d, and putting aside questions of national pride or
sensitiveness, what did military wisdom prescribe to England? The
question would afford an admirable study to a military inquirer, and
is not to be answered off-hand, but certain evident truths may be
pointed out. In the first place, it should have been determined what
part of the assailed empire was most necessary to be preserved. After
the British islands themselves, the North American colonies were the
most valuable possessions in the eyes of the England of that day. Next
should have been decided what others by their natural importance were
best worth preserving, and by their own inherent strength, or that of
the empire, which was mainly naval strength, could most surely be
held. In the Mediterranean, for instance, Gibraltar and Mahon were
both very valuable positions. Could both be held? Which was more
easily to be reached and supported by the fleet? If both could not
probably be held, one should have been frankly abandoned, and the
force and efforts necessary to its defence carried elsewhere. So in
the West Indies the evident strategic advantages of Barbadoes and Sta.
Lucia prescribed the abandonment of the other small islands by
garrisons as soon as the fleet was fairly outnumbered, if not before.
The case of so large an island as Jamaica must be studied separately,
as well as with reference to the general question. Such an island may
be so far self-supporting as to defy any attack but one in great force
and numbers, and that would rightly draw to it the whole English force
from the windward stations at Barbadoes and Sta. Lucia.

With the defence thus concentrated, England's great weapon, the navy,
should have been vigorously used on the offensive. Experience has
taught that free nations, popular governments, will seldom dare wholly
to remove the force that lies between an invader and its shores or
capital. Whatever the military wisdom, therefore, of sending the
Channel fleet to seek the enemy before it united, the step may not
have been possible. But at points less vital the attack of the English
should have anticipated that of the allies. This was most especially
true of that theatre of the war which has so far been considered. If
North America was the first object, Jamaica and the other islands
should have been boldly risked. It is due to Rodney to say that he
claims that his orders to the admirals at Jamaica and New York were
disobeyed in 1781, and that to th