We had, on the other hand, the finest supply of the best steam coal in the world, safe in our mines under our own land. To commit the Navy irrevocably to oil was indeed to "take arms against a sea of troubles." Yet, if the difficulties and risk could be surmounted, "we should be able to raise the whole power and efficiency of the Navy to a definitely higher level; better ships, better crews, higher economies, more intense forms of war power"—in a word, "mastery itself was the prize of the venture."