ITS LESSONS AND ITS WARNINGS 3 



of Lloyd's to the following effect : " No form of 

 insurance was practical except keeping up a 

 strong navy and army ; and also, as a second 

 line of defence, a reserve of wheat." 



Admiral Harding Close said on the same sub- 

 ject : " We spend 31 millions a year on the Navy. 

 You might as well chuck that money into the 

 sea for all the good it will do ; for what is the 

 use of going to sea and winning battles of 

 Trafalgar if we leave a starving population 

 behind ? . . . It is no use your boasting that 

 we have a powerful navy, and that, therefore, 

 having command of the sea, our food supply is 

 safe. You cannot get a naval officer to say so. 

 We never had command of the sea, so far as the 

 protection of our merchant ships is concerned. 

 If there was a period in the history of this coun- 

 try when we might say we had command of the 

 sea, surely it was after the battle of Trafalgar, 

 when there was not an enemy left on the sea : 

 yet after that battle hundreds of our merchant 

 ships were captured, and it will be so again. 

 We cannot protect our merchant ships ; the 

 thing is impossible. But I believe this also, 

 that a blockade of our ports is impossible. The 

 true blockade will be the impossibility of our 



