Page images
PDF
EPUB

ARMENIA AND RUSSIA.

THE CRUX OF THE WHOLE BUSINESS.

MR. WALTER B. HARRIS writes an article in Blackwood's Magazine which is entitled "An Unbiassed View of the Armenian Question." Mr. Harris has travelled in Armenia and is in no way inclined to deny that the Turks have behaved brutally and atrociously in their dealings with the Armenians. But Mr. Harris lays his finger on a point which weighs with a good many people, and which I confess weighs with me to an extent which has brought down upon my head vehement remonstrances from some much esteemed correspondents. I have always maintained that, looking at the question practically, there is no means of establishing law and order in Armenia short of giving the Russians a commission to occupy and administer the country, as Austria occupied and administered Bosnia. But against this the Armenians and their spokesmen in this country shriek indignantly with one accord. They maintain that they will never, never, never consent to pass under the yoke of the Tsar, and that they prefer to remain under the sovereignty of the Sultan, with a chance of securing their autonomy under a European Commission, rather than accept immediate redress from the Russians. Clearly if this be the deliberate conviction of the Armenians, it would imply that their present condition is by no means so intolerable as the recorded facts would lead us to imagine. Mr. Harris puts this point very clearly. He says:

Let us look for a moment at the condition of the Armenians in Russia. There the Gregorian Church is still untouched, though that of the Georgians has long ago been swallowed up in the national religion of the country. Armenian schools flourish in every part; their worship is freely allowed; the dignitaries of their Church are chosen by the Armenians and appointed by the Emperor himself, who has never been known to object to the Catholicos elected by the people. In fact, they are allowed every religious and civil privilege, with the excepion that children of mixed marriages shall be brought up in the Orthodox Church. Under the just rule of Russia the Armenian flourishes; all the petty offices, and many of the higher ones, in the Government of Transcaucasia are held by them; in trade they have ruined the less crafty Russian; and Southern Russia to-day is an Armenian province. But ask the agitators whether they desire that the plateau of Asia Minor should fall under Russian rule, and what will they tell you? That they prefer Turkey to Russia. Astonishing as this reply is, it is heard throughout all the East wherever Armenians are found; and why is this?

A CYNICAL SUGGESTION.

Up to this point in associating myself with Mr. Harris, it seems to me that he has stated the case with accuracy, and I pause for a reply. Meantime I will quote what Mr. Harris says is the reason for this, although by no means associating myself with his explanation :

Because if Russia held Armenia, there would only be opportunities for the agitators and their friends to gain an honest livelihood by their labours or their efficiency, whereas what they are desirous of doing is to form a free and autonomous Armenia, in which their own personal enrichment and aggrandisement would take the place of patriotism and the welfare of their country. If you think that the Armenians are patriotic or sincere as a people, you are mistaken. At Echmiazin, the religions centre of the Armenians, one of the highest of the dignitaries of the Gregorian Church, spoke the following words to me:-"We love England," he said. After Armenia we love her best of all. We pray for her every day, and many times a day. She is so rich." In these ingenuous words you have the whole key-note of the Armenian policy, the whole character of her people-love of power and wealth. In an autonomous Armenia there would be every opportunity for the agitators to practise their powers of intrigue, a gentle art in which they excel. In a Russian Armenia intrigue means

Siberia at least, such intrigue as the Armenian loves to indulge in. No! the Armenian agitators and political aspirants with whom I came in contact in Southern Russia and in Persia, hovering about the frontiers, but careful never to run their necks into danger, one and all told me that they preferred Turkish to Russian rule, and that their war-cry was "Autonomy!"

This is probably unjust; but so long as the Armenians manifest such insuperable objections to accept relief from the hands of the Russians, many people will question whether their sufferings from the hands of the Turks are as intense as they certainly appear to be from the undisputed facts. It is the more to be regretted that the Armenians are taking this line, because there is every reason to think the Russians would refuse to have them at a gift. If England would only offer Armenia to Russia and the Armenians would agree to be handed over, Russia would probably refuse to accept them. Then we could work for a European commission with a much clearer conscience than we do at present.

In Praise of the Commander-in-Chief. MAJOR ARTHUR GRIFFITHS, Writing in the Fortnightly Review on "Advancement in the Army," tarries by the way for a moment to say what he thinks of Lord Wolseley :-

The new Commander-in-Chief will, no doubt, be invested with large powers, and will not shrink from using them. Not the least hopeful of the many anticipations encouraged by Lord Wolseley's appointment is that he will undertake to select, and this in the most fearless, independent manner. He has the courage of his opinions, and withal the strongest sense of duty. with a gift of penetration into character which amounts to genius. The best proof of this, if proof were needed, has been his unerring choice of his lieutenants and assistants throughout his distinguished career. The best men in the army, the most noted, many who have since risen to great distinction, made their first mark on Lord Wolseley's staff or under his orders. There was at one time a very erroneous impression abroad, and it has indeed been revived recently, that Lord Wolseley was the centre of a narrow clique, the so-called " Ring' which monopolised the good things of the profession, and outside which no one, however capable, could hope to make his way. If clique there was it embraced the whole army; the ring was a wide, ever-widening circle, which drew constantly within it the choicest spirits of the service. Nothing is more certain than that Lord Wolseley has always been keenly on the look out for the best ability, has been prompt to recognise, eager to utilise it, not for himself alone, but in the best interests of the State. Another mistaken idea is that the new Commander-in-Chief is not in touch, not in close sympathy with the army at large. No one knows it better, more intimately, has clearer ideas of what is best for it, a deeper and more abiding affection for it and for his comrades of all ranks, high and low. Any doubt on this head has been completely removed during the period of his Irish command, now approaching its close. Lord Wolseley has shown in the most substantial manner that he is before everything the soldier's friend. Officers generally have found, possibly to their surprise, that his knowledge of them is much deeper than a passing acquaintance, and none who are worth it, none who are keen and capable, will fail to be duly appreciated by him.

LORD ROSEBERY is the subject of a character sketch in the September Deutsche Revue.

A NEW college magazine is the Ampleforth Journal. Ampleforth College is a Catholic boys' school at York.

MR. KIDD's book continues to occupy the attention of thoughtful reviewers. Mr. L. P. Jacks, of Birmingham, contributes to the New World for September an article entitled "The Larger Issues of Mr. Kidd's Position."

322

REUNION DAY: WHAT SHALL IT BE?

JULY 4TH OR SEPTEMBER 3RD ?

THE suggestion made in the last number of the REVIEW, that the Fourth of July should be adopted by Great Britain as the day for celebrating the fête of the reunion of the English-speaking race, has been much discussed.

There was, of course, the inevitable objection that Britons would not stomach the Fourth of July, although it is admitted that no day falls more conveniently for such a popular fête. By way of turning this objection, one ingenious correspondent has discovered that the Fourth of July was a great date in English history more than a hundred years before it became famous as the day of the declaration of American independence. His letter runs thus:

Apropos of your suggestion in the last issue of the REVIEW OF REVIEWS to make the 4th day of July a fête day common to the Anglo-Saxon race, the following extract from a MS. play a reason from British "Oliver Cromwell"- indicates In the play Cromwell history for selection of that day. has just dissolved the Long Parliament, and, turning to his friends Harrison and St. John, he says:

Disburthen us of that power. Call a council of officers and others and consult who shall be summoned to Parliament, so that no delay occur.

"St. John: Will your Excellency name a day?

"Cromwell: My fortunate day of Dunbar and Worcester. Nay, that is too distant; July three months hence. We can make that day memorable to all time. England's first free Parliament of the people shall meet on the 4th day of July. "St. John: The 4th day of July."

[ocr errors]

On this day-4th July, 1653-Cromwell met his first Parliament, and his speech on that occasion is as remarkable a Declaration of Independence" as that later and more widely known one of 1776, for which it paved the way, and made a possibility, if, indeed, it was not directly the parent.

Cromwell's inaugural address, delivered July 4th, 1653, to the first of his Parliaments, may be read with advantage to-day. Of all known Fourth of July orations extant Not eloquent, according to the it is about the best. stump-orator standard, but full of a glowing sincerity and a manifest conviction in the reality of the providential mission of the English-speaking race which renders it very appropriate for Reunion Day. Certainly, there is little or nothing in it that would not be as useful when the temporary and local element is removed-if it were read in the United States or in any British colony, as in England itself. The root of the matter was in Oliver, and his speech is instinct with the truest and most sagacious statesmanship.

But, plump on the top of this vindication of the Fourth of July on account of its Cromwellian associations, comes a letter from another correspondent, who recommends the adoption of Cromwell's own day-the third of September:

"The day of double victory and death

Which saw him win two realms and happier yield his breath." And what makes this suggestion all the more interesting is that it is not put forward because the third of September was Cromwell's day, but because it was on the third of September on which the treaty was signed by which Britain recognised the independence of the United States. My correspondent says:

The "Fourth of July" is a great day which all Englishspeaking people may yet learn genuinely to honour, and which hosts of us do already honour at least with our sympathy. But, in asking the people of this country to deliberately adopt that particular day as the chief English fête-day of the year, there is, in spite of all that can be said in favour of the idea, and which I, personally, thoroughly appreciate, something

unpleasantly and even obtrusively artificial, obsequious, almost
truckling, toadying, leek-eating about it, that I am afraid it
will not generally commend itself to honest John Bull, who
abominates affectation, and even Jonathan would only admire
For an Englishman-for
it with his tongue in his cheek.
every living Englishman-to celebrate not only courteously,
but heartily and ungrudgingly, the Fourth of July with
American friends is one thing, and to adopt it as his own
national fête-day is quite another.

I therefore venture to propose another day, which will.
nevertheless have reference (as, of course, is desired) to the
great Anglo-Saxon rupture, viz., the third day of September.
On the Fourth of July the great English Colonies flung
defiance in the face of the Parent-land (justly, no doubt), ands
inaugurated not only a bitter fratricidal war, but a long
century of unfraternal severance, during which brothers
became and continued mutually "foreigners"; and hosts of
worthy people, untravelled Pilgrim-fathers, on this side of the
Atlantic, who had no real part in the quarrel, nor ever truly
sanctioned it, were deprived of their birthright of brotherly
love and help and sympathy. On the third of September,
1783, the King and Government of these realms, accompanied
with the acclamations and rejoicings of the people on both
sides of the ocean, acknowledged the Independence which had
been claimed on the Fourth of July, and made peace with all
the countries that had been involved in the great controversy.
That is to say, on that day first, the parent-country of all
these world-circling colonies accepted the severe lesson which
countless other parents have found similar difficulty in
learning, and acknowledged that her stalwart firstborn hadi
reached majority and man's estate, and could no longer brook
(Hitherto, by the way, the said
unreasoning dictation.
stalwart son has rather forgotten that it was, after all, a
reverend and very noble parent who committed this serious
but natural mistake.)

If there is to be a Reunion Day (and may a reconciling Heaven send it!) then the first public step in that direction was taken on the third day of September, 1783. It was an act of the central power, prompted not more by the prowess of her revolted sons at Saratoga and Yorktown, than by vehement and at length successful advocacy of colonial claims in EngIt ought to have ripened land and in the British Parliament. ages ago into better fruit than has yet been gathered. Speaking as one individual, but one who loves both countries, I endorse all that the Americans did up to the day that crowned their efforts with success, but I think with shame and with real resentment of the bitter unbrotherliness so cruelly and quite illegitimately fostered in all the long years since. Their second civil war taught them great lessons which, one verily believes, will yet have glorious retrospective influence. Eng lish-speaking people have had many terrible but inevitable civil wars-all healed but one!

Do you not think there is something to be said for my suggestion? It selects a new day-it does not in the least interfere with the American Fourth of July-but it so concurs with it and, so to speak, caps it, that Americans may be expected to join heartily in its celebration, and with some warm return of filial sentiment, along with British citizens wherever dwelling; and even governmental people would have no reason to look askance at such a fête, seeing that the holiday would celebrate a deliberate act of the Government.

A great deal is to be said for it indeed. September at the beginning is often excellent weather for holiday making, and it is just a month after the last summer Bank Holiday. English Royalists who dislike the memory of Cromwell can easily forget that the treaty of peace was signed on his day. For those of us-who on both sides of the sea constitute an immense majorityto whom Cromwell is the greatest ruler our race ever produced, the coincidence lends an added charm to the proposed Reunion Day, as the day when, to quote Cromwell's own words in his fourth of July speech, "We have rather desired and studied Healing and Looking forward than to rake into sores and to look backward."

THE MONROE DOCTRINE AND ITS COROLLARY. BY CAPTAIN MAHAN.

THERE is no American living whose writings are read with so much attention as those which come from the pen of Captain Mahan, whose books on "The Sea Power in History" have been recognised by naval men throughout the world as classics. Captain Mahan writes in a somewhat three-decker style, but what he says is carefully thought out and judicially stated. Hence it would be a great mistake if any of our people, especially those who have charge of the navy, the Colonies, or of our foreign policy, were not to read his article in the current number of Harper.

UNCLE SAM'S NEW ROLE.

It is one more warning as to the resolution of the citizens of the United States to abandon their old policy of non-intervention and to assert their right to be suzerain and protector of all the South and Central American Republics. This is a very serious new departure, and one which will entail grave consequences if the effect of its corollaries are not frankly faced by both sides. What adds to the significance of Captain Mahan's paper is, that it is obviously not written with any object of enlightening foreign Powers upon their new relations of the United States. It is addressed throughout to his own countrymen, and assumes as a matter beyond dispute that this decision has been arrived at, in order to lead them on to the next step, namely, the provision of an adequate navy to give effect to their new over-sea obligations.

THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS.

He begins his paper by pointing out that we are face to face with a new order of things. We see

a commencing change of conditions, economical and political, throughout the world, with which sea-power, in the broad sense of the phrase, will be closely associated; not, indeed, as the cause, nor even chiefly as a result, but rather as a leading characteristic of activities which shall cease to be mainly internal, and shall occupy themselves with the wider interests that concern the relations of states to the world at large.

:

In this new era the United States can no longer profess to pursue its traditional policy of non-intervention:The United States are not now in a position of insignificance or isolation, political or geographical, in any way resembling the times of Jefferson, and from the changed conditions may result to us a dilemma similar to which confronted him and his supporter. Not only have we grown-that is a detail-but the face of the world is changed, economically and politically. The sea, now as always the great means of communication between nations, is traversed with a rapidity and a certainty that have minimised distances. The world has grown smaller. But, while distances have shortened, they remain for us water distances, and, however short, for political influence they must in the last resort be traversed by a navy, the only instrument by which the nation can, when emergencies arise, project its power beyond its own shore-line.

THE MONROE DOCTRINE.

From this Captain Mahan diverges by an easy gradient to point out the significance of the Monroe doctrine :

It is not as an utterance of passing concern, benevolent or selfish, but because it voiced an enduring principle of necessary self-interest, that the Monroe doctrine has retained its vitality, and has been so easily made to do duty as the expression of intuitive national sensitiveness to occurrences of various kinds in regions beyond the sea. In its first application, it was a confession that danger of European complications did exist, under conditions far less provocative of real European interest than those which now obtain and are continually growing. Its subsequent applications have been many and various, and

the incidents giving rise to them have been increasingly important, culminating up to the present in the growth of the United States to be a great Pacific power, and her probable dependence in the near future upon an Isthmian canal for the freest and most copious intercourse between her two ocean seaboards. In the elasticity and flexibleness with which the dogma has thus accommodated, itself to varying conditions, rather than in the strict wording of the original statement, is to be seen the essential characteristic of a living principle-the recognition, namely, that not merely the interests of individual citizens, but the interests of the United States as a nation, are bound up with regions beyond the sea, not part of our own political domain, in which we may, therefore, under some imaginable circumstances, be forced to take action.

POSSIBLE CAUSES OF WAR.

There is not much difficulty in seeing what these circumstances may be under which the United States may be forced to take action, for Captain Mahan tells us

The force of circumstances has imposed upon her the necessity, recognised with practical unanimity by her people, of insuring to the weaker states of America, although of racial and political antecedents different from her own, freedom to develop politically along their own lines and according to their own capacities, without interference in that respect from governments foreign to these continents. The duty is self-assumed; and resting, as it does, not upon political philanthropy, but simply upon our own proximate interests as affected by such foreign interference, has towards others rather the nature of a right than a duty. It is probably safe to say that an undertaking like that of Great Britain in Egypt, if attempted in this hemisphere by a non-American state, would not be tolerated by us if able to prevent it; but the moral force of our contention might conceivably be weakened, in the view of an opponent, by attendant circumstances, in which case our physical power to support it should be open to no doubt.

MORAL: INCREASE THE NAVY!

Captain Mahan's practical conclusion is, as might be expected, that there is nothing like leather, and the American navy must be increased :

A navy, therefore, whose primary sphere of action is war, in the last analysis and from the least misleading point of view a political factor of the utmost importance in international affairs, one more often deterrent than irritant. It is in that light, according to the conditions of the age and of the nation, that it asks and deserves the appreciation of the state, and that it should be developed in proportion to the reasonable possibilities of the political future.

THE SICK MAN OF THE NEW WORLD. AN AMERICAN ON THE CENTRAL AMERICAN REPUBLICS. It is not for Great Britain to interfere with the policy which the United States appears to have decided to adopt in its dealings with its Central American neighbours, excepting in so far as it affects our own interests. But a friendly onlooker may say that the American Republic seems to be in danger of imitating one of the worst mistakes which has disgraced English diplomacy for the last half century. Captain Mahan, in the article just noticed, tells us that it is recognised with practical unanimity by the American people that the United States must, even at the risk of war, prevent any interference with the free political development of the Central and Southern American States. This course, he tells us, is taken not because of political philanthropy, but simply because of our own approximate interests.'

[ocr errors]

WHAT THE NEW POLICY MEANS.

That is to say, the United States of America in the last decade of the nineteenth century is deliberately

adopting in relation to the government of Central and South America exactly the same immoral and indefensible line of policy which England has pursued for the last sixty years in regard to the Ottoman Empire. It has been the traditional policy of England to support the Ottoman Turk, not from any motive of political philanthropy, but because we believe our approximate interests justified the adoption of such a policy. In other words, England has for three generations deliberately subordinated the permanent welfare of some of the most fertile countries in the world to the supposed necessity of preventing any interference with the political independence of the Ottoman Empire. The result of that can be read in letters of blood and fire in Armenia and Macedonia to-day..

IMITATING OUR PRO-TURKISH LINE.

These consequences of a policy which ostentatiously repudiates political philanthropy, and makes imagined interest the sole guide in national duty, have excited lively and well-deserved protests in the American Republic. But the policy which Captain Mahan tells us has been unanimously adopted by American citizens in dealing with their neighbours can hardly be regarded as one whit less immoral and unphilanthropic. Upon this subject it is not for me as an Englishman to do more than express an opinion and point to unimpeachable American evidence as the proof of what I am saying. In the same magazine in which Captain Mahan publishes his valuable paper, Mr. Richard Harding Davis, the well-known American traveller, describes the result of his experience in travelling in the Central American Republics. He says:

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "REPUBLICS."

The Republics of Central America are Republics in name only, and the movements of a stranger within the boundaries of Honduras are as closely watched as though he were a newspaper correspondent in Siberia. I had often to sign the names of our party twice in one day for the benefit of police and customs officers, and we never entered a hotel or boarded a steamer or disembarked from one that we were not carefully checked and receipted for exactly as though we were boxes of merchandise or registered letters. Even the natives cannot walk the street after nightfall without being challenged by sentries, and the collection of letters we received from alcaldes and comandantes and governors and presidents certifying to our being reputable citizens is large enough to paper the side of a wall. The only time in Central America when our privacy was absolutely unmolested, and when we felt as free to walk abroad as though we were on the streets of New York, was when we were under the protection of the hated monarchical institution of Great Britain at Belize, but never when we were in any of these disorganised military camps called free Republics.

CENTRAL AMERICAN "INDEPENDENCE."

The Central-American citizen is no more fit for a Republican form of government than he is for an Arctic expedition, and what he needs is to have a Protectorate established over him, either by the United States or by another Power; it does not matter which, so long as it leaves the Nicaragua Canal in our hands. In the capital of Costa Rica there is a statue of the Republic in the form of a young woman standing with her foot on the neck of General Walker, the American filibuster. would have been a very good thing for Costa Rica if Walker, or any other man of force, had put his foot on the neck of every Republic in Central America and turned it to some account.

It

Away from the coasts, where there is fever, Central America is a wonderful country, rich and beautiful, and burdened with plenty, but its people make it a nusance and an affront to other nations, and its parcel of independent little states, with the pomp of power and none of its dignity, are and will continue to be a constant danger to the peace which should exist between great Powers.

A DOG-IN-THE-MANGER POLICY.

There is no more interesting question of the present day than that of what is to be done with the world's land which is lying unimproved; whether it shall go to the great Power that is willing to turn it to account, or remain with its original owner, who fails to understand its value. The Central Americans are like a lot of semi-barbarians in a beautifully furnished house, of which they can understand neither its possibilities of comfort nor its use. They are the dogs in the manger among nations. Nature has given to their country great pasture-lands, wonderful forests of rare woods and fruits, treasures of silver and gold and iron, and soil rich enough to supply the world with coffee, and it only waits for an honest effort to make it the natural highway of traffic from every portion of the globe. The lakes of Nicaragua are ready to furnish a passageway which should save two months of sailing around the Horn, and only forty-eight miles of swamp land at Panama separate the two greatest bodies of water on the earth's surface. Nature has done so much that there is little left for man to do, but it will have to be some other man than a native-born CentralAmerican who is to do it.

"LET PANDEMONIUM CONTINUE: IT SUITS U.S." This evidence is not English, it is American, but it coincides with the opinion of every traveller who has visited these regions. With such testimony staring them in their faces, how can philanthropic and public-spirited citizens say they will condemn these regions to be a pandemonium in perpetuity merely because of this insensate jealousy of the interference of Great Britain? We have no objections, not the least in the world, if the United States would establish a real protectorate over these squalid and disorganised military camps which masquerade under the name of Republics. But we must be permitted to express mild surprise when we see our kinsmen across the water repeating in another continent, notwithstanding the beacon-light of our melancholy example, the self-same blunder which has so long discredited the English name in the East of Europe.

The Taming of African Elephants.

MR. HAGENBECK, the well-known lion tamer, has succeeded in convincing the German Geographical Society that one of the most firmly-established beliefsnamely, that of the untamable character of the African elephant-has no foundation in fact. In the current number of the English Illustrated Magazine Mr. Hagenbeck thus explains how he succeeded in converting the geographers:

"I stated my views at a meeting, and mentioned that I had at the time eight African elephants, which, though quite tame, had never been ridden or carried a load, and I suggested as an experiment that if my audienco would pay me a visit at five o'clock on the following afternoon I would show them the whole number ridden or carrying a load, after such training as could be given them in twenty-four hours. Next day they came, and all eight African elephants passed before them either ridden or loaded. The attendants were all Nubians, for this was before the appearance of the Mahdi, and African elephants and Nubian grooms could be got without much difficulty. At present the German Government are sending officers to learn the Indian system. But when the young elephants can be got, I will undertake to train them in Hamburg, and send them back to the colony, to be paid only on approval, if they do their work. They are better for the purpose than the In lian-taller, stronger, faster, and much better able to endure the heat of the sun, which the Indian elephant always fears." If the Mahdi and his fanatics had not appeared on the scene the African elephant would have been redomesticated and at work already.

THE NAVAL WARFARE OF THE FUTURE.

AN IMAGINARY PICTURE OF A SEA-FIGHT. IN Longman's Magazine Mr. James Eastwick concludes his spirited description of the naval battle of the future, which, he holds, will be decided by the introduction of the automatic gun. I noticed last month his new Centurion, and how she behaved herself. He continues the narrative in the October number, and makes the Centurion smash single-handed a French squadron of three ironclads and one cruiser. The story is full of passages of lurid vigour. It quotes the following passage of how the Centurion in her death throes made a triumphant effort against two French ironclads, the Charlemagne and the Jaurèquiberry. The rapid firing of the Centurion had so smashed up the Jaurèquiberry, that the French Admiral's last chance was to ram and go down with his adversary. At the same time the Charlemagne, which had been very severely maimed, steamed down on the British ship from the starboard. The writer is on the Centurion in charge of the guns in one of the turrets, watching the onrush of the Jaurèquiberry. He says:

AN ATTEMPT TO RAM.

The other was drawing up at full speed. Every second we could see more clearly the red point of her ram lifting amid the foam round her bows as she rose on the swell. She was now but five cables off. We laid fair on that advancing ram and began to fire. Loud along our decks rang the cry, "Ready away, boarders." A torpedo or two from the enemy flashed away somewhere, or at least, I was told so afterwards-at the moment I had neither eyes nor ears for anything but that sharp stem. Through the blinding rain and spray, through the incessant flame from the great muzzles in front of me, I watched it draw nearer and nearer, the white smother around her now flying before the gale, now leaping up in columns of spray and smoke from our bursting shell; would she touch us or not? Now she was within three cables; she lifted her forefoot clear out of the water as she rose on a giant billow, and as she lifted it I saw two shots strike just by the point of her ram. She dipped on the instant, and as quick as thought we were ready again waiting for her to rise on another wave, but now she faltered and swerved, and then she seemed to rise higher than before. Crash went our shells into that rising bow, and still it faltered and rose; then I saw what was happening, and asked leave through the telephone to cease firing on the sinking ship. Answer there was none, but the howling of the wind and sea, and the shrill rattle-rattle of some machine guns in the forestops of the sinking foe. Now she swung round head to sea, and nearly broadside on, a short cable's length off, heeling heavily over towards us, and raising her bows high in the air. We could see her crew crowding her shattered decks, and tumbling in heaps into her scuppers; and as we tossed on the seas we seemed to look right down into the black vortex closing round her. There was a roar as of bursting boilers; a murky torrent of water and ashes spouted up through her funnels, then the waves rolled over her in an angry swirl, and the great ship was gone.

We were rolling on the edge of that swirl in a way that threatened to have the guns off their sides. I was singing out to secure them with the electric brakes when a voice shouted, "Look out, sir, she's right aboard us!" I turned at the word, and sure enough, through the driving scud, close on our starboard loomed the huge shadow of the Charlemagne.

THE TORPEDO.

"Hard over; continue the firing," was the word. Alas! it was easily said, but as for the ship she was like a log, and what a time it seemed before the guns came round! At last we got ours round, and all four swept her point blank almost at the same minute. She swerved and faltered; again the roar of the great guns and the crash and rattle of the bursting shell thundered out together. There was a shock and a hollow

boom somewhere near our bows, and a great column of water spouted up, flooding everything forward. Again the great guns roared, there was another shock, this time astern, and another waterspout all speckled with splinters and pieces of plating; then somehow or other the two ships fell on board each other, broadside on.

In another minute every man that could move was on her decks. It was just one jump and rush and that was all, for every living thing on her seemed to have been slain or stunned by the terrible blast of our point-blank broadsides.

The two ships were fast to each other, thumping and grinding together at every roll, and swaying about in a fashion that might make both of them broach to at any moment. I tried to find some steering gear on board the prize; the only thing that I could discover was the stump of a binnacle and the supports from which a wheel had been blown away, while close by lay a mangled figure in the uniform of a rear-admiral of France.

AFTER THE BATTLE.

The havoc wrought by the shells was terrible. The Charlemagne had no sooner been boarded and captured than it was discovered that the Centurion was fast sinking. She had been smashed by torpedoes stern and stem, and in a few minutes she went to the bottom. The Charlemagne was hardly in better plight, and it was with great difficulty that she was patched up so as to keep afloat until she reached Gibraltar :

The first thing to be done was to find some means of controlling her helm; clearly the stearing-gear on deck was past hope, so I went below, into a state of things which surpassed my wildest dreams. Not a gun was left serviceable between decks; nine-tenths of her crew had been blown into every shape into which "high" explosives can twist and shatter human flesh and bone; her main and battery decks were smashed into great holes, even the beams being wrenched and twisted; her sides were in some places rent, in others blown away altogether; and though her belts seemed fairly whole, her protective deck was cut through in many places by the heads or splinters of shell. Through her torn sides the heavy seas were flooding her every moment, and great masses of water were finding their way into her hold.

I cannot, of course, express any opinion as to the merits or possibilities of Mr. Eastwick's new Centurion with its automatic guns fired from below the water-line. There is no doubt, however, that he has given a very vivid picture of what at any moment may become a ghastly reality.

WHAT NAVAL WARFARE IS EVEN Now.

Blackwood's Magazine publishes a description of "The Battle of Yalu," which may be read as a complement to the imaginary account of the battle of the future. The correspondent says that the Chinese artillery fire was very bad. As for the Chinese guns, there were only three heavy shells on board the whole Chinese fleet when it went into action, and only fourteen smaller shells to each gun. Of the three heavy shells, two were fired away by the Chinese gunners without results; the third was fired by Krupp's officer, Hekmann, of the Japanese flagship, which killed and wounded forty-six men. Japanese fire

was centred on the torpedo rooms, which in future will have to be put below water. The advantage of smokeless powder is another lesson of the fight. If it had not been for the foreigners on board the Chinese ships, and especially von Hanneken, there would have been no fight at all; yet the men, especially the Northern men, were intelligent, trustworthy, and one of them at least-a torpedo gunner, who went into the torpedo room when the ship was on fire and undid the charged heads on the fitted torpedoes, carrying them out of danger at the risk of his life seems to show they are capable of doing any thing if they are properly led.

« PreviousContinue »