such application; and almost all ships can be inclined to admit of it. A bombardment of this kind is, of course, absolutely aimless, and little likely to do harm save by a lucky shell—unless continued for a considerable time. A dockyard, however, covers a very large area, and that area can be exactly located by chart. The futility of bombarding land towns is held to be proved by the Boer bombardment of Ladysmith in the South African War, but such bombardments were carried out with little intelligence: had the British bombarded Pretoria, it is probable that bombardments would occupy a higher place in the scale than they now do. At Ladysmith no special area was selected, had the Boer guns taken the town piece by piece they would certainly have razed it in time, even as Port Arthur was being razed when it surrendered. A dockyard, moreover, is infinitely more vulnerable than a town, and there is little or no comparison possible between the destructive effects of big naval shell and those of shore guns which average a hundred pounds at the very most, and are apt to be much nearer twenty pounds. The big high-explosive shell is a fait accompli now and one such shell dropped into a dockyard would if it fell anywhere near shops, slips or docks do indescribable mischief. Probably a big common shell would do little less harm. It is true that Santiago de Cuba was subjected to a bombardment from the dynamite guns of the Vesuvius (which simulated a long-range bombardment fairly well) and the Vesuvius
