| "Two short siren blasts rang out over the water as the main battle fleet, steaming in four groups, turned to port to form themselves in a single line of battle--the last line ahead battle formation in the history of the British navy. Not wooden walls this time, but walls of steel, with streamlined gray hulls instead of gilded stern galleries and figureheads, and funnels belching black smoke instead of sails close-hauled. But it was a formation Blake or Rooke or Rodney would have recognized, and approved. King George V and Ajax were first, followed by Orion, Royal Oak, Iron Duke, Superb, Thunderer, Benbow, Bellerophon, Temeraire, Collingwood, Colossus, Marlborough, St. Vincent -- twenty-seven in all, names redolent with the navy's past [...], names of admirals and generals, Greek heroes and Roman virtues. And all slowly bringing their guns to bear as they steamed into harm's way--just as their predecessors had for so many centuries in exactly the same sea. [...]" |