THE GLOUCESTER AND THE SPANISH TORPEDO-BOATS

The Furor is sinking, and the Pluton is heading for shore

boats, and tore their upper works and sides. Shattered by the shells from the battle-ships, and overwhelmed by the close and savage attack of the Gloucester, which fought in absolute disregard of the fire from either ships or shore, the race of the torpedo-boat destroyers was soon run. Within twenty minutes of their rush from the harbor's mouth the Furor was beached and sunk, and the Pluton had gone down in deep water. At the risk of their lives the officers and men of the Gloucester boarded their sinking enemies, whose decks looked like shambles, and saved all those who could be saved. There were but few to rescue. Nineteen were taken from the Furor, 26 from the Pluton; all the rest of the 64 men on each boat were killed or drowned. It is worth while to make a little comparison here. The Furor and Pluton were 370 tons each, with a complement together of 134 men. They had together four IIpounders, four 6-pounders, and four Maxim guns, in addition to their torpedoes. The Gloucester was of 800 tons, with 93 men, four 6-pounders, four 3-pounders, and two Colt automatic guns. The Spanish boats were fatally wounded by the secondary batteries of the battle-ships, but they were hunted down and destroyed by the Gloucester, which, regardless of the fire of the Socapa battery, closed with them and overwhelmed them. There is a very interesting exhibition here of the superior quality of the American sailor. The fierce rapid, gallant attack of the Gloucester carried all before it, and showed that spirit of daring sea-fighting without which the best ships and the finest guns are of little avail, and which has made the English-speaking man the victor on the ocean from the days of the Armada.

When the Vizcaya went ashore at quarter past eleven, only one Spanish ship remained, the Cristóbal Colon. She was the newest, the fastest, and the best of the squadron. With their bottled steam, all the Spanish cruisers gained at first, while the American ships were gathering and increasing their pressure, but the Colon gained most of all. She did, apparently, comparatively little firing, kept inside of her consorts, hugging the shore, and then raced ahead, gaining on all the American ships except the Brooklyn, which kept on well outside to head her off. When the Vizcaya went ashore, the Colon had a lead of about six miles over the Brooklyn and the Oregon, which had forged to the front, with the Texas and Vixen following at their best speed. As the New York came tearing along the coast, striving with might and main to get into the fight, now so nearly done, Admiral Sampson saw, after he passed the wreck of the Vizcaya, that the American ships were overhauling the Spaniard. The Colon had a contract speed five knots faster than the contract speed of the Oregon. But the Spaniard's best was seven knots below her contract speed, while the Oregon, fresh from her 14,000 miles of travel, was going a little faster than her contract speed, a very splendid thing, worthy of much thought and consideration as to the value of perfect and honest workmanship done quite obscurely in the builder's yard, and of the skill, energy, and exact training which could then get more than any one had a right to expect from both ship and engines. On they went, the Americans coming ever nearer, until at last, at ten minutes before one, the Brooklyn and Oregon opened fire. A thirteen-inch

shell from the great battle-ship, crushing her way at top speed through the water, fell in the sea beyond the Colon while the eight-inch shells of the Brooklyn began to drop about her. But the big shell from the Oregon turret was enough; and without waiting for another of those grim messengers from the battle-ship, without firing another shot, the Spaniard hauled down her flag and ran at full speed ashore upon the beach at Rio Tarquino, forty-five miles from Santiago. Captain Cook of the Brooklyn boarded her, received the surrender, and reported it to Admiral Sampson, who had come up just in time to share in the last act of the drama. The Colon was only slightly hurt by the shells, but it was soon found that the Spaniards, to whom the point of honor is very dear, had opened and broken her seavalves after surrendering her, and that she was filling fast. The New York pushed her in nearer the shore, and she sank, comparatively uninjured, in shoal water.

So the fight ended. Every Spanish ship which had dashed out of the harbor in the morning was a halfsunken wreck on the Cuban coast at half past one. The officers and men of the Iowa, assisted by the Ericsson and Hist, took off the Spanish crews from the red-hot decks and amid the exploding batteries and ammunition of the Vizcaya. The same work was done by the Gloucester and Harvard for the Oquendo and Maria Teresa. From the water and the surf, from the beaches, and from the burning wrecks, at greater peril than they had endured all day in battle, American officers and crews rescued their beaten foes. It was a very noble conclusion to a very perfect victory. The Spanish lost, according to their own accounts and the