Painful, indeed, must have been the reflections of those strangely-constituted Britons--if any were present--whose interest in public affairs is limited to the squalid area of parochial politics, as their eyes ranged over the water in the direction of this mighty fleet. With what vain regret must such as these have looked back on the days, some ten or a dozen years since, when British Naval supremacy was but a name--when we had few ships, and those out of date, and few men to man them. Alas! for the fond anticipations of those who were looking forward to the time when Britain should throw away her Empire and sink to the prosperous unimportance of a Belgium, the cheerful mediocrity of a Holland. There, at Spithead, was overwhelming proof that such views are not shared by the great bulk of British people, whether Liberals, Radicals, or Conservatives; that power is still sweet to the ruling race; that that Empire which has been bought with the blood of the Anglo-Saxon will be maintained in its integrity at any cost. Here they lay in serried ranks on the moving waters, orderly as soldiers on a parade ground--the steel-clad champions of a nation's honour--as powerful to compel peace as to put the issue of war out of question if war must come. [Illustration: [_Fred T. Jane._ TORCHLIGHT EVOLUTIONS BY THE ETON BOYS IN THE QUADRANGLE OF WINDSOR CASTLE.] Exactly at eight o'clock the combined fleet began to decorate itself with a million flags, taking time from the Commander-in-Chief's flagship. The unnumbered merchant and pleasure craft of all kinds that dotted the waters and lay still at moorings by the quays were already gay with streaming pennants, nor were the fourteen battleships of the foreign powers behindhand in embellishing themselves for the great review. Some time before two o'clock the business of clearing the lines for the procession commenced, and at two precisely a Royal salute of guns on shore announced that the Royal yacht was under way. Not long afterwards the _Victoria and Albert_, with the Prince of Wales on board, preceded by the Trinity House yacht _Irene_, approached the head of the lines. Royal salutes and the cheers of bluejackets marked the passage of the Royal yacht along and through the lines. The _Victoria and Albert_ was followed by a train of vessels--the Peninsular and Oriental Company's liner, the _Carthage_, carrying those Royal guests for whom there was no accommodation on the _Victoria and Albert_; then another Royal yacht, the _Alberta_; then the _Enchantress_, with the Lords of the Admiralty and their friends; next the _Danube_, carrying the members of the House of Lords; after her the _Wildfire_, with the Colonial Prime Ministers and their suites and the Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain, Secretary of State for the Colonies, on board; then again the superb Cunard liner, the _Campania_, carrying the House of Commons; and lastly the _Eldorado_, with the foreign Ambassadors. The procession occupied