Herald and tribune. [volume] (Jonesborough, Tenn.) 1869-current, 1891-03-19

o create a navy 10 an emergency was
in the rebellion.
The duel between the Monitor and the
Merrimac in Hampton Roads revolu.
ionized naval warfare, and the problem
since been to construct armor that
40 projectile could penetrate, and then
projectiles that no armor could
European nations. have been con
Quoting these
EXPENSIVE EXPERIMENTS
hitherto, and the ships of 1880 are al.
ready obsolete and Anticipated for attack
defense, Dynamite and other explos-
complicate the situation, and the navy
that we are now building at a cost of
500, OOO, 900 will be as worthless in 1900
as Roman galleys. England, France and
Italy would gladly sell us their fleets at
90 per cent. of their cost. If we are to
depend upon a navy for protection we
must have ships enough to assemble at
every vulnerable point a force as large as
could be dispatched against it. The
millions we are squandering on vessels
that are sent on idle errands in ''squan.
drons of evolution" panied pagenants
the deep, had better be spent for
each works and powerful guns to COM
mand every roadstead, channel and har
Dor from which a hostile fleet could
threaten or assail.
Is there any necessity for spending
millions every year for naval defense, or
any justification for the hysterical APP
peals TO popular apprehension and alarm?
Onr policy is pacific. We have no colo
mics nor dependencies nor entangling ALI
ances. Wars break out Unexpectedly,
ii is true, sometimes, but from what
quarter can danger be nationally antici-
patedY Our relations with France are
those of traditional amity; with Ger
many, of kinship and consanguinity,
with Russia, of fraternity. The rest
are trivial.
Our only enemy is England and she is
under bond to keep the peace. No one
nation is so vulnerable and none so de-
tested. She has incurred the resent.
ment of the human race by centuries of
injustice.
Colonel Mcclure, a noted Mississippi
duelist, had occasion to kick an unre.
gentleman at a hotel in Natchez
Being not long after in Memphis the
Colonel saw his victim subjecting an
other to the same treatment. Being
somewhat
CURIOUS AND UNCERTAIN
as to the identity of the person, he said :
Are you not the fellow l kicked down
stairs in Natchez?'
Yes replied he, but, Colonel, you
and know who to kick
England kicked us when we were
helpless and feeble. She sacked and
burned a defenseless capital. She has
kicked Ireland; she has kicked Egypt;
she has kicked the Hindoos, the Zulus,
the Beers, and the Chinese, but she is
mol in the habit of kicking her equals
Her courage il prudent and calculati =
She was careful not to kick Napoleon
until TIE rest of z rope joined her, and
she endured Russian aggression unit
she had persuaded France to bear lh4
brunt of the Crimean campaign. la gu,
civil war she did all she could. snort "
open hostility, to destroy The union, and
then %apolOIizel and paid DAMAGES
Lately we have had another contention
about cal p~oaching and the Bchrinq
S"a Oceans of ink have been shed in dip.
lOmatic correspondence between LORD
Salisbury and Secretary Blaine
Great Britain forfeited Vancouver aud
sent ships # war into the disputed wa
ters, walk NJ around, m%etaphorica ~
speaking, begging US to KIN ok the ch D
from her shoulders or to tread on lllr
tails of her coat. Legally she had an
1pen case, at least, in some respects the
best of the argument. A casus belli
could easily have been found if wanted,
and we were assured that the danger
was imminent.
The boldest held his breath fora while.
Immense appropriations were promptly
voted for Notifications and the navy,
and then while the national hair was
standing on end, England suddenly
came into our supreme court as a sultor
and submitted the whole controversy to
the decision Of that great tribunal. The
newspapers that described the dramatic
utterances Of senators about the dangers
OF war with Great Britain, contained, in
another column of the same issue, an ac.
count of the proceedings of the old
Senate Chamber, in which Lord Salisbury
submitted the claims of England to ad-
judication, as a question of international,
law. 1t was %reassuring but it was laugh.
able, nevertheless.