a step to which he was further forced by
the exceptionally bad condition of many of his ships. So Sir James
Saumarez in 1800 even used Douarnenez Bay, on the French coast, only
five miles from Brest, to anchor the in-shore squadron of the
blockading force in heavy weather. The positions at Plymouth and
Torbay cannot be considered perfectly satisfactory from this point of
view; not being, like Maddalena Bay, on the flank of the enemy's
route, but like Sta. Lucia, rather to its rear. Nevertheless, Hawke
proved that diligence and well-managed ships could overcome this
disadvantage, as Rodney also afterward showed on his less tempestuous
station.

In the use of the ships at its disposal, taking the war of 1778 as a
whole, the English ministry kept their foreign detachments in America,
and in the West and East Indies, equal to those of the enemy. At
particular times, indeed, this was not so; but speaking generally of
the assignment of ships, the statement is correct. In Europe, on the
contrary, and in necessary consequence of the policy mentioned, the
British fleet was habitually much inferior to that in the French and
Spanish ports. It therefore could be used offensively only by great
care, and through good fortune in meeting the enemy in detail; and
even so an expensive victory, unless very decisive, entailed
considerable risk from the consequent temporary disability of the
ships engaged. It followed that the English home (or Channel) fleet,
upon which depended also the communications with Gibraltar and the
Mediterranean, was used very economically both as to battle and
weather, and was confined to the defence of the home coast, or to
operations against the enemy's communications.

India was so far distant that no exception can be taken to the policy
there. Ships sent there went to stay, and could be neither reinforced
nor recalled with a view to sudden emergencies. The field stood by
itself. But Europe, North America, and the West Indies should have
been looked upon as one large theatre of war, throughout which events
were mutually dependent, and whose different parts stood in close
relatio