"WHAT! put an engine and screws into the Royal Albert?" said, in 1849, the best of the naval shipbuilders in England, if not in the world. "Turn that ship, sir, into a steamer! Never while I live!" The Royal Albert was then on the stocks, and the Agamemnon's keel was being laid in Woolwich dockyard. Five years afterwards, that worthy old man was in his grave, and the Royal Albert was a screw three-decker, and flagship to Admiral Sir Edmund Lyons. The world will wag on in spite of the school of naval architecture. "What!" exclaim others to-day, as good and as true as Oliver Langwhat put our Benbows, our Hawkes, Nelsons, and Victorias into armour-cover our heart-of-oak with iron, sir? Have a care!" Yes! alas! we say, good sirs, it must be 80. Men of the sea, and men of the dockyards, may, like the worthy Canadian who first saw a vessel move under steam, throw up their hands to heaven, and exclaim, "Croyez Vous que le bon Dieu permettra tout cela!" and yet the world will wag on. Gunnery, steam, rifled muskets and rifled cannon, have called into existence certain safeguards, such as stouter earthen and granite parapets, better mantlets, securer magazines, and lastly, iron plates to resist for a while the terrific strokes of Armstrong's and Whitworth's projectiles. The thick parapet, the mantlet of stout rope, the magazine deeply buried in the ground, are out of the power of sailors to adapt to their ships; but the iron plate-which is perfectly proof to shell, to hot-shot, to grape-shot, and to congreve rockets, and only to be penetrated, when overlaying an elastic substance, by the heaviest solid shot, thrown at the close distance of 200 yards affords to our navy an amount of security equal to that found by soldiers behind their parapets of earth, or in granite casemated fortresses; not immunity, remember, but partial security. To the unprofessional inhabitant of the United Kingdom,

the immediate adoption of these iron plates, as a security against some of the great risks of a sea-fight, would appear to be a natural and sensible measure. Surely," he argues, "if it be found that the wooden sides of our ships, whether of oak or teak, no longer afford partial protection for the seamen at their guns against the strokes of Armstrong shells, at even a mile distance-and Whitworth boasts that his 3-pounder (which is about the weight of the grapeshot of the old 68-pounder gun) will likewise pass into a vessel at a greater distance-if it is known that an Armstrong's hundred-pounder shell, bursting at the water-line in the wooden side of a man-of-war, rends a hole that will assuredly sink her, in spite of all the shot-plugs in the navy-if a solitary red-hot shot, planted in a ship's side, sets her on fire-or if either it reaches, or a shell bursts in, the magazines or handing rooms, the entire ship and crew will be hurled into eternity-and it is found that a 4-inch armour of wrought-iron materially reduces all these risks-it must be better to apply it, even should it not be entirely invulnerable, until some better invention is discovered. It may not be perfect," he would argue, "but it is a step in the right direction, and evidently an improvement upon wood alone." Our unprofessional man is simply rational upon this point of ship-armour, because he happens to be untrammelled with any preconceived notions upon the subject. It is far otherwise with the majority of naval officers and naval ship-architects. They are just as intractable upon the question of covering their wooden ships with armour as he (the landsman) would be if the matter were one of Puseyite innovation, church-rates, town-drainage, or municipal taxes. Bearing this in mind, therefore, let us not rail at the old and experienced seamen and shipwrights, who are so hard to convince upon the desirability of employing this new invention; but try to con

vince them, by meeting all their objections, and by pointing out the proved and probable advantages of iron-clad ships over wooden ones.

We will first point out the causes that have called into existence this novel mode of protecting ships from the destructive effects of modern artillery. When the Russian war of 1854 broke out, there was a general opinion in naval circles, shared by ourselves, that a fleet of line-of-battle ships, manned with good seamen gunners, would batter down any fortifications, if it could be laid sufficiently close for the purposenamely, at about three hundred yards' distance. If any one demurred to this opinion, and quoted the case of the line-of-battle ship that, in the Walcheren expedition, was beaten off by a couple of howitzers worked through a gap in a dike or the severe punishment of the Pompée and Tigre, under the heroic Sir Sydney Smith, by a solitary martello tower-he was at once met by the very just reply, that naval gunnery was then unborn; and all objections were overruled by the triumphant enumeration of Lord Exmouth's exploit at Algiers, and of Admiral Stopford at St Jean d'Acre. There, you were told, fleets had recently succeeded in fighting fortresses, and only required to be well led to do so again. The fact that it was in both cases a mere contest between European and Eastern skill and courage, was ignored -and that at Algiers, as well as at Acre, our fleet was tamely permitted to proceed deliberately into position, and open fire at its own time and convenience, was not sufficiently borne in mind. However, our fleets had hardly sighted the fortifications of Russia, and had a taste here and there of the quality of their metal, and precision of their practice, before the fact of the extreme insecurity of the wooden ship as an engine of modern warfare, dawned on the intellect of those immediately taking part in the operations. If the Czar Nicholas would have made war according to rule, and sent his wooden

ships out to fight our wooden ships, no doubt our fleet would have handled his as effectively as the Russian fleet did that of the Porte at Sinope. But that is exactly what the Russian did not do. He had no distant colonies to defend-he estimated at their proper value the man material of his fleet; and he logically argued that a crew of seamen gunners behind a shot-and-shell proof parapet upon the coast, must be a far more formidable force for our fleet to tackle, than if they were behind a wooden wall through which every projec tile could pass. That he judged rightly, the history of our naval proceedings in the Baltic and Black Sea thoroughly proves. A steam-frigate of ours grounded a few miles from Odessa. She had fourteen heavy guns, throwing 32-pound shot and shell, besides two pivots of the most formidable description in the navy. She had two 24-pounder howitzers, and two field-pieces (a 6-pounder and 12-pounder). The Russians despatched from Odessa a battery of four 24-pounder or 12-pounder howitzers, with a portable furnace for heating shot. There was a fog at first: when it lifted, the frigate and battery commenced action at short range. There was no wind to affect the practice, and the only thing against the frigate was, that she could only fire a portion of her battery-yet the weight of metal was all in favour of the ship. The frigate was thoroughly searched by the enemy's fire, the shell from the howitzers of the enemy passed easily through her sides and decks, bursting and spreading destruction everywhere. The hot shot lodged in sail-bins, storerooms, and amongst other inflammable matter. The ship was soon on fire in many places; the captain was mortally wounded-poor Giffard could do no more than die in the execution of his duty. Threatened with explosion of the magazines, the frigate surrendered, and the Tiger fell a prize to the Russians. A court - martial acquitted officers and men of all blame; but the

facts ought to be very instructive, and incontestably prove that even light shells and hot shot, thrown from guns whose crews are properly sheltered, will generally master heavy artillery where the men have only a wooden parapet. The bombardment of Odessa, for the purpose of destroying the shipping within the mole, was our next lesson. So far as numbers, weight, and efficiency of the guns upon the side of the Allies was concerned, all was in our favour. Yet prudence forbade the fleet taking up fixed positions, and deliberately engaging the open batteries and field-works of the Russians. The attacking force had to keep moving to disconcert the fire of the enemy. This measure told both ways, for our vessels, instead of hitting the fortifications alone, often missed them, and spread their shot all over an open and harmless city. We subsequently visited Odessa, and the impression left on our mind was a very painful one; for the people fancied these stray shots were intentional and, indeed, their numbers obliged one to confess that the practice must have been very bad. We do not know whether it is so still, but all those numerous shot-marks on the houses, churches, boulevards, shops, or palaces, were then surrounded with two black circles forming a riband, on which was inscribed, Holy Saturday, 1854," as a memento of what in Odessa was considered an attack gloriously repulsed. Of course we do not think so; for although no landing was effected, no trophies carried off, yet our object was attained; we burnt the shipping with rockets, and destroyed the Russian means of transport. Still the general result seemed still in favour

of land-batteries over wooden vessels, however great the disparity of force in guns and weight of metal. We need not go into details; but amongst those engaged, there were several who readily allowed that the employment of hot shot by the Russians, to the extent that they used them, added undeniably to the dangers of ship-fights; and one vessel was often quoted as an instance of the effect of a single hot-shot well placed. She was struck by such a missile, and it rolled down near the lining of the magazine; this vessel had to cease firing, go out of action, and turn the energies of her crew to the discovery of the shot and the extinguishing of the fire. We may safely say that a naval action, upon the plan of the Odessa bombardment, will not again be repeated. It may answer, as it did at Sveaborg, to have a fleet of heavily-armed gunboats, rattling along, and firing broadcast over the area of a fortification, just to distract attention from mortar-vessels, or heavy ships that are really doing the pounding; but the issue of the combat must rest with the latter; and at Sveaborg the mortar-boats were judiciously placed at an extreme range, where the heavy guns of the enemy could not reach them with effect.

On the 17th October 1854 the final experiment of wooden ships against granite and earthen walls was made, never, we believe, again to be repeated until iron-clad ships range up in line of battle. The allied fleet was repulsed. The Agamemnon, the Albion, Sanspareil, and other ships, did all that skill, gallantry, and daring could accomplish to silence that Fort Constantine. They did not succeed; neither will the Russian official ac