e Navy Records Society.
The object of Mr. Holland's discourses was to reform the Navy, purge it of
abuses, and strengthen it for the defence of this realm; and I have been
curious to compare his methods with those of our own Navy League, which
has been making such a noise for ten years or so. The first thing I
observe is the attitude of mind in which he approaches his subject:--

"If either the honour of a nation, commerce or trust with all nations,
peace at home, grounded upon our enemies' fear or love of us abroad,
and attended with plenty of all things necessary either for the
preservation of the public weal or thy private welfare, be things
worthy thy esteem (though it may be beyond thy shoal conceit) then
next to God and thy King give thy thanks for the same to the Navy.
As for honour, who knows not (that knows anything) that in all
records of late times of actions, chronicled to the everlasting fame
and renown of this nation, still the naval part is the thread that
runs through the whole wooft, the burden of the song, the scope of
the text? . . ."

He proceeds to enumerate some particular commercial advantages due to our
mastery of the sea, and sums up in these words:--

"Suffice it thus far, nothing under God, who doth all, hath brought so
much, so great commerce to this Kingdom as the rightly noble
employments of our navy; a wheel, if truly turned, that sets to work
all Christendom by its motion; a mill, if well extended, that in a
sweet yet sovereign composure contracts the grist of all nations to
its own dominions, and requires only the tribute of its own people,
not for, but towards, its maintenance."

The eloquence may be turgid, but the attitude is dignified. The man does
not scold; does not terrify. He lays his stress on the benefits of a
strong navy--on the renown it has won for England in the past. He assumes
his readers to be intelligent men, amenable to advice which will help them
to perpetuate this renown and secure these benefits in time to come.
His exordium over, he settles down to an exposition of the abuses which
are impairing our naval efficiency, and suggests reforms, some wisely
conceived, others not so wisely, with the business-like, confident air of
one who knows what he is talking about.

Now I open the prospectus in which our Navy League started out to make
everyone's flesh creep, and come plump