66. It purported
to be, and I have no doubt was, from a personal letter recently
discovered; but I subsequently found it almost word for word in the
_Memoires du Comte de Guiche_, also a participant, printed in 1743.
This _Revue_ contained many able and suggestive articles, historical
and professional, as did the British _Journal of the United Service
Institution_; each being in its own country a principal medium for the
exchange of professional views. Conspicuous in these contributions to
naval history and thought, in England, were Admiral Colomb and
Professor Laughton; upon the last named of whom, since these words
were first written, has been bestowed the honor of knighthood, a
recognition in the evening of life which will be heartily welcomed by
his many naval friends on both sides of the Atlantic. In short, apart
from the first-hand inquiry which I did not yet attempt, the material
available in 1885 was chiefly histories written long before,
supplemented by a great many scattered papers of more recent date.

Before leaving this part of my experience I will say a good word for
Campbell's _Lives of the Admirals_, so far as his own work--down to
1744--is concerned. Under this title it is really a history of the
British navy, very well done for enabling a professional man to
understand the naval operations; but, more than this, maritime
occurrences of other sorts, commercial movement, and naval policy, are
presented clearly, and with sufficient fulness to illustrate the
influence of sea power in its broadest sense upon the general history.
Bearing, as it does, strong indications of a full use of accessible
accounts, contemporary with the events narrated, I know no naval work
superior to it for lucidity and breadth of treatment. Campbell was he
of whom Dr. Johnson said: "Campbell is a good man, a pious man; I am
afraid he has not been inside a church for many years; but he never
passes a church without pulling off his hat. This shows he has good
principles."

In history other than naval I was for my object as fortunate as I had
been in Lapeyrouse-Bonfils. An accident first placed in my hands
Henri Martin's _History of France_. I happened to see the volumes,
then unknown to me, on the shelves of a friend. The English
translation of Martin covered only the reigns of Louis XIV. and XV.,
and of Louis XVI. to 1783, the close of the War of American
Independence. The scope of my first book, _The Influence of Sea Power
upon