windward ships bore up to relieve their leeward party; upon which his highness tacked a fifth time and with eight or ten frigates got to the windward of the enemy’s whole fleet, and thinking to bear in upon them, his mainstay and main topmast being terribly shaken, came all by the board.’  Monck not being able to tack for wounded masts ‘made up to the prince,’ and then the Dutch, after a threat to get between the two admirals, suddenly bore away before the wind for Flushing.[1]

The manoeuvre by which Myngs attempted from to windward to divide the enemy’s fleet and so gain the wind of part of it seems to be exactly what the new instruction contemplated, while its remarkable provision for a containing movement seems designed to prevent the disastrous confusion that ensued after the Dutch line had been broken.  This undoubtedly is the great merit of the new instruction, and it is the first time, so far as is known, that the principle of containing was ever enunciated.  In this it compares favourably with everything we know of until Nelson’s famous memorandum.  Its relations to Rodney’s and Howe’s manoeuvres for breaking the line must be considered later.  For the present it will suffice to note that it seems designed rather as a method of gaining the wind than as a method of concentration, and that the initiation of the manoeuvre is left to the discretion of the leading flag officer, and cannot be signalled by the commander-in-chief.

As to the date at which these three ‘Further Instructions’ were first drawn up there is some difficulty.  It is possible that they were not entirely new in 1672, but that their origin, at least in design, went back to the close of the Second War.  In Spragge’s first ‘Sea Book’ there is another copy of them identical except for a few verbal differences with those in the second ‘Sea Book.’  In the first ’Sea Book’ they appear on the back of a leaf containing some ’Sailing Instructions by the Duke of York,’ which are dated November 16, 1666, and this is the latest date in the book.  Moreover in this copy they are headed ’Additional Instructions to be observed in the next engagement,’ as though they were the outcome of a previous action.  Now, as Wren died on June 10 (o.s.), and the battle of Solebay, the first action of the Third War, was fought on May 28 (o.s.), it is pretty clear that it must have been the Second War and not the Third that was in Spragge’s mind at the time.  Still if we have to put them as early as November 1666 it leaves the question much where it was.  Besides the idea of containing the main body of the enemy after cutting off part of his fleet, the death penalty for firing over the line is obviously designed to meet certain regrettable incidents known to have occurred in the Four Days’ Battle.  Nor is there any evidence that they were used in the St. James’s fight of July 25, and as this was the last action in the war fought, the ’next engagement’ did not take place till the Third War.  It is fairly clear therefore that we must regard these remarkable orders as resulting from the experience of the Second War, and as having been first put in force during the Third one.