The Ocala evening star., 1915-09-04
WHAT THE BRITISH
NAVY HAS DONE

Every once in a while you will see
some American paper, which should
know better, asking what the British
navy has done, or saying that the
British navy is practically helpless
against German submarines. The fol-
lowing from the Columbia State is an
accurate answer to all such remarks:
''The Mistress of the Seas
What has the British navy done in
the present war to justify Great Brit
aims title as Mistress of the Seas?
That the navy has been unable to
stop the submarine attacks on mer-
chant ships is true, and the fact has
been cited to prove the failure of the
British to command the oceans. Yet
in the last few days, a German naval
expert, writing in a German newspa-
per, points out that the enemy ships
destroyed by the German submarines
average but 1.5 per day, while at least
l, 800 merchant vessels come into and
go out of British ports each day.
Germany's submarine campaign af-
fects one per cent of the British ship
ping.
On the other hand, German mer-
chant vessels are completely obliter-
ated from the worlds commerce, for
the time being; and Germany's ex-
port and import commerce is COM
pletely stopped. Not only that, but
the British fleet, Somewhere in the
North Seas" has the German navy
bottled up in the harbors of the home
country; only a few unimportant
forays have been made by the kaiser's
warships.
The British fleets have conveyed
hundreds of thousands of soldiers
across the channel to France, without
a mishap; and only one transport has
been lost in carrying an unknown,
but certainly large, number of troops
to the Dardanelles. Similarly, sew
eral expeditions of Canadian troops
have been safely conveyed across the
Atlantic ocean.
But not the least of the achieve
ments of the British navy is the safe
conduct of at least one hundred mil.
lions of dollars, in gold and securities
from England to America. On Au-
gust 10 there arrived in New York
by way of Canada, from London, g
shipment of $19,5OO,OOO in gold and
from thirty to thirty-five million ii
securities; and a few days ago an.
other shipment was safely delivered
in New York consisting of about
100000 in gold and s30,000,00C
in securities, making in all something
like S1OO,000,000 in gold and securi
ties transported within the last few
weeks across the Atlantic ocean
without mishap, and now securely de
posted in New York to back up ;
loan to the British government ant
her allies.
1t is said that the last shipmen
was made on a British supeF-dread
nought and that the battleship, whel
she steamed out of her harbor TO
Halifax, and for a considerable dis
tance, if not all the way across tn
ocean, was surrounded by a flotilla o
smaller vessels as guards agains
submarines. The transportation o
this immense value of gold and Sc
curities across the ocean, to NeN
York, where it becomes the basis 70
credit in the purchase of supplies fo
the Allies, means as much for tn
H benefit of the Allies as the enlistmen
and landing of hundreds of thousand
of soldiers at the front, and it is a
achievement which Germany woul
have readily sacrificed men and ship
to prevent. 1t is an achievement
which the supremacy of Great Brit
ain on the seas has been again sig
ii nallv demonstrated.