The commander of our fleet would be constrained to keep his fighting force pretty close together, thus restricting his initiative; lest the entire enemy fleet catch a detached part out of supporting distance of the main body, and annihilate it with little loss to themselves.
We could probably shut off most of the enemy's sea-borne commerce; and the war would become one of endurance between our fleet, on the one hand, and the economic forces and the morale of the enemy country on the other hand.
In the case of operations carried on far away from the bases of both fleets, operations like those that the French and British carried on in the West Indies, the commanders-in-chief will naturally be much less directed by the admiralties at home than will a commander-in-chief operating near home; and the strategical advantage, as affected by the proximity of bases, and by the possession of the better chance for the initiative, will be reduced to its minimum.
Of course, the victory will go to the more powerful force; but so many factors go to make up power, that it may be difficult to determine which is the more powerful, until after victory itself shall have decided it.

Supposing the skill to be equal on both sides, the victory will go to the side that possesses the most numerous and powerful vessels of all kinds.

But unless there is a very great disproportion, it may be difficult to determine which side has the more powerful ships, even though we may know which side has the more numerous.

It is extremely difficult to compare even two single war-ships because we do not know the relative values of their factors.

Suppose two ships, for instance, to be equal in all ways, except that one ship has ten 14-inch guns, and the other has twelve 12-inch guns of higher initial velocity.