were so crippled that a continuance of the
fight had become a matter of physical impossibility.

What advantage remained appeared to be on the side of the remains of
the Franco-Italian fleet; but this was speedily negatived an hour
after sunrise by the appearance of a fresh British Squadron,
consisting of the five battleships, fifteen cruisers, and a large
flotilla of gunboats and torpedo-boats which had passed through the
Canal during the night from Aden and Suakim, and appeared on the
scene just in time to turn the tide of battle decisively in favour of
the British Admiral.

As soon as this new force got into action it went to work with
terrible effectiveness, and in three hours there was not a single
vessel that was still flying the French or Italian flag. The victory
had, it is true, been bought at a tremendous price, but it was
complete and decisive, and at the moment that the last of the ships
of the League struck her flag, Admiral Beresford stood in the same
glorious position as Sir George Rodney had done a hundred and
twenty-two years before, when he saved the British Empire in the
ever-memorable victory of the 12th of April 1782.

The triumph in the Mediterranean was, however, only a set-off to a
disaster which had occurred more than five weeks previously in the
Atlantic. The Russian fleet, which had broken the blockade of the
Sound, with the assistance of the _Lucifer_, had, after coaling at
Aberdeen, made its way into the Atlantic, and there, in conjunction
with the Franco-Italian fleets operating along the Atlantic steamer
route, had, after a series of desperate engagements, succeeded in
breaking up the line of British communication with America and
Canada.

This result had been achieved mainly in consequence of the contrast
between the necessary methods of attack and defence. On the one hand,
Britain had been compelled to maintain an extended line of ocean
defence more than three thousand miles in length, and her ships had
further been hampered by the absolute necessity of attending, first,
to the protection of the Atlantic liners, and, secondly, to warding
off isolated attacks which were directed upon different parts of the
line by squadrons which could not be attacked in turn without
breaking the line of convoy which it was all-essential to preserve
intact.

For two or three weeks there had been a series of running fights; but
at length the ocean chain had broken under the perpetual strain, and
a