The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1899-02-13

the privilege 10 TESTIFY In his own behalf.
The ram of the battleship London has
been delivered at Portsmouth dockyard.
1t weighs so tons and is cast in one piece.
Russia has ordered two large steamers
at yards on the Clyde, for her volunteer
fleet. Their aggregate cost will be about
So, 900, 0O0
A public subscription fund for building
submarine boat for the French navy
was started last month by the "Matin,"
Partisan paper, and in couple of weeks
| reached the sum of $4,000.
The British Admiralty has invited ten
ders for the erection of new naval bar
| racks on the site of the old Anglesea
barracks, Portsea Invitations have been
sent to foreign as we'll as to English
firms.
The naval budget Of Japan for the f1s-
cal year. beginning April l. is 1854 $50 for
ordinary and s17,S32547 for extraordinary
expenditures, making a total of $25, ATT 1873
to cover the running expenses Of the navy
and making partial payments on thirty
four vessels of all classes building abroad
The new private shipbuilding yard at
Nicolaieff, near Sebastopol, is rapidly ap-
preaching completion. II will be much
larger than the entire Admiralty works
at that place and will accommodate two
battleships three cruisers and a number
of torpedo-boat destroyers at the same
time. An order for an armored cruiser
of 5000 tons has already been given to the
new yard.
Sir Edward J. Reed, ex-chief construc-
tor of the British navy, delivered an adj
dress recently at the annual dinner of the
Institute of Marine Engineers, on 1.-The
British Navy" Regarding the personnel
he said that the only blot in 1t was that
they had not in this country (England)
arrived at the time when the marine en-
gineer and his staff were considered
worthy to rank with officers of the SER
vice.
The British cruiser Arrogant had a
strange experience while proceeding from
Vigo to Gibraltar. She was going at full
speed in a calm sea and the crew were
lined up to receive their daily allowance
of grog, when all of a sudden a great
tremcr went through the ship and the
sailors were thrown in all directions. It
was thought that the ship had struck a
sunken rock and the engines were imme-
diately reversed. 1t was then found that
the cause of the disturbance was great
whale which had been hit squarely in the
middle by the forefoot of the Arrogant
1t was not stated what became of the
whale.
The British cruiser Eclipse had q mar
row escape from destruction recently
while lying at Bombay. The officers were
at dinner in the wardroom when an ex-
plosion was felt beneath them, followed
by several slighter conclusions. The
sounds were located in the shellroom of
the twelve FOUNDER quick-firing gun. This
was at once flooded, and after pumping
out 1t was found that three twelve
FOUNDER shells from the top tier had ex-
ploded, the fragments being scattered all
over the room, but having done only
slight damage to the fittings or to the
other shells. The only explanation of
the mystery is the theory of spontaneous
explosion.
Admiral Makaroff of the Russian navy
in a discourse on the relative merits of
armored cruisers and protected cruisers
favors the latter. Lord Charles Beresford
takes a contrary view and declares that
he would rather have something on the
side that would cause the shells to burst
on the outside rather than inside the ship
The United Service Gazette, commenting
on these opposite views, sides with Lord
Beresford and says: I'VE believe this
Is the view held by the vast majority of
naval officers; for although all combus-
tible material may in future be carefully
excluded when building warships, and the
danger of fire be thus reduced to mini
mum, still the tremendous wrecking
power of high explosive shell Is much
too terrible to make 1t a desirable visitor
between the decks Of a cruiser.