POPOFFKAS, OR CIRCULAR IRONCLADS. 
267 
Popoffkas, and described her performances in the remarkable 
letters to the “ Times,” which at length attracted general atten- 
tion to the subject ; and then, on Feb. 4, he gave a full account 
of the circular ironclads in a paper read before the Eoyal 
United Service Institution, in which he spoke of the introduc- 
tion of this new type of man-of-war into a European navy as 
marking the beginning of a revolution in naval architecture. 
The Popoffka was originally designed only for coast defence ; 
but Mr. Eeed would have us make such vessels, with or with- 
out certain modifications, the type of the line-of-battle ship of 
the future. We propose to review the subject here ; but, as the 
Popoffkas have been so fully and so recently described, we 
need not enter into the details of their construction at any great 
length. 
The Popoffka is, roughly speaking, a saucer-shaped ship. 
With the exception of a slight projection at the stern, the ship 
is in outline a perfect circle. The deck is about 18 inches 
above the water, but curves upwards towards the centre to a 
height of about 4 feet. The bottom is flat, with several 
parallel keels, but its diameter is much less than that of the 
deck, and the side curves upwards, any section of it being a 
quadrant of a circle whose radius is equal to the depth of the 
ship. In the centre of the deck is what has been called a fixed 
turret, but it is really an open breastwork over which two 
heavy guns fire en barbette . The deck, the breastwork, and the 
sides of the ship, are all armoured. In front of the breastwork, 
at what is called the bow of the vessel, there is a lightly-built 
forecastle, and before this, hang the anchors, the cables passing 
into it through hawse-holes, and thence to the chain-lockers. 
The two funnels are placed amidships, one on each side of the 
deck. There are six engines, each driving a screw, the six 
screws being arranged three on each side of the rudder along 
the sternward part of the circumference, the screws working 
independently, and the shafts being laid parallel to each other 
and to the line from bow to stern. On each side of the 
diameter there are two boiler-rooms each containing four 
boilers. The engine and boiler-rooms and coal-bunkers occupy 
the sternward half of the ship. In the middle are the powder- 
magazines and the shot-and shell-rooms, and in the forepart 
are the chain-lockers, water-tanks, and store-rooms. Above these 
and in the forecastle are rooms for the crew, the officers’ rooms 
being placed in the centre of the ship under the breastwork. A 
passage runs round the ship, another traverses her longitudinally, 
and these form the chief means of communication under the 
upper deck. The armour on the sides of the Novgorod is from 
9 to 11 inches thick, including an allowance for the hollow 
iron girders filled with teak which form the backing. The 
