The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1875-01-19

inore certaln tnan the triumph OF the party ID
the next campaign for the Presidency and its
continuance in long period of power.
Our Navy-The AdmiraIs Report.
From Admiral Porter's report it results that
as we are no longer-a maritime nation in the
commercial sense SO we are also no longer a
naval Power IN the military sense. Our
renown gathered in the early days of the Re-
public, and the record of some good fights and
some great inventions in the recent war, are
all that are left to us of naval glory that
promised to fill the world with the names of
our seagoing heroes. Farragut and Porter
and Winthrop and Cushing, Perry, Decatur,
cambridge and Hull, are names that we may
treasure, for it will evidently be many long
year before any new list OF this class will be
added to the roll. Our naval register shows
forty-eight monitors, and yet we have not one
ship, iron-clad or otherwise, that would be of
the slightest value in naval combat with
any capable enemy Out of the forty-cight
monitors thus recorded only six are fit Tor
service of any sort, and their armor would be
before modern artillery scarcely more effective
for resistance than the veneering on an old
chest of drawers. Not only are the monitors
useless for close combat at sea or elsewhere,
but our wooden ships ore also useless as
cruisers from their want of speed 1t
seems to be recognized that in the naval war
fare of our time wooden ships are no longer to
be counted, save for their speed as cruisers in
some such service as was performed by the A a.
bama, or by the Kearsage against that famous
ship; but our wooden ships, our ''swift sailing
cruisers, are inferior in speed to the enormous
iron-clads, the floating Gibraltars of England.
Not only are our monitors valueless as IRON
clads and our cruisers as cruisers, but our ar
tillery is also of the sort that on enemy would
find absolutely innocuous. Shots from either
Whitworth or Krupp guns could, in the words
of Admiral rorter's report, ''perforate the tur-
rets Of any Of our monitors, while the vessels
from which they were fred could remain at
distance where our smooth bore guns could do
them no harm" And the same authority as
sures us that ''our navy as compared with
others is like foot soldier armed with pis-
toll encountering q mounted man clad in
armor, and armed with breech-loading
rifle" In Europe, in the hands of various
governments, there are upward of one hun
dred iron-clads, of which not only is any one
superior to the best of ours, but of which GER
tain ones could, in the opinion of our own
Admiral, cut down or disable every ship of
our navy in single battle.
The possibility of improving our present
navy, iron-clad and wooden, by alterations
and the application Of modern improvements
may occur to some. But this hope the Ad-
miral destroys. If our present worthless
iron-clads were improved-which could only
be done by making their armor stronger-they
would become too heavy for use. What we need
is fleet of monitors, with invulnerability and
speed, SO that we might properly defend our
coast and follow any attacking vessels. With
out speed the iron-clads are simply harbor
defences afoat. We cannot get these quail
ties by tinkering our present iron-clads, and if
we desire to continue naval Power we must
put ourselves IN q condition to meet other
first class Powers on the sea. For the Same
reasons it is idle any longer to repair our old
wooden ships. We should entirely rebuild
them, with NV hulls and improved machinery
and guns, and we SHOULD construct feet of
swift wooden cruisers of at least twelve hun
bred tons, with speed of not less tnan four
teen knots and with the heaviest batteries"
These are the measures that would prove the
most economical in the end, provided we de-
sire to retain our rank among the nations of
the world. 1t must be conceded, however,
that if our present government has deprived
us of navy it has also deprived us of our
commerce on the ocean-about the only thing
we require navy to protect. As to foreign
war and invasion, we need be under no ap-
prehension of danger from that quarter,
while, as the London Times assures us,
all the nations of Europe are arming to
the teeth and "the momentary dreams of
peace have fed away" To be sure, this is
only an accidental, perhaps an unforeseen,
protection. Nevertheless, in view OF the inn
beclity of our government, we may we'll be
grateful that we may reckon on it with some
degree of certainty.
The BROOKLYN TRIAL.-Mr Moulton's tes-
timony was continued yesterday, and after
considerable discussion between the opposing
counsel upon the admission Of certain letters
II l.