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wheel standard gave a registered immersion and emersion of 15° star- 

 board, and 12° port ; and there is little doubt but that in a gale of wind 

 the deflection will be considerably more, as when the above deflections 

 were registered the weather was moderate. No doubt exists of the 

 want of stability in vessels of the "Koyal Sovereign" class, when the 

 weight of the turrets is considered — 130 tons, and the 5 J inch armour 

 plate. The plan adopted, also, of transforming old wooden liners into iron 

 cupola ships, is evidently erroneous, — the timbers of these ships not be- 

 ing able to withstand the strain of the increased weights ; their ponder- 

 ous turrets also are most objectionable, — liable, on the one hand, to get 

 out of order, from failure or injury of the revolving machinery; and, 

 on the other, to become rapidly choked with smoke. They oxidize to a 

 great extent, and once strained out of the vertical line are incapable of 

 rotation. In order to substantiate the above theories we have many 

 American testimonies. I cannot but state a few of the most remarka- 

 ble here, quoted from authentic sources. 



The official reports of the commanders of the Monitors, or turret-ships, 

 made immediately after the failure of the attack upon Fort Sumter in 

 April, 1863, tend to show that these vessels are incapable of resisting the 

 concentrated fire of heavy rifled ordnance. Gapt. Drayton, of the " Pas- 

 sive," says : — "The ship was struck in quick succession in the lower part 

 of the turret by two heavy shots, which bulged in its plates and beams, 

 and, forcing together the rails on which the carriage of the 11 -inch 

 gun revolved, rendered it wholly useless for the remainder of the action. 

 A little after a very heavy rifled shot struck the upper edge of the 

 turret, broke all its eleven plates, and then, glancing upwards, struck 

 the pilot house with such force as to send it over, open the plates, and 

 squeeze out the top, exposing the inside of the pilot house, and render- 

 ing it useless." Capt. Rogers, of the turret-ship " Weehawken," says : — 

 " Two or three heavy shots struck the side armour near the same place ; 

 they so broke the iron that it only remained in splintered fragments, 

 much of which could be picked off by the hand, and the wood exposed ; 

 the iron was five inches thick. The ' Petapsco' was disabled, and the 

 ' JsTantuck' and the ' Nahant' had the iron stripped from the wood, 

 their sides bulged in many places, and several holes in the turrets. 

 Their armour plates on the cupolas were disconnected, and the rivets 

 broken ; and before the close of the action the ' Weehawken' had shot- 

 holes in her sides so low down, that the water ran into the ship in 

 streams." Such is the published American account of their iron-clad 

 cupolas in action, and it can hardly be hoped that our turret ships 

 are by any means capable of performing with more satisfactory results. 



There seems every probability that gun-cotton will in a great mea- 

 sure take the place of gunpowder in iron-cased ships. In Austria it has 

 already done so. It has, no doubt, disadvantages, yet from recent ex- 

 periments it would seem that these were counterbalanced by certain 

 properties of most beneficial tendency. Xyloi'dine, first discovered by 

 M. Braconnot, bears a certain affinity to the pyroxyloidine of Professor 

 Schoenbein ; yet the former is essentially different in its composition, and 



