In view of these various courses of action open to von Spee, the reader will appreciate how our minds were occupied with the question of his future movements. Would he, in the hope of adding further to his laurels, attempt to repeat his success by going into the North Pacific to engage the Allied squadron there, which might have been inferior to him in strength? Or would he go south and follow up his advantage in a direction where there was nothing to oppose him for the moment, except the _Canopus_ and _Glasgow_? He could not hope successfully to combat all the different squadrons looking for him, nor, for that matter, did he wish to risk his ships, for there were no others to replace them. It was not his rôle to adopt such an offensive. He therefore chose to give the impression that he was remaining off Chile, and then suddenly vanished into complete oblivion. Leaving no trace of his movements, he was careful to forgo using all wireless; and, having completed arrangements as to future supplies, he determined to appear suddenly where he was least expected. History repeats itself, and he evidently decided that the boldest plan was what would be least anticipated, and therefore most likely to be productive of success. Taking another point of view, it was obviously to von Spee's advantage to hasten round to the east coast of South America as quickly as possible after the action off Coronel took place, and thus to reap the full benefit of the success that he had already gained. He could not possibly have shut his eyes to the fact that the immediate following up of his victory was the most promising policy for any scheme of operations in the South Atlantic. He would then have been able to strike before reinforcements could come out from England, which he must have been aware would be sent out to hunt him down. Why, then, did he delay a whole month? On his own showing the repairs necessary to render his ships fit for further service only took a few days, and it would not take long to arrange for his future supplies on the east coast of South America with all the German shipping cooped up in this part of the world waiting to be put to any useful purpose. Is it, therefore, unreasonable to suppose that he waited in order to collect German reservists from Chile, either to garrison the Falkland Islands once they had been captured, or to take or escort them home to Germany? He knew that he was really superior to the force under Admiral Stoddart, yet he delayed leaving till November 26th, a period of nearly four weeks. The inference of which is that he was not ready, and further that a seizure of the Falkland Islands was deliberately contemplated and prepared for, and was to be his first step. An additional possible explanation lies in the deduction that he could not have estimated that he would have defeated Cradock so completely, and therefore took time to consider the altered situation before committing himself to a definite move,