The daily gazette., 1881-10-25
fUEsDAr. oCroRER as. 1851.

PxsaRRss. .-"Wooden Walls" and
'.lron Olads'' fade before the progress
Of man - population and wealth en-
sbl@sl him 10 develope the ingenuity
with which all ages have show n him to
b sndowed with. The efforts that
wezp put forth In the war of the Revt
lution that We have just been cele~
bratlng ct Yorktown, in their time
wsre prodigious, aud crowned the
great men who used the means they
were able to procure, with splendid
saccess /; from which all the world has
been blssssd. But how insignificant
now appear the wooden walls of the
war ships behind which Count de-
Grasss and his sailors fought off the
GnGltah ships and enabled the French
and American armies to foice Corn
wallis to surrender his army of we'll
armed regular soldiers to the American
militia, when compared with the iron
caad ships initiated by the struggle
hstwsen the North and the South, or
tho forty-pound cannon and percussion
riis compared with the swamp -angel
and the breechloading- sixteen shooter
Spencer. When the Merrimac shet
out ffom Norfolk and went crashing
Into al the great war ships that lay
within her reach, the world was
startled. But the brilliant efforts of
the American rebels lasted but day
or two aud was ecIipsed by the more
scientific work that resulted in the
production of the little "cheese box"
from which the greatest monster that
had thon appeared on the ocean had
70 Withdraw with greater wonder and
astouishment. The action betwe On
these two machines inaugurated a
new era in the construction of war
ships as did the efforts to take Fort
Sumpter with huge cannon, and to drive
Lees armies from Richmond with the
repeating rifle carrying a ball with
deadly aim q mile.
Tho Merrimac and the Monitor
were crude and ill-shapen but the
world has produced nothing SO won.
derfui, while the principle has been
enlarged upon until hundr, DIS of mill
lions have been wasted by the nation.
apen monster iron clads only to b,
found to be useless before the grea
guns to which the 'swamp angel
gave biIth. The 100-ton gun of tn,
King OF Italy proved that iron clad,
could be shattered to pieces even more
readily than the wooden ships wer,
sunk before fifty pound guns of al
earlier age, and steel-clad ships wer,
the next step but neither iron no
steel will sustain the shock of th,
new monster with which America /
again to startle Europe. SO progress
sive In man where the means are a
his command. Yesterday a gun wa
cast ct Reading, weighing but thir,
ef the boasted cannon of Kin
humbert, yet 1t is SAID that it wi
project an iron wedge of $50 pound
wsight through two feet of soil
wrought iron. How useless seems tb
waste Of all ingenuity and labor O
Iron and steel clad ships after the orc
duct on Of such an engine. In a
ages mans ingenuity has astounde
his follows. We feel it the same te
day, that the builders of the pyramid
must have felt three thousand yeal
ago. Yet how weak are all moder
Efforts in view of the work of lh
Egyptians whose ingenuity enable
them to raise the prodigious blocks {
stone with wnich the "world's won
dsrs" that line the Nile are built, an
10 nicely jointed and securely capped
~ to defy the wear of the elements
sAsDsNhSV obtFU LILO bhEbu 10 WlilC
no effort of modern times ha
trowelsd so much as brick.
How useless seems all this time an
money wasted on wars dreadful Ell
gines. How much better will it b
fer this great government in view ,
the era Of peace that is before it, /
sxpend more Of its money on reducin
tho elements to useful arts. An elet
trie engine, or compressed air M,
tor would be Of far more value to ,
than the greatest iron clad. Happy is
for our people that there is but litt
disposition to waste their substance {
experimental engines of war. F,
better would it be to assist to impro
engines TO assist the arts of peace.
IT 10 fortunate for the good name
American hospitality that the Frenc
nasal 40 r.