Ovr Paris Correspondent mentioned in the letter which we published on Wednes-ions which had been We drew attention to the same subject some time ago and also to some wes which had been passed on the a navy. Our own has had broadsides poured into it by all manner of critics, yet the First Lord surveys his work and that of his colleagues with complacency and bids the public to have patience and it will have a navy which will make the country and its commerce secure. He says that last year and this year we shall have completed and have ready for commission more than double the number of shu completed by France. The figures he gives are—England, 1887-8 18 vessels with an' aggregate of 64,600 tons of which 41,000 tons is ironclad; France, 8 vessels of 21,000 tous of which 15,200 is ironclad. In the present and next year—England 29 vessels of 100,000 tous of which 60,000 is ironclad; France, 10 vessels of 46,500 tons of which 30,000 is ironclad. At the beginning of the next financial year—April 1889—the hands of the Admiralty will be free as regards the future, and the First Lord says that any uew programme will not only embody the latest ideas of ship-building" but will carried through and completed' with celerity and economy. In the practice of the latter virtue he is able to claim 'a genuine success for the Board, as with 3,000 men less in the Dockyards the work is as well and more quickly done. The French on the other hand have 27,000 men to the 18,000 which are or were employed in the English dockyards, their work is slower done, their ships cost more and take a longer time to construct. For instance, the annual Report of the Parliamentary Commission to enquire into the state of the French naval estimates says that 10 years from the date of their being laid down will be required to complete the construction of the 3 ironclads now building in France. Now, as Lord George Hamilton points out, an ironclad becomes obsolete in these days of change in twenty years, so that a costly French ship can only have 10 years of service. In England fewer ships are laid down about one time than is the case in France, and by this system the Nile and Trafalgar, the two heaviest ever built at home, have been launched within two years of the laying down of the first late of their keels. We have had jitter complaints of the cost of our men-of-war exceeding the estimates for them, but the evil is so much greater in France, that on ironclads the excess has been nearly 40 per cent. and on cruisers and fast vessels the excess aver: 50 per cat In consequence of this the French Admiralty has been unable to carry out the extensive programme of since, and has had to stop the building building which was framed a few years
of several vessels. Lord George is satisfied that in future the largest ironclad can be turned out, completed and ready for use, in three years from the time of its commencement. The ships building in England are ironclads, fast cruis sers and torpedo craft and it is the same in France and Italy, The new German naval programme has been published, andis in some respects a reversal of the policy of the last chief of the German Admiralty, General von Caprivi, and it is also opposed to some extent to the present iglish ideas of what our navy should There has been a demand at home for the construction of fast cruisers to defend our colonies and commerce and the new German naval scheme is mainly intended for the same purpose. But the German Admiralty, while recognise ing the usefulness of fast cruisers, believes that the development of the colonial policy, and her position in Europe obliges them to make her able to comte at sea with any Power, whose navy is not of the first class. They wish to make her navy superior to that of Italy, Russia, Austria or Spain. To this end there is to be a considerable reconstruction of the German navy, by the withdrawal of ironclads of a obsolete type and the building of nine or ten new ironclads and twelve ironclad gunboats. Further, ironclads will be built to take the place of the Hansa, Hriederich Cart and Kronprinz which have become obsolete. The new ships are intended "to be craft of between 3,000 and 4,000 tous displacement with a complete armoured belt at the waterline, with considerable speed, with an armoured central battery and with a few powerful guns rather than with a number of light ones." These twelve armoured gunboats will cost £160,000 each, and the ten new battle ships are not expected to cost more than £400,000 each. The Head of the naval department is to ask for a vote of twelve millions sterling, and out of the balance left after building the gunboats and ironclads, other ironclads will be replaced, additions made to the torpedo boat flotilla and works built at Brunsbiittel. Germany has already 12 gunboats, but 11 of these are small and carry only a single 12 in. 87 ton gun and the addition
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.