posite condition of mind as to the naval requirements of the two countries. Like those two eminent lawyers who accepted the same premises, used the same arguments, yet arrived at exactly opposite conclusions, the heads of the executive departments of the two countries differed entirely as to the utility or advantages of those iron-clad batteries which had been first tried in 1855. We remember, indeed, one of our best and most valuable admirals-one whose recent experience under fire added to the weight of his opinion-pointing to those French batteries, and assuring us that, in England, they could drive shot through and through them-at least he was told so. Yet he allowed something must be done to stop shell, hot shot, and rockets; and he cordially took up the invention of Captain Cowper Coles for shielding guns' crews with iron cupolas, and urged its adoption upon the attention of the Admiralty. Captain Coles had, in effect, adopted the shield of 4-inch iron, but with certain modifications and many decided improvements. That Lord Lyons and Captain Coles were not singular in the opinions they held, the annexed official report will show.*

We point to this raft of Captain Coles, because it shows that the

*

necessity for an iron shield to protect guns' crews had taken a firm hold of the minds of the naval officers immediately engaged in the operations before Sebastopol. Another officer recommended an adoption of this armour to our gunboats for the protection of the very exposed crews and engines. Sir Edmund, afterwards Lord Lyons, it will be seen, concurred in the necessity of both these measures; but the advice or opinion came from young officers, and, with the peace of 1856, these projects appear to have been dismissed as utterly unnecessary. The perseverance of the French Admiralty, War Office, and, above all, that troublesome Emperor-who not only keeps all his own people up to the mark, but makes us likewise continually wipe our spectacles-did not leave our builders of wooden ships quite at their ease. Rumours would ooze out of certain designs and projects, based upon very satisfactory experiments, by which our Gallic friends expected to render the ship in armour as fleet and as seaworthy, and fivefold more powerful, than the ship without armour.

We pooh-poohed the idea, and said it was one of the freaks of genius good in theory, bad in practice. Yet, somehow, there was not the

"H.M.S. STROMBOLI, Kasatch, in the Black Sea, 13th November 1855.

value.

perfect ease which people enjoy who feel they are thoroughly in the right. "Early in 1857," says Capt. Halsted, "preparations were made with a view of testing the sides of the Trusty at 450 yards." It is evident some one had misgivings. Nothing came of it, and a year passed without certain progress in one direction or the other. We suppose that some gallant artilleryman had again driven a hole through a 44-inch plate with a solid 68-pounder shot at 200 yards. There was feverishness, however, in spite of the pretended calm, and we are told in the Quarterly Review, by a writer who appears to be sure of his authority, that "as early as 1856 designs for an iron-plated corvette with fine lines, and destined for high speed, very similar to those now being constructed (in 1860), were submitted to the Admiralty."*

The clouds that were gathering over Italy towards the close of 1858 drew fresh attention to our defences, naval and military, and the question of the penetrability of iron plates again came up; but before we proceed to consider the fresh experiments, we must remind the reader that one fact had evidently been arrived at by all authorities, that shells, filled either with explosive or inflammable matter, were the projectiles with which speedily to bring woodenship actions to an issue; and that all batteries placed near the sea ought to be furnished with furnaces for heating shot. The inflammability of men-of-war, and the accessibility of their weak points-the engine-room and powder-magazine-were thus acknowledged. Seamen-gunners swore by shell-guns, and the 10-inch gun became quite a pet; its shell carried 5 lb. of powder; its explosion would silence for some time, we were told, any deck of guns on which it lighted. We armed the great frigates, built in imitation of the United States' Niagara and others, with this wonder-working gun; whilst our cousins across the Atlantic armed such line-of-battle ships in disguise with shell-firing guns alone. Some of

their vessels had actually no solid shot whatever on board, and we were fast following the example. We beg the reader to keep this in mind, for no one now denies that shells are useless against iron-clad ships. We will now relate how the Trusty and iron plates were next maltreated, in what, with all due deference to Woolwich and the Excellent, we consider a series of tests very unlike what a ship in armour would be subjected to in a naval action.

66

In January '59 the first experiment was made with an Armstrong gun, a 32-pounder, that had a range of 9200 yards, or 5 miles. Fourteen shots were fired with 6-lb. charges of powder at distances the maximum of which was 450 yards, and gradually closed towards the Trusty's sides, until there was an interval of only twenty yards! The shot used were cast-iron, wrought-iron, and steel ones. Only two of the steel balls succeeded in fixing themselves into the joints between the plates; and, says Captain Halsted, the Armstrong 32-pounder was powerless to injure seriously the complete protection of the ship's side." We own we were astonished at this statement, but don't wish to take advantage of it to any serious extent in support of our opinions, because we consider the attempt to drive in iron-plates, bolted on to wood, with Armstrong guns, even with his 3-pounders, at twenty yards, must in time have proved successful; but nothing could have been more unlikely than that an ironcoated ship should be subjected to any such treatment upon the high seas, except from another iron-coated opponent. A wooden vessel approaching the Trusty to try such an experiment would, in the language of sailors, have been sent "to glory"!

and if it was Fort Constantine that the Trusty was engaging, her captain must be an idiot to close it to such a distance as twenty yards, when the recent experiments on the Sussex martello tower with Armstrong's guns, as well as the

breaching of Bomarsund, would tell him that stone and brick might be effectually treated at much greater distances. About the same time, it appears that some experiments were tried at Portsmouth upon the Alfred frigate, coated with 4-inch plates. In addition to the old fact that the ordinary spherical 68-pounder shot of wrought-iron would pass through such a ship at 450 yards,* it was discovered that a Whitworth bolt of the same weight would do as much at the same distance. Now, unless Mr Whitworth can do more than this, we are not prepared to allow that he has done much. A sphere of iron weighing 68 lb. has a diameter of 8 inches, and consequently makes a hole through timber of that dimensions. Mr Whitworth rolls out the sphere into a long bolt, diminishing its diameter very considerably, thereby reducing the resistance to its entry. The consequence is, that his bolt makes a small hole, and the sphere a large one. This is a very important point in ship actions, so far as damage to either an iron-clad or purely wooden ship is concerned, and may be more easily understood by the inexperienced, when we assure them that we have seen timbers, planking, and spars, through which balls of three inches diameter have passed in action, and that the hole left was so small as to be almost difficult to detect, from the natural elasticity of the woody fibres filling up the aperture. We do not, however, purpose to write a treatise on the laws, nature, or action of projectiles, but to deal with them in a general sense. We say, therefore, that those first experiments upon the Alfred showed but slight advantage in Whitworth's weapon or projectile over the solid 68-pounder, as an annihilator of iron plates. Another series of experiments with the same Whitworth's bolts was subsequently made on the Trusty, one of the original batteries. The distance selected was 200 yards! There was, we are told, a breeze and a small sea on, as if either would be unnatural in a sea-action. Five shots in all

were fired; and mark, only two fairly entered the ship through her side two others struck obliquely, and stuck in the broadside; and one shot missed the Trusty. Thus only two out of five of these shots took full effect; and had the Trusty been playing her part, the probabilities are that a much smaller proportion would have gone to the good of Mr Whitworth's bolts. Let it not be forgotten either, that no gunboat or wooden ship in existence would be able to take up with impunity such a position, with respect to the Trusty, as his gun, or the ordinary 68-pounder, was placed in. So far as the ordinary sea-service 68-pounder gun is concerned, the question is a very simple one. Grant that, when brought up fairly abreast of, and at right angles to, a 43-inch plate, placed over and bolted to wood, it penetrates the plate at a distance of 200 yards. The ball, however, must be an especial one, made of wrought-iron: not, as all cannon-balls are, of cast-iron. The expense of this becomes at once a serious objection, coupled with doubtful advantages. The cannon itself is the most rare and most unwieldy piece of ordnance we have in the navy; it weighs with its carriage more than five tons, and may not be cast loose for action in anything approaching to a heavy seaway. Our present frigates and ships of the line can only carry a few of them. The gunboats which are fitted for them only embark their 68-pounders in smooth water; and as a general sea-service ordnance, it is anything but desirable. Amongst many objections we will enumerate the following:-Its great weight calls for a crew of sixteen powerful men; its training and elevation are necessarily slow; the ports required are so big, that, in these days of rifles, the gun's crew would be swept away by sharpshooters; the increased weight of the shot, 68-pounders against the ordinary 32-pounders for sea-service ordnance, will necessitate more capacity in shot-lockers and magazines-ergo, larger ships. One 56-cwt. 32-pounder, with its hundred rounds of shot and

charges, would weigh about twelve tons; but one 68-pounder, with the same quantity of shot and powder, would weigh at the least twenty-three tons, or very nearly double. In short, our Royal Albert ought to be of twice the size to carry these 68-pounders, and they can alone at 200 yards pierce the armour of the Gloire, provided the Gloire kindly lets them come near enough before sinking, firing, or blowing up such monstrous targets. So much for our solid shot 68-pounders.

"Ah! but," Mr Whitworth may reply, "my 68-pounder throws a solid shot, and is still a light gun." Granted. But don't forget that, instead of making a 9-inch hole, the Whitworth only makes a 3-inch one; and that, at that rate, the Whitworth will have to be a 2-cwt. bolt, to make as big a rent in the plate as our old friend just dismissed. When Mr Whitworth makes such a gun, and it is approved as safe and serviceable, we will be ready to discuss its merits, weights, &c. But there is another point, which neither he nor other armour-piercing gun-inventors should forget, that it is not solid bolts which naval officers fear, any more than solid shot. We could astonish him with an enumeration of the extraordinary quantities of solid shot which have, in very recent times, been poured into a vessel in action. The French flag-ship in the battle of Obligado had a hundred-and-odd shot through her sides-H.M.S. Dolphin, a schooner, nearly as many; yet they won the victory.

Under all circumstances, therefore, it is not astonishing that in 1859, whilst the Conservative Ministry were in office, our Government took heart to order four iron-clad vessels to be constructed. The Admiralty called upon constructors of iron and wooden ships to send in plans and tenders; and we are told that the result was a perfect avalanche of inventive genius, which was most bewildering. It proved, however, how great were the resources of this country in producing these armourclad ships or steam-rams.

An order for two large vessels and two smaller ones was eventually

given; but before describing them, let us strive to meet the many objections to such an alarming innovation in men-of-war; and the objections did not all emanate from old sailors and shipwrights, for even to the present hour we have men of undoubted genius-such men as Mr Whitworth, for instance-giving their support to the obstructionists. He naturally believes in his own particular leather or projectile, and quite forgets that, although his gun might be a very Shitan to these new mailclad dragons of the deep, it will be far more dangerous to wooden ones. Indeed, if half we hear be true of these new rifled shells, our present Dukes and Royal Alberts, full of sailors, will be like baskets full of chickens hung up to be fired at with impunity-or one of those Druidical sacrifices, represented in our pictorial history of England, in which ancient Britons were piled up one on the other, and then set fire to. Touched, no doubt, with some such horror, and confounding the Gloire with our wooden slaughter-houses, Mr Whitworth is troubled with a vision of a large heavyplated ship, attacked by smaller and far swifter vessels of wood, carrying powerful guns, and choosing their own distance for striking the ship which presents so large a target. "What would be the result," says he in a letter to the Times," of firing flat-fronted shots at her plates below the water-line, or of their concentrated fire directed upon the axis of her screw?"

We will tell him, provided that he will allow the Gloire to have as good guns as his wooden Musquitoes. In the first place, by his own showing, the distance the wooden vessels would have to choose, would simply be the arbitrary one at which it is known their solid shot would penetrate the mail-clad sides of the Trusty. There would, in short, be no choice about it; they would fire their projectiles in vain, or have an especial range which those on board the Trusty will know as well as those on board the Musquitoes. And as Mr Whitworth's gun has a range of some three or

four miles, the Gloire would be hitting the Musquitoes from the time they came within 5000 yards, whilst the Musquitoes might as well fire at the moon as at the Gloire until they are 450 yards off, at which range a seaman gunner will hit a gunboat moving at any pace. The crew of the Musquitoes, if they still exist, come then within easy range of every missile, from the revolvers up to the diaphragm shell of the Gloire, whilst her people can only be injured by the passage of solid bolts of cold iron into the ship. Whose position would be most enviable then? And supposing every man in the Musquitoes to have ten lives, and to be as brave as Julius Cæsar, we still think it would go hard with them.

"Ah! but I fire one flat-fronted shot at her below water, and down she goes," says Mr Whitworth. No such thing, dear sir; we will meet that fallacy presently; and did those who believe in practice below water, ever see a flat-headed bolt making ricochet practice? "A chance shot," as the American one-gun privateer observed to the captain of a 50-gun frigate," may knock the devil's horns off;" and a chance Whitworth may have passed through 30 feet of water, and penetrated a wooden bottom; but to make direct practice, his gun must be within 20 feet of his opponent. And we should like to see Mr Whitworth trying his experiment in action at that distance in the present day; or rather, for his own sake, we hope he never may, except in an iron-clad ship, or one of Captain Cowper Coles' iron cupolas. As to concentrated broadsides in a sea-way, we say with the sapient Mr Glasse -first catch your hare. Lastly, Mr Whitworth must not, in speaking of his projectiles and their effect upon iron-clad ships, forget to keep in mind that, if dangerous to them, such projectiles must be far more destructive to wooden line-of-battle ships. It is this comparison which must constantly be kept in view by those who wish to arrive at any safe conclusion upon the subject.

There is a tale of the past war with France, which bears much upon the present question: Does security

for the men at their guns add to the chances of victory on board of a ship;

and, though a digression, we may be pardoned for repeating it. In the year 1796, a frigate called the Glatton was cruising in the North Sea. She had been originally an Indiaman, and, with others, had been bought into the navy in consequence of the lack of ships. She was of such remarkably stout scantling, that to be as strong and slow as the Glatton, was, we have heard, a proverb in those days. She naturally was able to carry heavier metal than vessels of her class. One July night, stout Henry Trollope, her captain, sighted off the coast of Flanders four large French frigates, and they were afterwards joined by two corvettes, a brig and a cutter. Many men would have avoided such odds-the Glatton's captain did not. The enemy formed in line; old Stout-sides stood steadily on, and, by the first watch of the following night, tackled them. Tradition has it that the fast sailingships of the enemy were prancing with delight. We can easily conceive it. "Vill you ishstrike,' shouted out the Frenchman to the challenge of the Glatton. "Yes," was the quiet remark of the gallant Trollope," and d-d hard too!" and he tumbled his old tub amongst them, taking their fire with comparative impunity, and knocking them about with his guns in a manner which astonished them. Figure to yourself, reader-because you need not be a sailor to understand it-one ship of 56 guns, with strong sides, enveloped in the fire of four frigates, of 50, 38, 36, and 28 guns, two 22-gun corvettes, a brig and sloop, driving them before her into port, and yet having herself none killed and only two wounded. Amongst other curious incidents of this noble action, which appear to bear upon the argument we seek to deduce, the 26-gun brig and 8-gun cutter actually for a while took up a position under the Glatton's stern, where only musketry could be brought to bear upon them; yet they did not, it appears, turn the tide of battle. As the French fled, and their losses were never known, we cannot report of the damage they