een altered to suit their new requirements, or by reason of the men
not being thoroughly drilled for their new tasks, considerable time
will have to be lost by the necessity of getting the ships and the
men into proper condition--or else warlike operations will have to be
entered into while unprepared, and the classic _Chesapeake-Shannon_
tragedy re-enacted.

Therefore, the endeavor must be strongly made to have ready always
all the ships and men that are to be added to the fleet; the ships
equipped for their duties in the fleet, and the men drilled for
their future tasks.

The matter of getting ready the navy ships that are in reserve
is largely a matter of getting the men to man them, as the ships
themselves are kept in repair, and so in a state of readiness,
materially speaking. At least this is the theory; and the successful
application of the theory, when tested in practice, depends greatly
on how large a proportion of the full complements has been kept
on board, and on the amount and nature of the cruising which the
vessels in reserve have done. The ideal conditions cannot be reached,
unless the full complements have been kept on board, and the ships
required to make frequent cruises. Of course, such a condition is
never met in reserve ships; there would be no reason for putting
ships in reserve if they were to be so handled. The more closely,
however, a ship is kept in that condition of readiness, the more
quickly she can be made absolutely ready in her material condition.

Unless one realizes how and why ships deteriorate in material,
it is surprising to see how many faults develop, when ships in
reserve, that are apparently in good condition, are put into active
service. Trouble is not found, of course, with the stationary parts,
like the bottoms, and sides, and decks, so much as with the moving
parts, especially the parts that have to move and be steam and
gas tight at the same time--the parts found mainly in the steam
engineering and ordnance departments. Defects in the moving parts,
especially in the joints, are not apt to be found out until they
are moved, and often not until they are moved under the pressure
and with the speeds required in service.

Now "in service" usually means in service in time of peace; but the
service for which those ships are kept in reserve is war service,
and the requirements of war service are much more rigorous than
those of peace service. Objection may be made to this stat