Centre Democrat. [volume] (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1848-1989, 1881-02-17
BRITISH DEFEATS.
FROM the Pail Mall Ganette.

! minated IN the final and utter disc0m-
future Of attempts to establish ourselves
in that country. We fought seven oh.
stinatc years TO prevent the independ-
encc Of the States and failed. From
all other contests we have either emerg-
ed victorious or the affair has ended in
tie. But the number of partial
defeats we have had to endure in the
course Of long wars is hardly realized
by members of the "Rule Britannia"
school. Pcssimists, on the other hand,
should remember that their country.
men have Il speciality for retrieving
disasters. Most true is it that Eng.
lishmen never know when they are
| beaten.
Hallam considers that the naval
glory of England can first be traced
"in continuous track of light" from
! the period of the Commonwealth and
that is about the case. But the be-
| giunings of that period were singular
~ inuuspicious. 1t was on the 2Sth
Of November, 1862, that Van Tromp
surprised and defeated our fleet in the
Downs. Next day he hoistcd the
broom at his masthead but We were
not swept long from the Channel. In
February of the following year Blake
came up with the Dutch admiral of
Portsmouth aud totally defeated him,
capturing or destroying eleven ships Of
war aud thirty merchantmen. In
June he again attacked them off the
North Forcland. when such a specta-
Gle was witnessed n wc can never hope
to see in these days-two fleets Of
about one hundred men of war each
engaging. six Dutch ships were taken
aud eleven sunk, The rest escaped
into the Calais Roads. The Dutch
were shown no mercy. They bravcIv
rcassembled the remains of the fleet
and sped northwards, but were attack
cd off their own coast in August. In
this action they lost thirty ship, and
the gallant Tromp was killed. Other
triumphs followed under the Protccio-
rate aud the earlier years of the Res.
toralion; but Charles lis govern
mcnt ended by 80 scaudalously mis-.
managing things that De Ruylcr one
day sailed up the Thames and destroy
several English ships of war. The
sound of the cannon could bc heard
at Whitehall but the King was
amusing himself the while by chasing
blue bottle fly, which it is under
stood he ultimately captured, but not
without assistance from certain mem
bcrs of his court who have acquired
an uncnviablc notoricty. This was in
1867 ; but the Dutch were not long to
brag of the humiliation they had in.
ilictcd on u. The long conflict With
Holland for supremacy at sea was
finally decided six years later, when
she formally conceded Us the honor of
the flag salute.
The French have occasionally beat
en- us at sea-notably off Bcachy Head
in 1880. an event which caused a
panic IN London; nor was our prestige
rcas-erted till years later, when Admi.
raj Russell gained the great victory Of
La lIoguc, I'm Anglo-Dutch squad.
ron commanded by Rookie managed to
get itself defeated off ~. Vincent in
the summer of l693-an affair much
talked of at the time, resulting a- il
did in the loss of eighty merchantmen
Of the Smyrna fleet, but now forgot.
ten. From the date of the Seven
Years War the object of all foreign
admirals has been to avoid contact
with their English friends. Two Incl.
dents in the naval campaign of 1905
strikingly illustrate the pitch of su.
pcriority at which we had arrived.
On July 22d Sir Robert Calder, with
fifteen sail, attacked the Franco-Span-
lsh fleet of twenty, capturing two aud
forcing the rest to retire. For this i'm.
perfect victory. though gained against
such serious odds. he was tried hy court.
martial and reprimanded. Another
fact ViIleueuve had TO mediate in
October as to whether he should meet
Nelson, and called council of war to
decide the knotty question. The ad. |
vice his captains gave him was not to
risk an engagement unless he had half |
as many ships again as the English. |
Ultimately the want Of provisions com
PEELED the French admiral TO leave |
Cadiz, and his doom was sealed. The /
figures of Trafalgar are these: Eng.
lish, twenty-seveu sail of the line, four |
frigates, schooner and a cutter
French and Spanish, thirty.three sail, |
five frigates aud two brigs. Their
weight of metal was 1926 guns TO our |
214S.
On land we have proved ourselves
second to none, without being able to |
claim a decisive superiority over
France. The principal defeats we
have sustained from the former power |
in modern times are at Steenkirk /
1922 and Laden (l693,) both lost |
kp Wiilian, III Tkn ,o-.s..-. -.