GEORGE DEWEY 155 ceived orders detaching him from the Narragansett and re- turned to his home country. After serving as lighthouse inspector for two years, he was made secretary of the lighthouse board in April, 1878, with his residence in Washington. Horseback riding was his fa- vorite form of exercise and he mentions the pleasant after- noon rides he had with the historian and former Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Bancroft. In October, 1882, Dewey left in command of the Juniata for the station in China, going by way of the Mediterranean. Ill- ness overtook him, however, and he was compelled to leave the ship at Malta and go to the British Naval Hospital. The next two years he spent traveling from one place to another in search of health, finding it at last in Santa Barbara, Cali- fornia. Here he received his promotion from commander to captain, a rank which he held for twelve years. As captain of the Pensacolaj he sailed again in European waters and visited European ports studying other navies. On his return to the United States Captain Dewey was made chief of the bureau of equipment and watched eagerly the building of the new navy. Modest was the beginning of this navy, only a small squadron of unarmored cruisers being put out at first In October, 1895, he was given the important position of president of the board of inspection and survey. This board inspected all the new battleships then being built — the Texas j the Maine^ the Iowa, the Indianaj and the Massachusetts — and also several torpedo boats. Promotion from captain to commodore was received May 23, 1896. This rank entitled him to the command of a squadron as soon as there was a va- cancy. In the summer and fall of 1897 the question of a suc- cessor to Acting Bear-Admiral McNair, in command of the Asiatic Squadron, arose. Commodore Dewey received orders on October twenty-first, 1897, which detached him from duty as president of the board of inspectors on the thirtieth of No- vember and directed him to sail on the seventh of December for Japan. On January 3, 1898, Commodore Dewey took over the command of the Asiatic Squadron and hoisted his pennant on the Olympia.
