The Sun.
London, England, 1865-12-12 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF T

JOURNALS

Ties.--We are gradually approaching a ques-

tion of vital importance to the efficiency of the
Navy. Our iron-clad fleet has recently been
strengthened by successive additions, exhibiting an
enormous increase of defensive power, until at
length we possess a vessel which may be expected
to resist even a shot of 6001 b. The Hercules, one
of Mr. Reed's ships, is completely proof against a
300-pounder, and will be so plated along her water-
line as to repel a ball of twice that weight. All
this time, however, we have made little or no ad-
vance in the way of offensive armament. Even the
300-pounder gun is not actually received into the
service, so that our progress is on the side of the
ships alone. For this there are good reasons. We
can make ships carry armour more easily than we
can make them carry cannon. The sides of a man-
of -war are now as thick as the walls of a feudal
castle, and yet the vessels are as fleet and buoyant
as ever ; but when it comes to mounting heavy
guns upon these batteries we soon find ourselves
checked. It was thought a few years ago that the
68-pounder was about the heaviest piece that could
be successfully carried and worked in a ship's broad-
side. This gun weighed 95cwt., or about 10,0001 b.,
and the Americans are still of opinion that a gun of
12,0001 b. represents the maximum of size admissible
under such circumstances. Of course, they have far
heavier guns in use, but they carry them in turrets,
and so, it is said, must we. This proposal, however,
opens another question. It is proved that very
heavy cannon can be worked in turrets, but it is not
proved that turret ships can be made seaworthy or
commodious vessels. Moreover, we have got some
magnificent ironclads constructed on the broadside
principle, and if these cannot, by some means or
other, be made to carrybatteries of effectivestrength,
they must either be reconstructed or be lost to the
service altogether. So it becomes of infinite import-
ance to ascertain by practical experiment whether
guns above a certain weight can or cannot be carried
in our first-rate ironclads, and what are the limits
imposed upon us in this arrangement. Great pro-
fessional authorities have asserted that any gun
which can be carried in a turret can be carried in a
broadside, but the contrary opinion has also been
strongly defended, and is very widely entertained.
Nothing, it is obvious, can solve this question but
experiment, and the experiment, we are glad to say,
will commence this morning. The Minotaur is, or,
at any rate, is intended to be, one of our finest iron-
dads. She was designed as an improvement on the
Warrior herself, and it happens that she may be
seen, beautifully modelled, in the South Kensington
Museum. But it is still a question whether this
noble ship can carry such guns as would be required
to render her battery effective, and accordingly she
will put to sea to-day to make trial of her capa-
cities. A report which we publish in another
column will explain the conditions of her trip.
She takes out three guns of the new pattern, each
weighing 12 tons, and throwing a 3001 b shot, and
each of these pieces is mounted on an experimental
carriage. The trial, therefore, will•be competitive
in one sense—that is to say, each carriage will be
carefully tested, and the advantages or disadvan-
tages of the several patterns will be compared and
balanced. But it cannot be dissembled that the
experiment will have another and a more compre-
hensive aspect. It is possible that the Report may
be unfavourable to all the patterns together, and
that the capacity of a man of war to carry 300-
pounders in broadside may be left doubtful still. In
that event we shall find ourselves in a strange di-
lemma, for it will appear as if really good ships and
really good guns are not to be obtained at once,
and as if we must sacrifice either the vessel to the
armament or the armament to the vessel. That
these new 12-ton guns can be carried in turrets is
beyond a doubt, but then it has never been ascer-
tained whether turret ships can be made good sea-
going vessels. We have reason to believe, on the
other hand, that the Minotaur is as good a vessel
as an ironclad can be, but then we do not know
that she can carry 12-ton guns. If she fails to do
so, we shall have to invert the experiment, and send
out a turret ship to see whether she is seaworthy
and habitable. The Americans have furnished
no information on this point, unless, indeed, the
fact itself may be thought to convey some intelli-
gence. They have a large fleet of ironclads, built
almost exclusively on the turret principle, but
not one of these vessels have they ventured to
send to sea. Only just now have they decided
on making the attempt with the latest and most
satisfactory of their specimens. The Monadnock
was the last Monitor launched, and so pleased
was Admiral Porter with her performance that he
declared he could take her across the Atlantic. She
is now selected to accompany three wooden frigates
to the Pacific, and there reinforce the United States'
squadron in those waters, so that we may, perlraps,
learn something fioin the history of her cruise.
With this exception, however, the Americans have
allowed it to be inferred that their turret ships are
floating batteries, but nothing more. Many—indeed,
most—American ships carry 8-ton, or, as they are
called, 11-inch guns, but they are mounted on
pivots. This was the gun with which the Kear-
sarge sank the Alabama, and which did such good
service in other actions of the war. We could
mount such guns on pivots too, but that principle
would only bring us round to the turret in the end,
for a turret gun is a pivot gun protected. The truth
is, the artillerists have overtaken the naval archi-
tects, for they have been allowed more unbounded
scope for their designs. In guns we have got to a
600-pounder ; in ships, we have .not got beyond a
broadside vessel. Mr. Reed has produced several
novelties, and with at least the merit of despatch.
He is of opinion, too, we believe, that his ships can
carry these new guns, but that has not been proved.
What ought to have been proved long ago, but is
still left uncertain, is whether a kind of vessel which
we know call carry cannon of any weight can also
lodge a crew comfortably, and be in all respects a
safe and commodious cruiser. It is possible, cer-
tainly, that the Minotaur may relieve us from the
trouble of instituting this inquiry, by demonstrating
the capacities of a broadside vessel to do all that is
necessary ; but in a matter so important we might
as well have had the two strings to our bow, As it
is, the qualifications required to make a really good
man-of-war are divided between two classes of ves-
sels. The Minotaur represents a fine seagoing
ship ; the Royal Sovereign represents a formidable
floating battery. We are nnw going to try
whether the .Minotaur cannot be made to carry
the Royal Sovereign's guns ; but we ought also to
have tried whether a Royal Sovereign could not be
built with the seagoing capacities of the Minotaur.
It must not be forgotten that this ship which is now
to be thus tested represents the first and most
powerful class of our new fleet. The powers of Mr.
Reed's vessels remain still to be shown, but at
present the Minotaur herself, the Agincourt, the
Northumberland, the Achilles, the Black Prince,
and the Warrior are our six first-rates. These are
the specimens in which our ironclad fleet surpasses
the fleets of other countries, and it is, therefore, of
no slight importance to discover, if possible, some
method of arming them with the most powerful
guns known. The experiments now to be com-
menced will illustrate the question for us, though
they will not exactly decide it. It will be discou-
raging if the resultstell against all the gun-carriages
alike, but still the resources of our inventors may
not have been exhausted in these three models. All
we know at present is, that before our best ships
can carry the best guns some new mechanism must
be devised. The approaching experiments will re-
present the first essays in this direction, but, what-
ever the result, we should be very sorry to regard
them as the last.
HERALD.—Every royal family in Europe is
placed iu mourning by the death of a king. Many
royal families have lost a kinsman in King Leopold
of Belgium. The uncle of our Queen, once the
Prince Consort of England, closely related to the
father of our Princes and Princesses, son-in-law of
Louis Philippe, King of the French, and connected
by the marriage of his son with the house of
Austria, the King of the Belgians, in dying, has
left a gap in the ranks of many princely families.
He was a man of remarkable ability, and not less
remarkable good fortune. It does not fall to the
lot of every man of ability to play the prominent
part in the world for which his talents have quali-
fied him. Still less commonly does it happen that
a man has a second chance in his life of attaining
distinction after having lost the first. Leopold
might have lived and died an obscure member of
the obscure ducal house of Saxe-Coburg. He
grew up in critical times, in times of constant
change, of political convulsion, of sudden reverses
and startling strokes of fortune. When the mili-
tary adventurer, the unknown hanger-on to the fol-
lowing of 'Alexander of Russia, coming to London
by chance in 1814, found grace in the eyes of the
coveted heiress of England—when, after Waterloo,
being called to Vienna by the Congress, he heard
that he was the accepted suitor of the Princess
Charlotte, the star of the young Prince seemed to
have reached its zenith, and an opportunity opened
to him which seemed to cast into the shade the
wildest dreams of ambition, the most enthusiastic
flights of fancy, In 1816 he became in a moment
the foremost man in England next to the King. In
1817, when the Princess died in childbed, he fell, as
it were, from his high estate, and subsided into a
poor pensioner on Imperial bounty. But the days
in which he lived were rich in opportunities to
princes. After 14 years of waiting and dignified
retirement two European thrones were successively
thrown into the market. The Allies, who had con-
: quered Napoleon, were driven by the force of events
and the power of public opinion to carve out new
states in the south and west of Europe—one from
the chaos of the ill-governed Greek provinces of