Regular stores for ships in the dockyards were also instituted, with a view to the speedy equipment of ships in reserve.[41] It was mainly owing to this last provision, introduced by Lord Barham in 1783, that, though when the war of the French Revolution broke out in 1793 but twelve ships of the line and thirty lesser vessels were in commission, a few months later seventy-one ships of the line and 104 smaller craft were in service. The number of men voted in 1793 was 45,000. VI. THE GREAT FRENCH WAR. The first incident of the war was connected with Toulon, which was partly Royalist and partly Republican. The story in full is to be found most dramatically rendered in _Ships and Men_, by David Hannay. Here it suffices to say that the Royalists and Moderates having coalesced at the eleventh hour, surrendered the town to Admiral Hood; that the British Government repudiated Hood’s arrangements, and that eventually in December, 1793, he was compelled to evacuate the place after doing such damage as he could and bringing away with him a few ships of the French navy.[42] The incident little concerns our naval history, the Navy being but a pawn in the political game of the moment. Indeed, it is mostly of some naval interest only because two figures, destined to bulk largely in future history, loomed up in it--Captain Horatio Nelson, of the _Agamemnon_, who laughed when the Spanish fleet excused its inaction by saying that it had been six weeks at sea and was disabled accordingly; and Napoleon, who, as much as anyone, served to hurry the English out. Early in 1794 the British fleet had ninety-five ships of the line in commission, besides 194 lesser vessels. The _personnel_ amounted to 85,000. The centre of interest was the French Brest fleet. Under Villaret-Joyeuse, a captain of the old Navy, made Admiral by the Terrorists, whose cause he had espoused, this fleet was by no means inefficient, like the undisciplined Toulon fleet had been. It carried on board the flagship Jean Bon St. André, the deputy of the State, who, whatever his faults, realised the meaning of “efficiency.” The bulk of the crew were men who had done well in America. Howe, on the other hand, commanded a somewhat raw fleet, hastily brought up to strength and still by no means “shaken down.” Howe’s orders were threefold--to convoy a British merchant fleet; to destroy the French fleet; and to intercept a convoy of French grain coming from America. From the 5th to the 28th May, Howe was keeping an eye on Brest and looking for the French convoy, the interception of which was more important than anything else, as France was dependent on these grain ships for the means to live.