ward if they have any;
and if they be in one company, our vanward, taking the advantage of
the wind, shall set upon their foremost rank, bringing them out of
order; and our vice-admiral shall seek to board their vice-admiral,
and every captain shall choose his equal as near as he may.

4. _Item_, the admiral of the wing shall be always in the wind
with his whole company; and when we shall join with the enemies he
shall keep still the advantage of the wind, to the intent he with his
company may the better beat off the galleys from the great ships.[2]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The articles are preceded, like the first ones, by a list of ships
or 'battle order,' showing an organisation into a vanward, main body
(battle), and one wing of oared craft. See Introductory Note, p. 19.

[2] Of the remaining seven articles, five relate to distinguishing
squadronal flags and lights as in the earlier instructions, and the last
one to the Watchword of the night. It is to be 'God save King Henry,'
and the answer, 'And long to reign over us.'

PART II

ELIZABETHAN AND JACOBEAN

SIR WALTER RALEGH, 1617

THE ELIZABETHAN ORIGIN OF RALEGH'S INSTRUCTIONS

INTRODUCTORY

No fighting instructions known to have been issued in the reign of
Elizabeth have been found, nor is there any indication that a regular
order of battle was ever laid down by the seamen-admirals of her
time.[1] Even Howard's great fleet of 1588 had twice been in action
with the Armada before it was so much as organised into squadrons. If
anything of the kind was introduced later in her reign Captain
Nathaniel Boteler, who had served in the Jacobean navy and wrote on
the subject early in the reign of Charles I, was ignorant of it. In
his _Dialogues about Sea Services_, he devotes the sixth to
'Ordering of Fleets in Sailing, Chases, Boardings and Battles,' but
although he suggests a battle order which we know was never put in
practice, he is unable to give one that had been used by an English
fleet.[2] It is not surprising. In the despatches of the Elizabethan
admirals, though they have much to say on strategy, there is not a
word of fleet-tactics, as we understand the thing. The domination of
the seamen's idea of naval warfare, the increasing handiness of ships,
the improved design of their batteries, the special progress made by
Englishmen in guns and gunnery led rapidly to the preference of
broadside gunfire over boarding, and to an exaggeration of the value