So far as fitness for battle depended on the officers and men of the Navy itself the Grand Fleet was as nearly perfect as anything could be. Sprung from the finest race of seamen in the world, trained for a longer time than any foreigners, and belonging to what everyone for centuries has known to be the first of all the navies, the British bluejackets formed the handiest crews you could have found in any age or country. Their officers knew how to handle men, ships, and fleets alike; and every one had been long "tuned up" for instant action. The gunnery stood every test, as the Germans know to their cost; and it actually got better as the fight grew worse, partly because the British keep so cool, and partly because length of expert training tells more and more as the storm and stress increase. It was the same in the engine room, the same in everything, right up to the supreme art of handling a fleet at racing speed in the midst of a battle on which the fate of freedom hung. But when we come to those things that depended on the Government there is a very different tale to tell, because no government can get money for the Navy without votes in Parliament, and men cannot become Members of Parliament without the votes of the People, and most people will not spend enough money to get ready for even a life-or-death war unless they see the danger very close at hand, right in among the other things that press hard upon their notice. Looking after the country's safety needs so much time, so much knowledge, and so much thinking out that it has to be left, like all other kinds of public service, to the Government, which consists of a few leaders acting as the agents of Parliament, which, in its turn, consists of a few hundred members elected by the People in their millions. Whatever government is in power for the time being can, as the trusted agent of the People's chosen Parliament, do whatever it likes with the Army and Navy. The great soldiers and sailors, who know most about war, can only tell the Government what they think. The Government can then follow this expert advice or not, just as it pleases. Now, even in time of approaching danger, the trouble is that governments are always tempted to say and do what costs the least money and gives the least cause for alarm, because they think the People like that best. This was the case with the British governments in power during the fourteen years before the war, when Germany was straining every nerve to get the better of the British Navy. They were warned again and again. But they saw that most of the People, who were not watching the coming German storm, wanted most of the money spent on other things. So they did not like to hear the expert truth; they feared to tell the People; and they hoped the worst would never happen. But it did happen; and it found many a weak spot due to the Government; though not one that was due to the Navy itself.