The herald., 1898-12-04

the British ships, not to speak of the super.
iority OF the men behind the guns, our pos
sible ally in a general war could be depended
upon to keep Russia and France too busily
engaged to think of turning their attention
to the United States.
Then, what of the rest OF the nations?
Poor Spain can safely be left out of the cal
culation entirely, as her boasted navy is
at present in the depths of various waters.
Germany is credited with having of battle
ships six Of the first class and nine of the
second class; of armored cruisers, seven, OF
protected and partially protected cruisers
thirteen, of unprotected cruisers, six, of tor
pedo boats and torpedo boat destroyers 1872.
Italy, who is known to be friendly to Eng
land, and would probably side with the
Anglo-American alliance in the event of a
general war, has a fine navy of ten battle
ships, eight armored cruisers, twenty-three
protected and partially protected cruisers,
and 2l9 torpedo boats and torpedo boat de-
stroyers of all kinds.
OF the smaller nations, most of them have
very little fight in them, according to naval
mans point of view, Denmark has no bat
tleshps, no armored cruisers, five protected
| cruisers, and about twenty-five torpedo
boats, none OF them formidable. She will
be no very valuable ally to the European
powers. Holland has about the same kind
Of navy as Denmark, and can be counted
of little help to the larger nations in a naval
war, although she once took good deal of
beating from England. Turkey has a rick
ETY. old navy, consisting of nine battleships,
OF which only one is first class, no armored
cruisers, six protected cruisers, two unpro-
tected cruisers, about fifty gunboats and
torpedo boats. Turkey as a naval power is
not calculated to scare an opponent. Por-
tugal boasts of one battleship, four pro.
tected cruisers, and about forty little yes.
sels OF the gunboat and torpedo boat variety.
Sweden and Norway possess between them,
outside of little mosquito fleet of coast de-
fense boats, two protected cruisers, four un-
protected cruisers and about fifty torpedo
and gunboats.
1t is hardly necessary to take into calcu.
| lation some of the small navies whose figures
| are given here, for the reason that although
they comprise quite a number of small boats
the vessels are for the large part only Of the
class that could be fitted out in almost un-
limited numbers by America and England
| by drawing on the reserves of the merchant
marine or yachting fleets of the two coun-
tries. In real fighting ships it will be seen
that outside Of France, Germany, Italy and
Russia, there are no foes in Europe that an
Anglo-American alliance need take much
cognizance of.
10 oppose the fleets enumerated above the
United States would have the unsurpassa-
BILE navy that did such wonders in the late
war, and brought glory that will never grow
dim to the flag of freedom. When the last
official returns were made America pos
sessed nine tirstclass battleships, of second
class battleships two, of armored cruisers
two, OF protected and partially protected
cruisers sixteen, of unprotected cruisers five,
OF gunboats of the first class eighteen, of
torpedo boats twenty-one. These figures
do not include the splendid subsidized
cruisers that did such good service in the
war with Spain. Nor do they include the
magnificent fleet OF superb battleships now
being got ready in various parts of the coun-
try. These battleships include the Ala
bama, Wisconsin, Illinois, Kearsarge, Ken.
lucky, Colorado and Pennsylvania. These
seven battleships will be as fine as any
afloat, and infinitely superior to anything
| that Europe could bring against them.
With all our new battleships in commits
sion the United States and Great Britain
would have more effective force of heavy
weight ships than any possible combination
of nations could oppose to them, while in
the lighter vessels the combined fleets Of
the two English-spealing nations, as has
been shown by the above figures, would be
more than able to hold its own, and, with
the reserves of the United States and Great
Britain called from the merchant marine
the vessels of the Anglo American alliance
would swarm everywhere and sweep the