The Roman senate and the Roman military system were excellently organized for a purely Italian policy.  The wars which such a policy provoked were purely continental wars, and always rested on the capital situated in the middle of the peninsula as the ultimate basis of operations, and proximately on the chain of Roman fortresses.  The problems to be solved were mainly tactical, not strategical; marches and operations occupied but a subordinate, battles held the first, place; fortress warfare was in its infancy; the sea and naval war hardly crossed men’s thoughts even incidentally.  We can easily understand—­especially if we bear in mind that in the battles of that period, where the naked weapon predominated, it was really the hand-to-hand encounter that proved decisive—­how a deliberative assembly might direct such operations, and how any one who just was burgomaster might command the troops.  All this was changed in a moment.  The field of battle stretched away to an incalculable distance, to the unknown regions of another continent, and beyond a broad expanse of sea; every wave was a highway for the enemy; from any harbour he might be expected to issue for his onward march.  The siege of strong places, particularly maritime fortresses, in which the first tacticians of Greece had failed, had now for the first time to be attempted by the Romans.  A land army and the system of a civic militia no longer sufficed.  It was essential to create a fleet, and, what was more difficult, to employ it; it was essential to find out the true points of attack and defence, to combine and to direct masses, to calculate expeditions extending over long periods and great distances, and to adjust their co-operation; if these things were not attended to, even an enemy far weaker in the tactics of the field might easily vanquish a stronger opponent.  Is there any wonder that the reins of government in such an exigency slipped from the hands of a deliberative assembly and of commanding burgomasters?

It was plain, that at the beginning of the war the Romans did not know what they were undertaking; it was only during the course of the struggle that the inadequacies of their system, one after another, forced themselves on their notice—­the want of a naval power, the lack of fixed military leadership, the insufficiency of their generals, the total uselessness of their admirals.  In part these evils were remedied by energy and good fortune; as was the case with the want of a fleet.  That mighty creation, however, was but a grand makeshift, and always remained so.  A Roman fleet was formed, but it was rendered national only in name, and was always treated with the affection of a stepmother; the naval service continued to be little esteemed in comparison with the high honour of serving in the legions; the naval officers were in great part Italian Greeks; the crews were composed of subjects or even of slaves and outcasts.  The Italian farmer was at all times distrustful of