‘THE NAVAL GREATNESS OF BRITAIN’
Speech to the Royal Academy banquet, Burlington House, London, 3 May 1913
The year that has passed since I had the honour of replying on this important occasion to this toast has been a year of increasing naval power, so far as this country is concerned, and I should like to take this opportunity of acknowledging wholeheartedly the support the Admiralty have received from men of every shade of public opinion and every school of political thought, and the support which has been manifested not only in parliament by those who vote the large sums necessary, but in the country by those who provide these ample supplies for every naval purpose for which the ministers responsible have asked that credit should be granted.
We are now entering on that period of the year when the British Navy is at its strongest. The new system of refits introduced last autumn enables all the most powerful vessels of the Fleet to be constantly and instantly available during the summer months, and this month and for the next few months we attain and maintain our maximum peacetime development. Now, Sir Edward [Poynter], I should not venture to use at all any language which might be considered vainglorious boasting in the presence of my noble friend Lord Morley, who I am sure would not hesitate to rebuke such unseemly conduct in one who has so long followed him, but I feel that I am entitled to make one observation to this distinguished company. Like anyone else placed in my position, a year and a half ago I endeavoured to turn upon the different features of naval organization, which I had great opportunities of examining, a questioning eye, and I can truthfully and honestly say that after a year and a half of very good opportunity of observing, the confidence which one feels in this tremendous naval organization grows steadily, and the more one knows about it, and the more one understands it, the more sure one feels of the solid and sober foundation upon which the naval greatness of Britain depends. When we talk of naval strength we are accustomed usually to compute it in the number of ships and men, but after all that is no true measure of naval supremacy; quality, and quality in the first place, is what we must depend upon. I am sure you will not be indulging in any unreasonable expectation or hope if you believe that, ship for ship and man for man, our people have no reason to be deemed unequal to any task they may be called upon to undertake. It is only when this question of quality has been effectually disposed of that our great superiority in numbers would need to be carefully examined.
During the year that has passed we have witnessed increasing co-operation with the military forces. The Secretary of State for War and I have been friends since schoolboy times, and his Serene Highness the First Sea Lord is on terms of close and cordial friendship with the distinguished head of the General Staff of the Army. It is very necessary that the Navy and the Army should work together. In an island country and a maritime Empire all warfare tends sooner or later to become amphibious, and a close, intimate, and flexible co-operation between the forces of sea and land is necessary if we are to develop our full power on either element. There have been times when speakers for the Navy and the naval authorities have been inclined to belittle the part taken by the Army in maintaining the security of the country. Those times are done, and to-day naval men of every school recognize that it is essential for the effective naval defence of those islands that an adequate military establishment should be preserved therein.
I have been racking my brain, Sir Edward, during your sumptuous entertainment, to think of some connection, however far-fetched, between art and our modern battleships, but I frankly confess I find it difficult to trace in the outlines of these formidable engines any of those qualities of grace and beauty which, perhaps, in ancient times were associated with ships of the line, and to which you would look as the groundwork of the pictures which should find their place in the exhibition of the year. Modern ships do not afford much ground for artists to work upon, and I am not at all sure whether in the future our developments under the water or in the air are likely to remove that serious defect; so I am afraid we cannot on the aesthetic or artistic side claim any close acquaintanceship with the Royal Academy. Still, Sir Edward, you have touched upon another aspect. The times in which we live are stormy, the shadow of danger darkens the threshold of European civilization. We trust and we believe that it will pass, as it has so often passed before; but, still, you are right at your banquet tonight in comfortable London not to forget the officers and seamen upon whose punctual and faithful fulfilment of their arduous duties the safety, the fortunes and the honour of our country depend.