[Footnote 22: Carronades were short pieces of large calibre, throwing heavy shot, but with a very limited range. They were only of use for fighting at close quarters, when, however, they were terribly destructive. They were invented and first made at the Carron Ironworks in Scotland--whence the name.] [Footnote 23: Sir Gilbert Blane, _Dissertations on Medical Science_, vol. i. p. 86.] [Footnote 24: It extends sometimes to as far as six or seven miles seaward.--_West India Pilot._] [Footnote 25: 'De Grasse's action,' says Captain Mahan (_The Influence of Sea Power upon History_, p. 290), 'was justified by the court which tried him, in which were many officers of high rank and doubtless of distinction, as being "an act of prudence on the part of the admiral dictated to him by the ulterior projects of the cruise." Three days later he was signally beaten by the fleet he had failed to attack at disadvantage, and all the ulterior projects of the cruise went down with him.'] [Footnote 26: _Annual Register_, 1782 (History of Europe), p. 206.] [Footnote 27: Mundy's _Life of Rodney_, vol. ii. p. 251.] [Footnote 28: _United Service Journal_, 1833, part i. p. 512, Sir C. Douglas's narrative.] [Footnote 29: Imagine this page the surface of the sea, the top being north, the foot south, and so on. The wind would be blowing diagonally across from the right-hand corner at the foot of the page. Rodney's ships would be approaching slantwise towards the centre of the page from near the left-hand lower corner. De Grasse's fleet would be coming down to meet them near the centre from a point at the top of the page about two inches from the left-hand corner.] [Footnote 30: To make sure that they saw the signal and obeyed it without delay, De Grasse kept firing gun after gun to enforce it, until all had answered.] [Footnote 31: Captain Mahan in _The Royal Navy: A History_, vol. iii. p. 528.] [Footnote 32: Mundy's _Life of Rodney_, vol. ii. pp. 235-236.] [Footnote 33: British flag-officers were at this time still divided, for purposes of promotion, into groups and subdivisions, as Admirals, Vice-Admirals, and Rear-Admirals of the Red, White, and Blue (except that there was no Admiral of the Red), which had existed since the middle of the seventeenth century, although the original purpose of the arrangement, in accordance with the tactical formations of fleets for battle, had long ceased to exist. The French, on the other hand, had no permanent subsidiary gradations in their flag-officers' list, and held to their original tactical distribution of squadrons; the senior officer commanding the Escadre Blanche, the second the Escadre Blanche et Bleue, the third the Escadre Bleue.]