h it
could have been kept in contact by the sea. In the war that next
followed, the same energy is seen, but not the same vitality; and
France was everywhere beaten back and brought to the verge of ruin.
The lesson of both is the same; nations, like men, however strong,
decay when cut off from the external activities and resources which at
once draw out and support their internal powers. A nation, as we have
already shown, cannot live indefinitely off itself, and the easiest
way by which it can communicate with other peoples and renew its own
strength is the sea.

FOOTNOTES:

[66] Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

[67] Martin: History of France.

[68] See Map of English Channel, etc., p. 107.

[69] That is, nearly motionless.

[70] Hoste: Naval Tactics.

[71] Ledyard says the order to remove the buoys was not carried out
(Naval History, vol. ii. p. 636).

[72] Seignelay, the French minister of marine of the day, called him
"poltron de tete, mais pas de coeur."

[73] The author has followed in the text the traditional and generally
accepted account of Tourville's orders and the motives of his action.
A French writer, M. de Crisenoy, in a very interesting paper upon the
secret history preceding and accompanying the event, traverses many of
these traditional statements. According to him, Louis XIV. was not
under any illusion as to the loyalty of the English officers to their
flag; and the instructions given to Tourville, while peremptory under
certain conditions, did not compel him to fight in the situation of
the French fleet on the day of the battle. The tone of the
instructions, however, implied dissatisfaction with the admiral's
action in previous cruises, probably in the pursuit after Beachy Head,
and a consequent doubt of his vigor in the campaign then beginning.
Mortification therefore impelled him to the desperate attack on the
allied fleet; and, according to M. de Crisenoy, the council of war in
the admiral's cabin, and the dramatic production of the king's orders,
had no existence in fact.

[74] Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

CHAPTER V.

WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION, 1702-1713.--SEA BATTLE OF MALAGA.

During the last thirty years of the seventeenth century, amid all the
strifes of arms and diplomacy, there had been clearly foreseen the
coming of an event which would raise new and great issues. This was
the failure of the direct royal line in that branch of the House of
Austria w