The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-01 00:00:00

THE IN lUNCH OF THE WARRIOR.

(From 21> e Times.)
The ' auc '3essfill launch of the Warrior may be
though ,t Go open a 'new chapter in the history of
the B this/ Navy..
We cannot, indeed, regard the
theca ,y of iron-cr.sed ships as absolutely established,
but thereiscertAinly sufficient reason for concluding
-Oust such fab 'ries must hereafter enter largely into
the compos'ition of our national marine, and repre-
see t a mos' s important element of our naval strength.
l'erhaps in the end they may be classed simply as
Illoatinp; batteries for the defence of our shores;
perlial,,s they may be found more available for more
dista'at service ' • but to some extent it may fairly
be presumed that ships of war will in future be
prof..ected by armour exactly as they have come to
be ioropelled by steam. Iron may not entirely super-
sex wood, any more than steam has superseded
malls, but in oneshape or other it may be confidently
expected that the new system will last. The par-
ticulars of this remarkable event we have already
recorded, and weLave put the public in possession
of the principal details connected with the structure
itself; but there are two points of the subject which
deserve furtlier notice in these columns. 'file War-
rior is not the first iron-cased frigate that has
been laurinhed, but she iy the largest. The former
of these 'facts expresses a very familiar feature in
the Advainistration of our Navy, the latter indi-
cates a material reform.
We are. always behind iri the work of discovery,
and 'are v3ven slow in applying the inventions of
others. We had exactly the same opportunities as
the A.ench in this matter. We constructed our
110'40 eg batteries for the Russian War just as they
did ; we saw, as they did, the actual results of the
es-peiiment. The difference between us was that
/they availed themselves of the lesson with true
practical wisdom, whereas we did our best to ex-
plain the lesson away. We spent infinite time and
pains in endeavouring to convince ourselves that
iron armour was no protection to a ship's side, and
when, after a dozen shots, we had succeeded in
piercing a 4-inch plate, we chuckled over the ex-
ploit -without remembering that 11 shots out of the
„I 2 had been repelled. We asked ourselves simply
-whether iron-cased ships could be rendered impreg-
nable, and, having contrived by indefatigable exer-
tion to provide a negative answer to the question,
we -were in a fair way of dropping the subject if
our neighbours had not set us a different example.
It, was precisely the same thing in the case of steam
Instead of sails, and of screws instead of paddles.
'Our authorities are so terribly anxious to find out
the weak points of a new invention that they over-
look its real strength. They ascertain to their own
satisfaction that the scheme is not perfect, and then
dismiss it ; whereas, upon a fair balance of advan-
tages and disadvantages, it might have been found
decidedly eligible. There is always something to
be said against a novel theory, but if we had
listened exclusively to such predictions we should
-never have had gas in our streets or locomotives on
our railroads.
It is no matter of wonder, therefore, that the
Warrior should make her appearance only some four
months after " possession of the seas" had been
taken by the Glorie. That is a very natural expres-
sion of British usage in such matters, but what is
by no means so ordinary an afair is the powerful
character in which our first iron frigate has ap-
peared. In the present generation we have, at any
rate, unlearned one of our national faults. From
the first days of modern shipbuilding our vessels of
every rate were uniformly smaller than those of
similar rates in rival navies. At the beginning of
the Revolutionary Wars a French 74 was usually
about one-fifth larger than a British 74 ; and so
universally did a similar feature prevail throughout
our fleets that James, the naval historian, speaks
of the " contracted size" of our ships and the " re-
duCed scale" of their complements as national cha-
racteristics, to be explained by some broad refer-
ence to policy or principle. It was certainly not
from want of better models that we persisted in
these customs, for the Spaniards as well as the
French set us an example of more sensible archi-
tecture; but the old fashions kept their ground as
long as we were on the winning side, and would
have flourished perhaps undisturbed up to the
present day had it not been for the rough lesson
administered by the Americans. In the short
war with the United States we found, to our
cost, that big ships were very likely to beat little
ones, and that when a frigate was built with
th© dimensions of a 74 she became pretty nearly
a match for the 74 in action. That lesson was
not lost upon us, and the capture of the Pre-
sident was the great event that revolutionised
our system of shipbuilding. From that time we
h ve kept well abreast of every rival in the
dimensions of our vessels. We did not imitate the
questionable models. of the Merrimac and the
Niagara, but neither the Americans nor the French
hove outstripped us of late in the power and size of
wir men-of-war. The Duke of Wellington was
fully as strong as the Bretagne, and was launched
three years eariier ; the Orlando and the Mersey
arc the most formidable frigates afloat; the Ariadne
and the Jason are unmatched in their respectiVe
classes ; and now the Warrior, in speed, capacity,
and armament, has outdone the Gloire.
The Great Eastern has so n -staled our concep-
tions of magnitude that even the dimensions of the
Warrior seem moderate in cawarison ; yet the
engines and coal alone of the new vessel are almost
equal in weight to the entire tonnage of a British
three-decker in 1815, and her armament is equally
extraordinary. If it were not that she combined
in herself illustrations of defensive and offensive
power together, we might be at a loss to imagine
what fabric could resist her attack. As it is, we
are left equally at liberty to wonder whether any
attack could overcome her powers of resistance, and
the great problem of warfare seems to be rendered
more insoluble .than ever. On which side have the
resources of modern ingenuity been mosteffectively
displayed? Which are we to regard with the
greatest surprise,—the Armstrong 100-pounders
dealing death and destruction at three miles' distanc.)
or the tremendous ribs of iron and teak, impene-
trable to the heaviest bullet ? The whole achieve,
meet seems really to ex pli-ss a emitradietion. We
have been at work neon it slip which no projectiles
are to he capable of darnal!ing, mid we have armed
her with fzu TIM' whieh no ship to he capable of
r.-sisting. Boo:, we been mast successful in the
means of attack or in those of (1( fence ? Does the
reality lie in the armour or the armament ? Both
can hardly be so powerful as we think, but the
combinations of the two has veil us, beyond
doubt, the most formidable ship of war ever yet seen.
The cost of this terrible machine is proportionate
to its power. It will certainly not he less thin
whereas the cost of our lareesS s ips of
t:u line has hitherto been but about half that sum
On this point, however, there is remit for consider •
Ltb!e r:ya,-Fnrance. It does not foliuw that the
:e::.:;.-t:gite charge of the Nsvy will he increas_-d
1) cause the charge is greater in particular ships.
On the contrary, it has been found by experience
that in proportion as single vessels are made more
powerful arid expensive the number of vessels de-
clines. IV have now as strong a fleet as we ever
had, but it (-nsists of many fewer ships than were
afloat 50 `-errs ap.-o To put the ease in a practical
emit, we may conipari,• the actual expenditure upon
the Navy in two years of war—in 1813 and in
185. In the former period a ship of war cost very
much less than in the latter, and yet 'it was the
expensive period of the two, f the Navy
Inure
Estimates were then nearly £22 ,000 ,()ef) whereas
in 1855, the heaviest year of the Russian War,
they .wers bat £19,000,000. It is clear, there-
fore, that what we spend upon, single specimens we
may saro in nu an hers, and the fact may lead us to
contemplate even a fleet of Warriors without much
aliirm.

-_-..

t" Fr om the Morning Herald.)

The Warrior is launched. The great iron monster
which was designed to eclipse the vessel of which
the French Government is so proud is at last a float-
ing fact. The Warrior is the largest fighting vessel
that was over built, being two-thirds of the length
of the Great Eastern, and in shape not unlike her
420 feet long, 58 feet wide at the beam, and carry-
ing 36 guns tif the heaviest calibre, she will prove,
if maraigeable, quific, and invulnerable, a tremen-
&loci engine of offence..
In the hnilling oft his ship and others like it the
new theory of the necessity of iron plating to the
protection of a ship's side against modern artillery
bas been acted upon. Plates of wrought-iron of 4
to 5 inches in thickness, have been found to resist
the impact of the solid shot of a 68 pounder, even
when aimed from very near. This has been known
for years past, and it is some time since it was first
proposed to construct invulnerable vessels by coat-
ing a ship's side with such a layer of iron. The
Emperor of the French constructed floating batteries
on this plan in 1855. They were used with effect in
the bombardment of Kinburn, but were found ex-
tremely unwieldy and unmanageable in a heavy
sea. There were still two questions for naval archi-
tects to solve, even supposing the value of iron
plating admitted. The first was, could a perfectly
seaworthy and fist ship he built with this iron mail
This posaility has been Icing stoutly denied. The
iinrnense accession of weight given by the iron
must proportionately increase the displacement,
render it difficult to carry a heavy armament, or
enough coals, make her unmanageable in a heavy
sea, slow at all times, and sure to sink if a breach
were made in her.sides. So it was argued by the
iron
ones. of wooden ships as preferable' to
ones. Trovvercr, there were naval architects who
declared themselves ready to overcome all these
difficulties ; the Emperor of the French, while we
Were furling, was building a mail-clad vessel, The