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Four of the enemy's squadron had struck their colors, two were on the beach, broken and burning, two had sunk to the bottom of the sea, two were in abject flight. Three battle-ships were hammering them with thirteen-inch guns. The battle was won. "It's all over," Channing said. His tone questioned his own words.
He pointed out that the country had two widely separated ocean frontiers to protect, and that there was only one way to protect them, namely, by two separate fleets of armored battle-ships.
So it was done, down in that Hampshire household on the heights near the downs, whence you might behold, off a terra firma resembling a roll of billows, England's big battle-ships in line fronting the island; when they were a spectacle of beauty as well as power: which now they are no more, but will have to be, if they are both to float and to fight.
The convex side of the crescent was nearest to Morro Castle, and in this part of the curve were the battle-ships Texas, Indiana, and Iowa, with the small gunboat Suwanee thrown out as scout or skirmisher in the position that the head of the arrow would occupy if the line of the blockading vessels were a bent bow eight miles long.
There was little of leading value in the arts and industries of the West which had not been introduced into this island empire, the equipment of her army vied with that of the most advanced powers, her navy possessed a number of the most powerful type of steel-clad battle-ships, she had been admitted into the family of the great nations by a compact on equal terms with Great Britain, and she had become adapted to cope with powers vastly more capable in the arts of war than China, to deal, indeed, with one of the greatest and much the most populous of European nations.
You little handful of people here little more than half a million imagine that you can defeat thirty-five millions, with an army of half a million, a hundred battle-ships, ten thousand cannon and a million rifles. Come now, don't be fools. The Governor alone up there in Montreal has enough men to drive you all into the hills of Maine in a week. You think you've got the start of Colborne?
But, comparing the navies ship to ship, the United States fleet, so far as it goes, is superior even to that of Great Britain. The battle-ships, while somewhat smaller, are more effective fighters.
There is one absolute and invariable test of the German-American's treason to this country, and that is bitterness towards England, because England is doing all she can to prevent Germany's victory. One thing has saved this country during four years, giving us a chance to prepare Great Britain's fleet, holding Germany's battle-ships behind the Kiel Canal.
Neither did it require aerial masts or wires and a trained telegrapher who could send and receive the telegraph code. It was put to some use between battle-ships and smaller craft lying within a radius of a few miles. The sensitive selenium cell proved unreliable, however, and this means of communication was destined to failure.
Led by a black, high-sided monster, the left column of the enemy was made up of four battle-ships of uncouth, foreign design and murderous appearance, while the right column contained the flag-ship and three others, all heavily armored cruisers. Flanking each fleet, far to the rear, were torpedo-boats and destroyers. "We're outclassed, Dalrymple," said Captain Blake.
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