176 Master Minds of Modern Science 



She developed twelve thousand three hundred horse- 

 power, and her speed over the measured mile was thirty- 

 seven and one-tenth knots. She went astern at fifteen 

 and a half knots. A second destroyer, the Cobra, was 

 built on similar lines, but she was not quite so fast, her 

 speed being just over thirty-four knots. 



In the Navy they say that it is the worst of luck to name 

 any ship after a reptile, and the fates of these two vessels 

 bear out this saying. Cobra was lost in a storm in the 

 North Sea in September 1901, while on her way to the 

 Tyne from the South. It is believed that she broke her 

 back. Viper was wrecked in a fog when she ran aground 

 on the rocky coast of the Channel Islands. All the repre- 

 sentatives of the Parsons staff and of the builders, as well 

 as most of the crew, were lost in the Cobra. 



Although these twin disasters were in no way due to the 

 turbine engines, yet they threw a sad damper on the pros- 

 pects of the Parsons Company, for now the little Turbinia 

 was the only vessel afloat having turbine engines. Then 

 Messrs Denny of Dumbarton stepped in and ordered 

 turbine engines for a new vessel they were building. She 

 was the King Edward, the first merchant ship to be fitted 

 with turbines. She was quite small, being only six 

 hundred and fifty tons, and was built for service on the 

 river Clyde. On her trials she did well over twenty knots, 

 and the weight of her motors, with condensers, steam 

 pipes, propellers, and all, was only sixty-six tons. 



She was so satisfactory that she was soon followed by 

 a second ship, the Queen Alexandra. The taunt to the 

 effect that turbines were ' steam-eaters ' failed completely 

 when tables were published showing that these two 

 vessels actually used a fifth less coal than similar ships 

 fitted with reciprocating engines. 



Success breeds success. The next thing that happened 

 was that the South-Eastern Railway Company ordered a 

 turbine-engined ship for cross-Channel work. She was 



