Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/384

 unusual demand for vessels of every description, and had given an extraordinary impulse to ship-building, prudent shipowners soon foresaw that so sudden a rush of prosperity could not long endure without as sudden a revulsion, and "that it was fallacious to suppose that the same demand would continue even while the war lasted."

Nor was it less apparent that the number of vessels engaged by Government exceeded what was actually required for the prosecution of the war, and that, if hostilities continued, the number would be materially reduced as soon as something like an organised system had been established. Such, indeed, proved*