campaign, it is only fair to take into account the quality of the instruments with which the admirals had to deal. It was not possible to do anything very rapid with clumsy, ill-balanced vessels, which were overstrained by a summer breeze. Moreover, both leaders were in reality hampered by what they no doubt considered an element of strength. The numbers of their fleets alone would have made any kind of combined action impossible. At a time when the vessels were incomparably better, and our seamen had a far larger experience, Nelson considered it impossible to manœuvre more than thirty ships in a line of battle. That is to say, he thought it beyond the power of the most skilful and practised body of captains ever collected under one command to combine the movements of more than thirty well-constructed ships in such a manner that they could be brought to bear upon an enemy all together. If this was impossible with so small a number of very superior vessels, we can imagine how hopeless must have been the attempt of D'Annebault or Lisle to direct the movements of a hundred and a hundred and fifty inferior vessels of all sorts and sizes. With the best will in the world, they could not but straggle in the variable summer breezes and the tides of the Channel. Besides, the system of signals was hardly yet in existence. There were, and indeed at all times must have been, a few arbitrary signals, to anchor or to get up anchor, to fight or leave off fighting, and so forth, but there were no means by which an admiral could communicate an order to make a particular movement, except by sending a boat with an officer. Of course this implies that the movements of fleets must have been very slow, or else a messenger who had to row could not have overtaken the captain to whom he was sent. Even so, to send orders to the ships ahead of the admiral must have required an amount of time which made any rapidity of movement impossible, besides leaving an interval for accidents which would render the order improper by altering the whole circumstances. In fact, no battle, in the sense the word had in even the seventeenth century, could well be expected to take place between these two fleets in 1545, even if there had been a more manifest desire on the part of the admirals to bring one on.
The truth is, that neither D'Annebault nor Lisle showed any such inclination. The Frenchman returned from his own coast to ours, and began to stretch along it from west to east. Lisle followed, with the intention of making a stroke at the enemy if a particularly tempting opportunity presented itself. On the 9th of August he wrote to Paget: "If we chance to meet with them, divided as it should seem they be, we shall have some sport with them." From the French account in the memoirs of Martin du Bellay, which is both full and fair, it is clear that D'Annebault was no more adventurous than Lisle. On the coast of Sussex he showed the same incapacity to understand that, in war more than in most enterprises, he who will nothing venture shall nothing have. The English fleet came in sight of the French near Shoreham on the 15th of August. D'Annebault had drawn his vessels as close to the beach as was safe, with his galleys to the west, under a small headland, and therefore between his great ships and the English, who were advancing from Portsmouth. The galleys had been hauled into very shallow water, where the larger of Lisle's ships could not reach them. D'Annebault's calculation was, that the English admiral would not care to run the risk of passing the galleys, for the purpose of attacking the great ships beyond, lest they should fall upon his rear, and so put him between two fires. According to Lisle's statement to the king of the plan on which he intended to fight, he would not have been deterred from attacking by the dispositions of the French admiral. He had made counter arrangements which were skilful in intention, and might have been effective. His plan was to fall upon the great ships of the French fleet, with the Vanwarde and the Battle, leaving the smaller craft which formed the Wing to stay behind, or to windward, and ward off the French galleys. A shift of the wind from the west to north-east rendered it impossible for him to carry out his intention. The change in the wind had transferred the weather-gage to D'Annebault, and if he had been as eager for battle as according to Martin du Bellay he asserted himself to be, he had now an admirable opportunity of fighting. But D'Annebault again found insuperable difficulties in the way of coming to close quarters. All the use he made of his chance was to fight a tardy, inconclusive battle. Martin du Bellay and Lord Lisle substantially agree, but we may give the preference to our own countryman.
"After my right hartie commendacions. Theis shalbe tadvertise you, that the Kinges Majesties navie ys arrived twhart of Beauchif; where, for lack of wynde, we be at this present comme to ancker, to stopp this ebbe, and with the nexte fludd, which wooll be aboute foure of the clock in the mornying, we entend (God willing) tapplye towards Dover. I had thought the French fleete wold have been here before me, to have stopped us at this place, for uppon Saturdaye night last, both they and we came to ancker within a leage togethurs; and all the same daye, frome noone untill night, they assailed us with ther gallyes, but ther hole fleete approached us not, untill it was after son settyng; before which tyme ther gallies were repulced, and then both they and we came to ancker, within a leage one of an other: and yarly in the mornyng they were dislodged; for by the tyme yt was daye, they were asfarre unto the wynde of us, as we might escrye them oute of my mayne topp, halyng into the seawarde, the wynde beyng somewhat fresshe; so that, if they had taried, ther gallyes could have doon them letill pleasour. And wheras, the daye before, they came togethurs, like an hole wood, they kepte now, in ther removing, noon order; for some of our small boates, which could lye best by a wynde, (whome I dyd purposely send to se what course they helde, and what order they kept) brought me wourde, that they lay est with the sailes, as though it shuld seame that they mynded to fetche the Narrow Sees before us. Ther was five myles in lenght (as they thought) between ther foremost and ther hyndermost shippes. And seyng that they be not here in this baye (which we have alredy seane) I cannot perceave, howe they can be before us in any part of the Narrow Sees. Wherefore I have thought good to desyer you to send me some of your intelligence, and allso that you wold gyve knowledge to Rye, that all the shippes, which be there with the Kinges Majesties victualles, may comme and mete with me to morowe at the Nasse (Dungeness), as I goe towardes Dover; where, (God willyng) if the wynde wooll suffer me, I wooll be with thole flete to morowe at night. Herof I requier you, with diligence, tadvertise the Kinges Majestie. And if ther armye, or any parte of them, remayne in any parte of the Narrowe Sees, whethur it be uppon ther owne quoast, or uppon oures, I doubt not but I wooll have some knowledge of them, ones ere to morowe night; wherof allso (God willyng) I wooll not faile to signifye unto His Highnes. And thus I byd you right hartilly well to fare. In the Harrye, under Beauchif, this Mondaye, the 17th of August, at 9 of the clock in the night."
Your assured loving Frende,
(Signed) John Lisle.
To this lame and impotent conclusion came the great attempt of Francis I. to punish Henry for the capture of Boulogne. When every allowance is made for the insufficiency of the tools with which the French admiral had to work, it is impossible to acquit him of having shown a remarkable want of spirit. It would appear, if we are to trust Blaise de Montluc, that his countrymen did not expect much. "Our business is rather on the land than on the water, where I do not know that our nation has ever gained any great battles," is the sentence in which he dismisses the expedition. Montluc, for his part, did nothing that was worthy to be written about. But it was perhaps because the French did not expect much, then or at later periods, that their admirals have so commonly shown the timidity of D'Annebault.
The war contained no further naval operations of any importance. Both fleets were worn out by operations which for the time were lengthy and trying. The Governments, too, were exhausted, and all but bankrupt. Both Francis and Henry VIII. were at the end of their lives; and although peace was not actually made till after the death of both of them, the war was not pushed seriously. Only a very detailed history of the navy could find place for an account of the reigns of Edward VI. and Mary Tudor. Much could not be said, however anxious the historian might be to pass over absolutely nothing. The only achievement of Edward VI.'s Government with regard to the navy was to employ it for the purpose of assisting the Protector Somerset's invasion of Scotland. This effort appears to have exhausted the energies of King Edward's Council, as far as the navy was concerned. In fact, all the members of that body were far too busy intriguing against one another, to attend to the defences of the realm. The resources of the country had been taxed to the utmost during the reign of Henry VIII. A sum of over £3,600,000 was calculated to have been spent on wars during the reign of father and son, and to get the equivalent of that outlay in our generation we
