The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 | Page 8

of the
conditions of war vary from age to age with the progress of weapons,
there are certain teachings in the school of history which remain
constant, and being, therefore, of universal application, can be elevated
to the rank of general principles. For the same reason the study of the
sea history of the past will be found instructive, by its illustration of the
general principles of maritime war, notwithstanding the great changes
that have been brought about in naval weapons by the scientific
advances of the past half century, and by the introduction of steam as
the motive power.
It is doubly necessary thus to study critically the history and experience
of naval warfare in the days of sailing-ships, because while these will
be found to afford lessons of present application and value, steam
navies have as yet made no history which can be quoted as decisive in
its teaching. Of the one we have much experimental knowledge; of the
other, practically none. Hence theories about the naval warfare of the
future are almost wholly presumptive; and although the attempt has
been made to give them a more solid basis by dwelling upon the
resemblance between fleets of steamships and fleets of galleys moved
by oars, which have a long and well-known history, it will be well not
to be carried away by this analogy until it has been thoroughly tested.
The resemblance is indeed far from superficial. The feature which the
steamer and the galley have in common is the ability to move in any
direction independent of the wind. Such a power makes a radical
distinction between those classes of vessels and the sailing-ship; for the
latter can follow only a limited number of courses when the wind blows,
and must remain motionless when it fails. But while it is wise to
observe things that are alike, it is also wise to look for things that differ;
for when the imagination is carried away by the detection of points of
resemblance,--one of the most pleasing of mental pursuits,--it is apt to
be impatient of any divergence in its new-found parallels, and so may

overlook or refuse to recognize such. Thus the galley and the steamship
have in common, though unequally developed, the important
characteristic mentioned, but in at least two points they differ; and in an
appeal to the history of the galley for lessons as to fighting steamships,
the differences as well as the likeness must be kept steadily in view, or
false deductions may be made. The motive power of the galley when in
use necessarily and rapidly declined, because human strength could not
long maintain such exhausting efforts, and consequently tactical
movements could continue but for a limited time;[1] and again, during
the galley period offensive weapons were not only of short range, but
were almost wholly confined to hand-to-hand encounter. These two
conditions led almost necessarily to a rush upon each other, not,
however, without some dexterous attempts to turn or double on the
enemy, followed by a hand-to-hand mêlée. In such a rush and such a
mêlée a great consensus of respectable, even eminent, naval opinion of
the present day finds the necessary outcome of modern naval
weapons,--a kind of Donnybrook Fair, in which, as the history of
mêlées shows, it will be hard to know friend from foe. Whatever may
prove to be the worth of this opinion, it cannot claim an historical basis
in the sole fact that galley and steamship can move at any moment
directly upon the enemy, and carry a beak upon their prow, regardless
of the points in which galley and steamship differ. As yet this opinion
is only a presumption, upon which final judgment may well be deferred
until the trial of battle has given further light. Until that time there is
room for the opposite view,--that a mêlée between numerically equal
fleets, in which skill is reduced to a minimum, is not the best that can
be done with the elaborate and mighty weapons of this age. The surer
of himself an admiral is, the finer the tactical development of his fleet,
the better his captains, the more reluctant must he necessarily be to
enter into a mêlée with equal forces, in which all these advantages will
be thrown away, chance reign supreme, and his fleet be placed on terms
of equality with an assemblage of ships which have never before acted
together.[2] History has lessons as to when mêlées are, or are not, in
order.
The galley, then, has one striking resemblance to the steamer, but
differs in other important features which are not so immediately

apparent and are therefore less accounted of. In the sailing-ship, on the
contrary, the striking feature is the difference between it and the more
modern vessel; the points of