ation--as a lucky hand at cards may redeem a gambler's
fortune at even the last moment. But strategy is opposed to taking
desperate measures; and pugilists and even gamblers recognize the
fact that when a man becomes "desperate," his judgment is bad,
and his chances of success are almost zero.

While it is possible, therefore, that the main bodies of hostile
fleets may come together in the night, we may assume that it will
not be as part of any planned operations, and therefore not within
the scope of this discussion; and that any combat which may result
will be one in which strategy will play no part, and in which even
tactics will yield first place to chance.

But while our defending fleet will have to base most of its decisions
on guesses, the coming fleet, on the other hand, having accepted
the strategical disadvantage of leaving its base far in rear, will
advance with all the advantage of the offensive, especially in
knowing where it intends to go and what it desires to do. Coming
over on a definite mission it will have been able to know what
preparations to make; and as the naval Powers of Europe understand
the need of co-ordination between policy and strategy, the fleet
will doubtless have had time to make those preparations; it will
not have started, in fact, and war will not have been declared,
until all those preparations have been made.

We may assume that the coming fleet will come across with all possible
precautions for protecting itself against detection by the defender's
scouts, and therefore against an unexpected attack, by night or by
day. It cannot receive an unexpected attack unless surprised; and
how can it be surprised, if it has more scouts, faster scouts, and
more powerfully armed scouts than the defending fleet has?

The possession of the more powerful scouts, however, will be valuable
to the enemy, not only for forming a screen as a protection against
enemy scouts, but also for scouting and thereby getting information
for itself. A numerous squadron of scouts of different kinds, sent
out ahead and on each flank would see any of our scouts that saw
them; and the scouts that were the more powerful would force the
weaker scouts back to the arms of their own main body, toward which
the more powerful scouts would, of course, advance. The weaker
scouts, therefore, would have no value whatever as a screen, save
in retarding the advance of the stronger scouts, and in delaying
their getting informa