designer cannot exceed that limit of weight. He must divide it between
guns with their ammunition, engines with their coal, and armour. Every
ton given to armour diminishes the tonnage possible for guns and
engines, and, given a minimum for armour, every extra ton given to
engines and coal reduces the possible weight of guns and ammunition. In
the _Dreadnought_ a very great effort was made to obtain a considerable
extra speed over that of all other battleships. This extra speed was
defended on the ground that it would enable a fleet of _Dreadnoughts_ to
fight a battle at long range, and with a view to such battle the
_Dreadnought_ was provided only with guns of the heaviest calibre and
deprived of those guns of medium calibre with which earlier battleships
were well provided. The theories thus embodied in the new class of ships
were both of them doubtful, and even dangerous. In the first place, it
is in the highest degree injurious to the spirit and courage of the crew
to have a ship which they know will be at a disadvantage if brought into
close proximity with the enemy. Their great object ought to be to get as
near to the enemy as possible. The hypothesis that more damage will be
done by an armament exclusively of the largest guns is in the opinion
of many of the best judges likely to be refuted. There is some reason to
believe that a given tonnage, if devoted to guns of medium calibre,
would yield a very much greater total damage to an enemy's ship than if
devoted to a smaller number of guns of heavy calibre and firing much
less rapidly.

There is, moreover, a widespread belief among naval officers of the
highest repute, among whom may be named the author of the "Influence of
Sea Power upon History," than whom no one has thought more profoundly on
the subject of naval war, that it is bad economy to concentrate in a few
very large ships the power which might be more conveniently and
effectively employed if distributed in a great number of ships of more
moderate size.

Surely, so long as naval opinion is divided about the tactical and
strategical wisdom of a new type of battleship, it is rash to continue
building battleships exclusively of that type, and it would be more
reasonable to make an attempt to have naval opinion sifted and
clarified, and thus to have a secure basis for a shipbuilding programme,
than to hurry on an enormous expenditure upon what may after all prove
to have been a series of doubtful experime