To explore libraries, to sift out from masses of irrelevant matter what alone is of value to the naval student, to subject the poetical descriptions of great battles to the cold eye of professional criticism, and to give the results in a condensed, well written, and interesting form, is the task Commodore Parker has assumed, and so far as the volume under consideration is concerned[11]--the first of a series--the task has been well and faithfully performed. The amount of labor involved is immense! The author passes rapidly over the navies of antiquity for the reason, probably, that we are more familiar with that history than with the naval history of a period nearer to us both in time and relationship. What schoolboy has not read of Xerxes sitting in his golden chair overlooking the Piræus and the galleys of his immense fleet strung along the coast of Attica as far as the eye could reach? He counted them at break of day, But when the sun set where were they? [11] "_The Fleets of the World._" By Commodore FOXHALL A. PARKER, United States Navy. New York: D. Van Nostrand. Such was Salamis. When his narrative reaches the navies of the Italian republics of the middle ages, however, our author seems all aglow with love of his theme, and well he may be! Venice, in her day of glory, possessed the finest navy of the times. Captain Pantero Pantera, writing of it in 1614, speaks with enthusiastic admiration of its fine arsenals, numerous stores, and numbers of workmen on permanent pay. These things, he says, were always most "carefully attended to by the republic of Venice, which indeed in this respect not only equals, but excels all the naval powers of the Mediterranean." There is so much of romance and poetry, indeed, in connection with the naval history of Venice, that it requires a cool head and steady hand to steer along the courses of sober truth; but that truth we must not be surprised to find, in that clime of sunshine and beauty, often out-vieing the wildest efforts of fiction. Very similar is the history of the sister republic of Genoa. Unfortunately these lovely sisters were great rivals, and during wars which covered a period of about one hundred and thirty years wasted each other's strength and resources without achieving a particle of good to either. As a judgment, it would almost seem, for such stupendous and long-continued folly, the seeds of destruction were planted without their own bosoms. Both attained the pinnacle of earthly glory, but from both issued forth a wanderer who was destined in time to set his seal upon the fate of his native city. The Genoese Columbus, followed by the Venetian Cabot, led the way to the great western continent which, by diverting the course of trade and commerce from its old channels, caused the loss of wealth and the final decay of the Italian republic. The spirit of discovery once aroused, other navigators followed, and Vasco da Gama, by opening the