The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1886-11-11

French navy are to have minimum speed OF
nineteen Knots, capable of being increased to
twenty knots during five hours at stretch
by the application of an apparatus of tirage
force. If they don't attain this speed the
government will refuse them"
then asked the admiral if he would ex
plain the best way for the United States to
set about to get navy The admiral rang
an electric bell and said to the attendants:
"Dont let any one interrupt me for half an
hour" He rolled cigarette and said:
MUST HAVE SPEED.
"You have a truly magnificent body of
naval officers, you have splendid sailors, and
you have no heavy ironclads, three points
upon which you are most heartily to be con-
graduated Naval experiments have now
clearly demonstrated that the huge ironclads
in which European governments have spent
hundreds and hundreds of millions have had
their day. These mastodons of the ocean
have had their day. They will be scarcely
more useful in the next naval war than the
grand old line-of-hattle ships of Trafalgar
and Aboukir. The mastodons have been
rendered worthless by those microbes of the
sea, torpedo boats and swift cruisers. The
till lately have attempted the impossible.
They have tried to unite in the same vessel all
the means of modern naval warfare--the
RAM heavy guns, armor plating and torpe-
does. The result is a vast unwieldly tloatlng
fortress, liable to be sunk by the first we'll
directed torpedo The United States, l re-
peat, are sincerely to be congratulated at hav-
| ing none of these useless monsters.
"Your situation is this In the first place
you are not hampered by having any mer-
camille marine to protect. In naval war
this will give you a great advantage. All
your naval operations can, therefore, be con-
fined to protecting your harbors and destroy
| ing the enemy's commerce. You can make
your harbors impregnable with your land
| forts, torpedoes and torpedo boats Forty Oh
fifty unarmored cruisers, with sufficient
speed, could destroy your enemy's commerce
for all the iron-clads of all the fleets of the
world would to-day be utterly inadequate tc
blockade your coasts and prevent these
cruisers from getting to sea. But these
cruisers should have minimum speed Of
nineteen knots
IRoN-CLADS UTTERLY Worthless.
'That is to say, they should be faster thai
the great transatlantic steamers. The,
should, besides the ordinary machine guns
have two or three guns Of the longest possibl
range, firing projectiles filled with the lates
explosives discovered by science. Sucl
cruisers could to-day destroy or demon
alize the entire maritime commerce o
united Europe Even if one of these cruiser
were compelled to fight huge European
iron-clad the advantage would still be will
the cruiser, for the cruiser, being small anC
moving about with rapidity, is almost impos
sible to be hit, while the huge iron-clad is
splendid target, and the huge steel plates az
now perfectly vulnerable to projectile
charged with fulmi cotton or with meniline.
Here the admiral showed me three stee
plates pierced by projectiles containing
fulmi-coton, meniline, and third substance
a composition which is a secret of the Frenc
government, which has twice the power o
menilinc, and is no more dangerous to man
ipulate than the ordinary gun loader. Thi
new explosive will enable the caliber an
consequent weight of the guns to be dimin
ished, and makes the steel plates almost a
penetrable as the wooden walls of ships in tn
DAVIS of Decatur and Bainbridge. The adm
raj continued:
"Now, compare one of these cruisers wit
an ironcad i'll attacking port. Both al
equally vulnerable to the ironclads, bu
the cruiser is almost invisible from the di
lance from which she can throw her explC
sives, while the ironclad is so huge and cum
bersome as to be a good mark from I'll
land. For even at night, when all the NOV,
ments of this floating fortress can be 70
lowed by electric lights, the cruiser, on I'll
contrary, is almost invisible because of he
smalness and uncatchable because of he
speed These proposed cruisers are mostl
the application of lessons taught by yor
. GREAT civil war. They are merely Alabama
adapted to the latest advances of science
The motto of your naval reform should b.
les Alabamas, encore les Alabamas, etto
ionrs les Alabamas. Paris Cor New Hor
Herald.