The first of the three periods just spoken of may be passed over rapidly. In the earlier ages there was neither the organised State which could wield a navy, nor the ships for it to use. From the days of Julius Cæsar to those of William of Normandy, no invader found effectual resistance for long on water when he was about invading this country. Our own Teutonic fathers, who were raiding on the coast long before they began their permanent settlements, the generals of the Roman emperors who had rebellions to suppress, the "hornets," as Simeon of Durham called them, who swarmed out of Scandinavia, and the Conqueror himself, landed as they pleased, with rare and doubtful exceptions. There was no State so rich and so fully organised as to be able to maintain a permanent navy. How fully this was the case was shown in the fateful year 1066. Harold was undisputed king in England. The House of Godwin was familiar with the use of ships, and possessed not a few. Yet within a few months England was twice invaded from over sea. Harold must have known that the most effectual of all ways of protecting his crown was by preventing the landing of an enemy. But he was compelled to disband his land and sea forces on the Nativity of St. Mary, for want of provisions. No organisation capable of meeting the cost of a permanent navy existed. The ships, too, were but large open boats, seaworthy enough, and even capable of making long voyages, but, when full of fighting men, they could not be stored with provisions, and they could not give cover to their crews. So there could be no blockade, no long months of watching spent at sea, without which a navy can never be used except as a mere means of transport. Hence for centuries it is always the same story. The invader runs into an estuary, or on to an open beach, and marches inland, seizing horses. A battle on land decides whether he is or is not to succeed in his purpose, whether of mere plunder or settlement. The Conqueror himself made so little use of his ships, except to cross the Channel, that he could not prevent the Danish king from hanging on the eastern coast for months.