England In The Mediterranean A Study Of The Rise And Influence Of British Power Within The Straits 1603 1713 PDF Download

Excerpt from England in the Mediterranean, Vol. 1 of 2: A Study of the Rise and Influence of British Power Within the Straits, 1603-1713 The substance of the present work has been given during the past year partly in lectures before the Senior and the Flag Officers' War Courses at Greenwich, and partly in the Ford Lectures on English History for 1903 at Oxford. It is now presented in a complete form on the not inappropriate occasion of the tercentenary of the capture of Gibraltar. In its present shape it is designed in some measure as a continuation of the volumes in which I endeavoured to trace the development Of the eet and the naval art, and the history of naval operations under the Tudors. In approaching the Stuart period, however, it seemed wiser to restrict the field. There can be little doubt that much that is repellent in our naval histories is due to the vast arena they attempt to fill. In the effort to be complete they swing us to and fro from end to end of the earth, till we lose the sense Of continuity, fail to seize any underlying principles, and sink bewildered in a chaos Of facts with no apparent connection and no defined pro gression. It is in the seventeenth century that this com plexity begins to make itself felt, and discretion therefore suggested the desirability of seeking a leading line of development, and following it with as little distraction as possible. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."