226 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[June, 



thing, what was the all in all twenty years ago, is now no more than 

 an accessary to naval force — that fine squadron will be very near being 

 only a useless expense. Let us investigate a little the facts, which 

 have passed before our eyes, it is a cotemporary history, which every 

 one can appreciate from his remembrance. 



Since the progress of navigation has caused gallies to be abandoned 

 (this is old enough), each state has had squadrons or reunions of sailing 

 vessels, as the expression of its naval force. The French and English 

 fleets, have during a century and half disputed with each other the 

 empire of the sea,= ' and after long and sanguinary struggles, the Eng- 

 lish flag has been carried from one end of the globe to the other as a 

 conqueror and a master. The French navy might have been thought 

 to be annihilated. 



It was not however and peace bringing back tranquillity, confidence 

 and commerce, our merchant navigation employed and formed sea- 

 men enough in 1S40 to allow of a squadron of twenty ships carrying 

 with honour the French flag in the Mediterranean. 



Many minds were dazzled with these brilliant results ;-= they saw 

 with grief this fine fleet condemned to inaction at the moment when 

 the national sentiment was in them so deeply wounded. We had at 

 that moment over the English squadron a superiority in organization 

 and number. Our seamen commanded by an able and active chief, 

 were well-exercised, and everything promised them victorv. I do 

 not invoke on that point my own recollection, but that of one of the 

 most able oflicers of the English navy. 



Let us admit that a quarrel had then broken out; let us admit that 

 the god of battles had been favourable to France ; cries of joy would 

 have been uttered all over the kingdom ; it would not have been 

 thought that the triumph was of short duration. It must be allowed 

 in a conflict between two squadrons, French and English, victory will 

 be always strongly disputed ; it will belong to the most able, the most 

 persevering, but it will have been paid for most dearly, and on both 

 sides the loss will have been enormous, many vessels destroyed or 

 crippled. It follows that each will return to its ports with a maimed 

 squadron, deprived of its best officers and best seamen. 



But I will suppose what is without precedent; I will allow tliat 

 twenty English ships and fifteen thousand English seamen could ever 

 have been brought prisoners iuto Toulon by our triumphant squadron. 

 Would the victory be thereby more decisive ? Should we have sub- 

 dued an enemy who is cast down by the first blow, who wants re- 

 sources to repair a defeat and who in wiping ofFdisgrace, is accustomed 

 to calculate the expense ? To every one who knows the English peo- 

 ple it is evident that in sucli circumstances they would be found ani- 

 mated with an immense desire of avenging a check unknown in their 

 annals, a check which affects their very existence. We should see all 

 the naval resources of that immense empire, its numerous personnel, 

 its material riches, accumulated to wi))e off the blot on the English 

 navy, at thi! end of a month tv!o or three fleets as powerfully organized 

 as that which we should have carried off would be before our ports. 

 What have we to oppose them ? Nothing but wrecks. And here is 

 the place to tear oft' the veil under which the secret of our weakness 

 is hidden from us. Let us proclaim it aloud, a victory, like that 

 seemingly promised to us in 1840, would have been for the French 

 cavy the commencement of a new ruin. We were at the end of our 

 resources; our materiel was not rich enough to re])air from one day 

 to another the mischiefs whicli our ships would have suffered and our 

 personnel [our crews] would have presented the spectacle of an ira- 

 puissance still more distracting. It is not enough known what efforts 

 it took to arm then those twenty ships, which gave France so much 

 confidence and so much pride ; it is not well enough known that the 

 exhausted muster rolls of the inscription could furnish no more sea- 

 men. And what must be added is that on the first rumour of war, the 

 nuisery so impoverished of our merchant navy would have been re- 

 duced to nothing ; the few liands which might have remained would 

 immediately have taken to the profitable speculation of privateer- 

 ing.^" 



Many times in the course of its history, France, when tliought to be 

 without troops, has sent out thousands from her bosom, as by magic, 

 but it is not so with fleets ; the seaman cannot be made off-hand, he is 

 a work of art, which if not modelled from his infancy, to the sea 



*■* iEsop's cock was^a much more ratiooal animal when he scratched up the pearl on 

 the dunghill and rejecte'd it as of no use to him. The Gallic cock according to his own 

 account, must contend for the empire of the sea, which would have been of no use to him 

 when he had got It. 



2 3 The author would have done well had he reprobated this insane practice of making 

 a show of force without any grounds for its exhibition, or resources for its maintenance. 

 It is this vile pandering to popular vanity whicii is doing so mucli harm in France and 

 the United Stalen. Let the French set to work to make tliemselves a commercial power, 

 and then and then only talk about their naval force. The Hollanders now that their 

 supremacy is lost, .ire too wise to waste their thoughts in display, bnt exert tliemselves 

 soberly anil steadily to improve their position. 



26 All ihiH soi-iiiils liliL' common sense, why tlien sliould the author address himtelf to 

 engage bis counlryintu in a war, ^rhii-h could only biinsjs them riiiu and disgrace. 



business, always exhibits an inevitable inferiority. From the time 

 since we have been trying to make seamen, we have succeeded, it 

 must be allowed in getting men, who are not sea-sick, but (he name of 

 seaman is not to be acquired so cheaply. 



There then is the wreck of our victorious fleet either blockaded or 

 attacked with numerous forces, which to the power of organization 

 join the ardent desire of avenging defeat. The fruits of victory and 

 of the blood shed is lost. It is no longer permitted to call by the 

 name of victory a temporary superiority, which has only left behind it 

 the certainty of defeats near at hand, and that because, without fore- 

 sight for the morrow, we should have ventured all our resources at 

 once. 



No, we must not accustom the country to play in time of peace with 

 fleets, and flatter itself with tlie false idea that they give it power. 

 Let us never forget the effect which the recall of the fleet in 1840 pro- 

 duced; it was however what was necessary then, and what would be 

 so still on the first threat of war. 



It is clear therefore that the part of shipping can no longer be 

 henceforward to form even the main body of our naval power; the 

 employment of steamers reduces it perforce to the subaltern occu- 

 pation of siege artillery in a land army. They will be carried in the 

 train of a steam fleet (when sailers) the expedition has a determinate 

 object, when employed against a fort, or a sea town, which must be 

 attacked with a large mass of artillery brought to bear on one point. 

 Beyond that, services will not be required ot them, which they cannot, 

 ought not to render, and we shall be cautious of persevering, from an 

 exaggerated respect for ancient traditions, in a dangerous path, at the 

 end of which there might some day have to be rendered a very serious 

 account to France, disabused. 



I should not hesitate myself, to strike at once into a contrary path, 

 and I should put to myself plainly the question whether maintaining 

 eight armed ships and eight in commission to obtain no other advan- 

 tage thin that of striking afar off the eyes of superficial observers is 

 not a great deal too much. 



I shall be answered perhaps that these ships are schools of officers 

 and discipline. 



But every reunion of ships, either sailers or steamers, would attain 

 the same end. It is not necessary to have for that ships of the line, 

 the most costly of all floating machines, ships, which on the approach 

 of war, we should be obliged to disarm. 



Would it not be better to employ the leisure of peace in preparing 

 and sharpening a blade which would give certain blows in time of 

 war ? I am not afraid of affirming that from the formation of a steam 

 squadron would arise more new ideas and true progress that there has 

 been from all the lessons of the last war. 



In fine, and everything lies on that, let us look across the channel, 

 and see what England does : let us see the decision with which that 

 country, so sagacious, and so enlightened as to itsinterests, has known 

 how to give up the old instruments of its power and seize the new 

 arm. (See Appendix A.) 



Certainly if in any quarter sailing fleets should be kept up we should 

 expect it in the English Admiralty, which has derived profit and glory 

 enough from them. 



But they have followed the march of events, they have listened to 

 the voice of experience, and have comprehended that sailers would be 

 useless when a new naval force, capable of doing everything in despite 

 of them, had come into the world. 



So too lot us look at our fleet, nailed up by the force of circum- 

 stances in the Mediterranean, what do the English Government op- 

 pose to it? Three ships,* but on the other hand they have eleven 

 steamers, of which nine are of large size, and with this force, they 

 have enough to make their flag rule and their policy triumph. Our 

 budget, I know, gives us an effective force of forty-three steamers ; 

 that is something; but in England they know what to make of the 

 naval value of these vessels, and this is the total they have to set 

 against ours. 



In all, England now reckons one hundred and twenty-five steamers. 

 Of this number, seventy-seven are armed, and to these must be added 

 two hundred steamboats of superior quality, fit for carrying heavy 

 guns and troops, which the merchant navy coidd furnish to the state 

 on the very day they were wanted. = ' 



* The English Government reduces this year from sercnteen to nine the number of its 

 armed vessels. Three first class (three-deckers) will be employed as guard ships in their 

 ports, Sheerness, Portsmouth, Plymouth ; three in the lHeditterranean,onein the Pacific 

 Ocean, one in China, one in the West Indies and North America. Seven of these nine 

 ships are to carry the flags of Admiralty. 



-'7 The autiior must have a strange idea of his countrymen to give them the soundest 

 view of the resources of England, and show the impossibilityof competing with them, and 

 at the same time to recommend them to engage in an enterprize so worthless. There can 

 be little doubt indeed that this is an appeal to mob prejudices, and the author knows 

 That it they will, tbey will you may depend on*t. 

 And if they wont, they wont and there's an end ou't. 



