What followed however was that the fleet passed between the two separated Spanish squadrons in line ahead as Clerk advised.  The next thing to do, according to Clerk, was for the British fleet to wear or tack together, but instead of doing so Jervis signalled to tack in succession, and then repeated the signal to pass through the enemy’s line although it was still unformed.  It was at this moment that Nelson made his famous independent movement that saved the situation, and what he did was in effect as though Jervis had made the signal to tack together as Clerk enjoined.  Thereupon Jervis, with the intention apparently of annulling his last order to pass through the line, made the signal, which seems to have been the only one which the captains of those days believed in—­viz. to take suitable stations for mutual support and engage the enemy on arriving up with them in succession.  In practice it was little more than a frank relapse to the methods of the early Commonwealth, and it was this signal and not that for breaking the line which made the action general.

Again, at the battle of Camperdown, Duncan, while trying to form single line from two columns of sailing, began with the signal for each ship to steer independently for her opponent.  This was followed—­the fleet having failed to form line parallel to the enemy, and being still in two disordered columns—­by signals for the lee or van division to engage the enemy’s rear, and as some thought the weather division his centre; and ten minutes later came the new signal for passing through the line.  The result was an action almost exactly like that of Nelson at Trafalgar—­that is, though the leading ships duly acted on the combination of the two signals for engaging their opposites and for breaking the line, each at its opposite interval, the rest was a melee; for, since what was fundamentally a parallel attack was attempted as a perpendicular one, it could be nothing but a scramble for the rear ships.

In none of these actions therefore is there any evidence that Howe’s attempt to impress the service with a serious scientific view of tactics had been successful, and the impression which they made upon our enemies suggests that the real spirit that inspired British officers at this time was something very different from that which Howe had tried to instil.  Writing of the battle of St. Vincent, Don Domingo Perez de Grandallana, whose masterly studies of the French and English naval systems and tactics raised him to the highest offices of state, has the following passage:  ’An Englishman enters a naval action with the firm conviction that his duty is to hurt his enemies and help his friends and allies without looking out for directions in the midst of the fight; and while he thus clears his mind of all subsidiary distractions, he rests in confidence on the certainty that his comrades, actuated by the same principles as himself, will be bound by the sacred and priceless law of mutual support.