, and Portsmouth, and Dover, and London would be as defenceless
beneath their attack as Berlin, Vienna, and Hamburg had been. And
after them would come the millions of the League, descending like a
locust swarm upon the fields of eastern England; and after that would
come the deluge.

But the old Lion of the Seas was not skulking in his lair, or
trembling at the advent of his enemies, however numerous and mighty
they might be. On sea not a day passed but some daring raid was made
on the transports passing to and fro in the narrow seas, and all the
while a running fight was kept up with cruisers and battleships that
approached too near to the still inviolate shore. So surely as they
did so the signals flashed along the coast; and if they escaped at
all from the fierce sortie that they provoked, it was with
shot-riddled sides and battered top-works, sure signs that the Lion
still had claws, and could strike home with them.

On shore, from Land's End to John o' Groats, and from Holyhead to the
Forelands, everything that could be done was being done to prepare
for the struggle with the invader. It must, however, be confessed
that, in comparison with the enormous forces of the League, the ranks
of the defenders were miserably scanty. Forty years of universal
military service on the Continent had borne their fruits.

Soldiers are not made in a few weeks or months; and where the League
had millions in the field, Britain, even counting the remnant of her
German allies, that had been brought over from Antwerp, could hardly
muster hundreds of thousands. All told, there were little more than a
million men available for the defence of the country; and should the
landing of the invaders be successfully effected, not less than six
millions of men, trained to the highest efficiency, and flushed with
a rapid succession of unparalleled victories, would be hurled against
them.

This was the legitimate outcome of the policy to which Britain had
adhered since first she had maintained a standing army, instead of
pursuing the ancient policy of making every man a soldier, which had
won the triumphs of Crecy and Agincourt. She had trusted everything
to her sea-line of defence. Now that was practically broken, and it
seemed inevitable that her second line, by reason of its miserable
inadequacy, should fail her in a trial which no one had ever dreamt
it would have to endure.

A very grave aspect was given to the situation by the fact that