The results, though not unimportant, were not satisfactory, for men were compelled to see that from various causes the huge numbers brought upon the field lapsed into confusion, and that battle, however well planned in large outline, resolved itself into a mere mass of warring units incoherently struggling one with another.  There was lack of proportion between effort exerted and effect achieved.  A period of systematization and organization set in.  Unwieldy numbers were reduced to more manageable dimensions by excluding ships whose size and strength did not add to the efficiency of the order of battle; the powers and limitations of those which remained were studied, and certain simple tactical dispositions, fitted to particular emergencies, were recognized and adopted,—­all tending to impart unity of movement and action, and to keep the whole in regulated order under the hand of the commander-in-chief, free from confusion.

To this point there was improvement; but reaction, as often, went too far.  The change in accepted ideas is emphatically shown by a comparison of the Fighting Instructions of 1740 and 1756, when the crystallization of the system was complete but disintegration had not yet begun, with those issued in 1665 by the Duke of York, afterwards James ii., at the beginning of the second of the three Anglo-Dutch Wars.  His in turn are directly deducible from others framed shortly after the first war, in 1652-1654, when sail tactics had not passed the stage of infancy, and were still strongly affected by the galley tradition.  There is here found, on the one hand, the prescription of the line of battle,—­a single column of ships formed in each other’s wake,—­with the provision that if the enemy is to leeward, and awaits attack, the headmost squadron of the British shall steer for the headmost of the enemy’s ships.  This accords with the general tenor of the later Instructions; but there occurs elsewhere, and previously, the direction that, when the enemy is to windward, if the leading British Squadron finds it can weather any considerable part of them, it is to “tack and stand in, and strive to divide the enemy’s body,” and that, “being got to windward, is to bear down on those ships to leeward of them,” which have thus been cut off.

The thing to be observed here is the separate, but positive, initiative prescribed for a portion of the fleet, with a view to divide the enemy, and then concentrate the whole fleet upon the fraction thus isolated.  The British van takes a particular, but not an independent, action; for the other divisions contribute their part to the common purpose.  “The middle squadron is to keep her wind, and to observe the motion of the enemy’s van, which” [that is, “which” action of the middle squadron] “the last squadron—­the rear—­is to second; and both of these squadrons are to do their utmost to assist or relieve the first squadron, that divided the enemy’s fleet.”  Evidently here we have tactical combination in order