The age-herald., 1898-05-08

afternoon for San Antonio, and the cheer was the means by which they took their leave Mir. Roosevelt himself will follow Monday or Tuesday.
 A close study of Dewey's two telegrams during the day only increased the wonder early in the day by the naval experts at the extraordinary results achieved by the admiral almost without injury. The re- ports that came before the cutting of the cable were of a character to indicate that Dewey was going to make quick and thor ough work of the seizure of Manila, but 1t was feared that in so fierce an engagement against Spanish fleet, combined with the shore forces the American fleet must surely have sustained good deal of dam age, loss of life and other injuries That was regarded as inevitable in combat between two navies, for even the Chinese in the great battle of Yalu managed to inflict a considerable amount of damage upon their Japanese antagonists. Yet, Tn this battle of Manila, lasting two hours at least, according to the accounts first received and resulting in the destruction of the entire Spanish fleet and the silenc- ing of their forts, not American life was lost and not an American ship was burned. few men, it is true were slight ly wounded, but that is frequently the case when vessels indulged in target practicos All Sorts of Theories
 There are all sorts of theories among the officials to account for this, but in the ab- sence of facts 1t is hard to form a reason- able hypothesis. Superior gunnery, tar get practice, cooness, preparedness, are the factors that won the day in such astound- ing fashion in the opinion of one of the brightest of our naval officers. An older head and a man of higher grade, strate- gst, thought that Dewey had taken the Spaniards unawares in every respect. He had run the batteries at night undiscov- cred and at daybreak was pouring broadside after broadside into the Spanish fleet, which was taken unawares, with nobody at quar- ters, with most of the crews asleep and generally in a state utterly unprepared to resist an attack. One officer thought that Spaniards had not thought to keep banked fires so that they had no steam on and could not move, lying helpless while Dew ey's ships circled around them, firing first from one side and then the other. Proba- bly, the true explanation will be forthcom- ing only when mail advices are at hand, but the Spanish naval prestige has received blow from the battle of Manila from which it cannot recover in many years.
 Dewey Cut the Cable
 Admiral Dewey cut the cable himself and
 
 ing it is thought his purpose was not only to prevent the Spanish governor general from communicating with his own govern ment, but also to prevent the foreign con- suls at Manila from interfering with his plans by cabling protests-to their govern ments. He made it impossible for them to summon any war vessels to enforce the protest they were expected to make against the sege of Manila.
 A closer examination of the cablegrams claaxrr 1af the names of two Spanish vessels had been omitted from the list of those destroyed. They were the Don Juan de Austria and the Isla de Luzon The Austria was a 1130-ton vessel, IA knots, carrying four r. inch guns and also machine guns The Luzon was 1000-ton boat, similarly armed. That makes eleven Spanish ships destroyed by Dewey in the short space of two hours. As he left the navy department this after noon, Secretary Long said, in answer to a question, that he had nothing further to communicate to the public; he had given already all the news that the McCulloch brought, save a trifing detail not of gen. eneral interest and of importance only to the department. The receipt of advices at the state department, however, from com- mercial sources indica tes that further news may be coming by commercial steamers. If congress does not prematurely act, as 1t did in the case of Captain Worden, when
  Merrimac acting Admiral Dewey will be- come an actual admiral in few days. The law of July IS, 1882, provides that naval officers, who, upon the recommendation of the president receive the thanks of con gress may be advanced one grade. The president will do this in Dewey's case, which will put s1 GOO additional in his pocket and jump him over three commodores, as we'll as over Acting Admiral Sampson.
 How the Foreigners Looked On It
 At the embassies and legations Commo- dore Dewey's reports were read with great interest and served to renew the high trib- utes of the foreign authorities to the gal lant comma rftfer. The remarkable disparity between the casualties the American and Spanish ships as shown by the Dewey reports was a source of special comment and the military attache of one embassy said such a disparity probably was with out parallel in history.
 How the Spanards could have lost 150 killed and 25O wounded while the American loss was confined to few men slightly injured is regarded by the foreign observ- CTS as clearly disclosing the utter worth lessness of Spanish arms. The ambassador of one of the great powers said 1t showed that the guns of the Spanish forts as well as those on their ships were worthless, otherwise they would have inflicted at least some mortality upon the American steam- CTS.
 Tt recalls Solferino.' said he. "At that time. France and Austria were at war, but the range of the French guns was longer than that of the Austrians. That brought them together on unequal terms and the simple difference in the length of range of French guns determined the out come of that battle. sSs 59 <R16aE.