vade across the
Channel, but the invasion of Ireland was in full progress, and all
nourishment of it must be stopped and our own communications kept free.
There was, moreover, serious anxiety lest the French should extend their
operations to Scotland, and there was Killigrew's homeward-bound convoy
approaching. The situation was one that obviously could not be solved
effectually except by winning a general command of the sea, but in
Torrington's judgment it could be rendered innocuous by holding the command
in dispute. His design, therefore, was to act upon the defensive and
prevent the enemy achieving any positive result until he was in a position
to fight them with a fair chance of victory. A temporary defensive he
considered was the only way to win the command, while to hazard a decision
in inferior strength was the best way to lose it.

Nothing could be in closer harmony with the principles of good strategy as
we understand them now. It was undoubtedly in advance of anything that had
been done up to that time, and it was little wonder if the Government, as
is usually said, failed to appreciate the design. Their rejection of it has
come in for very severe criticism. But it would seem that they
misunderstood rather than failed to appreciate. The Earl of Nottingham, who
was at the head of the Government, believed, as his reply to the admiral
clearly shows, that Torrington meant to retire to the Gunfleet at once;
whereas it is equally clear to us that the Gunfleet was to be his extreme
point, and that he did not mean to retire so far unless the French forced
him. The Minister failed, as others have done since, to grasp what the
admiral meant by "A fleet in being." He thought that in Torrington's view a
fleet safe in port and not in contact with the enemy was "in being,"
whereas Torrington had no such idea. As Nottingham conceived the admiral's
intention he saw that although it might preserve the fleet, it would expose
everything else to destruction; that is, he was oppressed with the special
characteristic of naval warfare which always permits action against the
ulterior object when the enemy denies you any chance of acting against his
armed force.

Under this misapprehension, which indeed was not justified by the words of
Torrington's despatch, he procured from the Queen an order in these terms:
"We apprehend," it ran, "the consequences of your retiring to the Gunfleet
to be so fatal, that we choose rather you should u