Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1898-07-13

the most that any man can hope TO do
is to keep up with the times. From the
great, unwieldy wooden frigates and
schooners of the revolutionary period
with their nine and twelve pound guns,
and from SEQ TO 1000 tons displace-
ment. our navy has progressed to the
type of the Iowa, the Indiana and the
Oregon, whose mammoth steel hulks
displace LOCO tons of water and
whose terrible rifie-bored guns throw
metal projectiles weighing 1000
pounds.
This remarkable evolution in naval
warfare was not the result of acct
theory that nations. as individuals,
must fight the devil with fire. yea,
with his own fire. be it ever so fierce
and destructive. Moreover, naval war
fare has, as rule, kept pace with inn
provements in the arts. With respect
to size and strength, the navies of the
world have generally taken rank ac-
cording as their necessities required
and the enforcement of their claims,
meritorious or otherwise, demanded.
England, with a territory upon all
of which the sun never sets at one
time, has the most formidable navy in
the world. and the rest of the world
agrees that she needs It. America,
whose acres are contiguous and whose
foreign policy has been preseryatiye
rather than aggressive has hereto
fore been satisfied with the fifth navy
of the world trusting to her noninter-
ference and the great bodies of salt
water to her east and west as a de
Tense. The apparent incompatability
between the great commercial inter-
ests of the United States and the pov-
erty of her national defenses has long
been the marvel of Europe, and a great
many thinking people of our own coun-
try have doubted the policy of trusting
too implicitly in natural resources and
natural defenses.
Comparisons are not always odious,
but they are usually difficult To COM
pare the navy of colonial times with
the navy of today Is like comparing
tallow candles with arc lights, stage
coaches with modern railway palaces
and Fanueil hall with the Chicago
Auditorium or Masonic Temple; 1t is
comparing wood with Steel sailing
tackle with twin. screw motors and
primitive gun powder with brown
prismatic," dynamite and n'troglycern.
ships OF Past Century.
1t might be noted that In October,
lTI6, the colonies owned twenty six YES
sells. manning 536 guns; that the frigate
of the revolution was generally forty
feet long, propelled by oars and sails,
carving two small guns and Il supply
of small ordnance; that in 179S the
navy department was formally organ
tied; that in 1906 Congress authorized
the construction of PSI wooden war
vessels, but finding the scheme TOO eX-
pensive and the first vessels too UNI
wieldly abandoned the enterprise; that
the Bon Homme Richard, commanded
by Paul Jones, carried twenty eight
twelve Founders on her gun deck, four
teen nine-pounders on her quarter deck
and forecastle and total armament ol
forty-two guns, but these facts and fig
ures give little insight into the real sit
uation of the early days and afford nc
criterion whatever for comparison with
Rear Admiral Simpsons fleet in the
West Indies.
A review of the early history of the
American navy does not require, there
fore, that the student go back farther
than the beginning of the present cen
turv when steam was first applied to
the propulsion of vessels. RAISING D!
the discussion as to whether fulton
WAS in fact the first man who applied
uleam as motor for ships, suffice 1t tc
say that in 1914 he proposed to build Il
..hoating battery for the defense oil
New York harbor, vessel to DE pro