Besides employing these old battleships on convoy, we had also at the end of August sent three others abroad as rallying points for our cruisers in case a German heavy cruiser should break out: thus the _Glory_ was sent to Halifax, the _Albion_ to Gibraltar and the _Canopus_ to the Cape de Verde station. Naval history afforded numerous good examples of the use of a protective battleship to give security and defensive superiority to a cruiser force—to serve, in fact, as a floating fortress round which the faster vessels could manœuvre, and on which they could fall back. These battleships also gave protection to the colliers and supply ships at the various oceanic bases, without which all our cruiser system would have broken down. The reader will see the system further applied as the war advances. At the beginning of September I decided that the whole convoy system in the Indian Ocean must be put on a regular basis. Secretary. First Sea Lord. Chief of Staff. Sir Henry Jackson. _September 5, 1914_. There is no use in our sending escorts which are weaker than the enemy’s ship from which attack is to be apprehended. Armed merchant cruisers can in no case be counted on except as an additional reinforcement. Single troopships may be escorted by one war vessel, if that vessel is stronger than the _Königsberg_. No convoys of transports are to go across the Indian Ocean or Red Sea unless escorted by at least two war vessels, one of which must be stronger than the _Königsberg_. In large convoys of over six vessels a third, and in very large convoys a fourth, warship should be added. Military needs must give way to the limitations of escort. Six ships, including the _Fox_, are available; and it ought to be possible to organise fortnightly if not 12–day convoys from Bombay. Commander-in-Chief, East Indies, should be directed to submit, by telegraph, a scheme for such convoys. All transports which may want convoy must be held over till the next is ready. W. S. C. Secretary. First Sea Lord. Chief of Staff. _September 15, 1914._ In order to accelerate the despatch of the third Division from India to France, and the seven battalions to German East Africa, it is proposed that the transports now conveying the Territorial Division to Egypt shall go on to Bombay. It has also been decided to exchange thirty-one batteries of [British] Indian regular artillery for service in Europe with an equal number of Territorial batteries which are to embark shortly from home. The ships carrying the Territorial batteries will also go on to Bombay and be available as additional transport.