CHAPTER XIII
FOREIGN NAVIES— UNITED STATES AND SOUTH AMERICA
Condition of United States Navy before and after Civil War—Apathy in Naval Matters—Change of Feeling in 1880—New Cruisers constructed—Battle Ships decided on and commenced—Special Fast Cruiser—Torpedoes—The Howell Torpedo—Dynamite Gun—Development of Navies of South American States—Chili—Capture of 'Huascar' by 'Blanco Encalada' and 'Almirante Cochrane'—Peru—The Argentine Republic—Brazil.
If several of the navies of European states exhibit great progress during the last half century, in the west we observe a fleet practically created in little more than a decade. After a strange apathy of many years, the United States is now fully alive to the necessity of having a fleet commensurate with her position. A few years ago her navy consisted of a number of obsolete monitors and wooden cruisers equally ancient. Such a condition was humiliating, and might be dangerous, seeing that insignificant neighbouring states were in the possession of modern ironclads and swift powerful cruisers. No nation with a long sea frontier and important interests abroad should be without the means of protecting both, and for this an adequate naval force is essential. For the United States this dangerous
