the briefer exposition of
a French writer quoted by Admiral Mahan in his _Influence of Sea Power
upon History_:--

"With the increase of the power of the ship of war, and with the
perfecting of its sea and warlike qualities, there has come an equal
progress in the art of utilizing them.... As naval evolutions become
more skilful, their importance grows from day to day. To these
evolutions there is needed a base, a point from which they depart and to
which they return. A fleet of warships must always be ready to meet an
enemy; logically, therefore, this point of departure for naval
evolutions must be the order of battle. Now since the disappearance of
galleys, almost all the artillery is found upon the sides of a ship of
war. Hence it is the beam that must necessarily and always be turned
toward the enemy. On the other hand it is necessary that the sight of
the latter must never be interrupted by a friendly ship. Only one
formation allows the ships of the same fleet to satisfy fully these
conditions. That formation is the line ahead. The line, therefore, is
imposed as the only order of battle, and consequently as the basis of
all fleet tactics. In order that this line of battle, this long thin
line of guns, may not be injured or broken at some point weaker than the
rest, there is at the same time felt to be the necessity of putting in
it only ships which, if not of equal force, have at least equally strong
sides. Logically it follows, at the same moment in which the line ahead
became definitely the order for battle, there was established the
distinction between the 'ships of the line' alone destined for a place
therein, and the lighter ships meant for other uses."

But the need for other and lighter ships "meant for other uses" and not
"fit to lie in a line," is equally demonstrable. The function of
battleships is to act in concert. They must therefore be concentrated in
fleets sufficiently strong to give a good account of the enemy's fleets
opposed to them. This does not necessarily mean that all the fleets of a
belligerent must be concentrated in a single position. But it does mean
that if disposed in accordance with the dispositions of the enemy they
must be so disposed and connected, that, moving on interior lines, they
can always bring a superior force to the point of contact with the
enemy. Subject to this paramount condition, that of being able to
concentrate more rapidly than the enemy can, dispersal of naval
f