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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OE 
increase of power, and accuracy in guns, is of a very serious character. 
There is no way of meeting that change except by the use of iron. I need 
not dwell on the objections to the general use of this material for land 
defences. It must be borne in mind that those who advocate its use do so 
because it is the only alternative that has presented itself. I need only 
remark that a two 12-ton gun cupola completed costs, exclusive of the guns 
themselves, about £15,000, and the price of a sufficient armour shield is 
not yet decided on. 
The expense of making sufficient defences on the system I propose would 
almost be defrayed by the interest of the money required to be sunk in making 
thoroughly efficient iron-plated works. The saving is therefore prodigious 
and such as would be of the utmost consequence, and would even seriously 
affect the resources of the wealthiest nation; and as in war, cheapness has 
often the same meaning as possibility, it is difficult to over-estimate this 
feature. 
In the event of my system partly supplying the place of iron-plated land 
works, I hope the country will not forget what it has been relieved from. 
With mature deliberation, and after every other resource had been exhausted 
the government have been forced to adopt iron as the only material giving 
satisfactory results. It would have been false economy indeed, to have done 
otherwise. To have left vital positions on our coast insecure, whatever 
might be the expenditure required to make them Safe, would have been a 
grave error, and the system now proposed, would not in every case supersede 
its advantageous use: it might undoubtedly however, be employed in 
conjunction with the more expensive batteries, and in certain positions 
would be preferable, while the expense would be reduced materially 
whenever it could be applied. 
Independent however altogether of the consideration of the first enormous 
expense of building iron-plated strongholds, there are important military 
considerations to be taken into account in connexion with them. 
Such permanent and complete works as I refer to, when once made have 
to be taken care of, and garrisoned; they must always remain a source of 
anxiety, and a continual drain upon our resources in men and materiel: a 
certain number of such strongholds are necessary, but they cost vast sums 
to complete them, and much to maintain them, and after all if iron case¬ 
mates and embrasures alone are employed they may be found at some 
future period insufficient to cope with improved artillery. 
Tor these reasons it will no doubt be considered inexpedient to multiply 
the number of such works. What is then to become of secondary positions 
of importance ? Must they be left with defences that will crumble before the 
new artillery of ships P Are English soldiers to have the forlorn duty of 
fighting armour-clads from behind crazy embrasures ? Or, are those positions 
to be left to the mercy of any adventurous privateer ? I sincerely hope that 
the system now advocated may to some extent prove a satisfactory solution 
to these questions. Captain H. Tyler, R.E.,* alluding to the requirements 
in future fortifications says,— 
“ The great problem to be solved is, how to obtain all these advantages with 
economy'—not such economy as would deprive the works constructed of efficiency, 
* Professional Papers of the Royal Engineers, Yol, IX. p. 95. 
