make
heavy demands upon us in any maritime war. Nor can it be urged that
that interest alone will suffer by its own interruption. The bulky
cargoes carried by it cannot be transferred to the coastwise railroads
without overtaxing the capacities of the latter; all of which means,
ultimately, increase of cost and consequent suffering to the consumer,
together with serious injury to all related industries dependent upon
this traffic.

Under these combined influences the United States Government found
itself confronted from the beginning with two objects of military
solicitude, widely divergent one from the other, both in geographical
position and in method of action; namely, the attack upon Cuba and the
protection of its own shores. As the defences did not inspire
confidence, the navy had to supplement their weakness, although it is
essentially an offensive, and not a defensive, organization. Upon this
the enemy counted much at the first. "To defend the Atlantic coasts in
case of war," wrote a Spanish lieutenant who had been Naval Attache in
Washington, "the United States will need one squadron to protect the
port of New York and another for the Gulf of Mexico. But if the
squadron which it now possesses is devoted to the defence of New York
(including Long Island Sound), the coasts of the Gulf of Mexico must
be entirely abandoned and left at the mercy of blockade and
bombardment." Our total force for the order of battle, prior to the
arrival of the _Oregon_, was nominally only equal to that of the
enemy, and, when divided between the two objects named, the halves
were not decisively superior to the single squadron under
Cervera,--which also might be reinforced by some of the armored ships
then in Spain. The situation, therefore, was one that is not
infrequent, but always embarrassing,--a double purpose and a single
force, which, although divisible, ought not to be divided.

It is proper here to say, for the remark is both pertinent and most
important, that coast defences and naval force are not interchangeable
things; neither are they opponents, one of the other, but
complementary. The one is stationary, the other mobile; and, however
perfect in itself either may be, the other is necessary to its
completeness. In different nations the relative consequence of the two
may vary. In Great Britain, whose people are fed, and their raw
materials obtained, from the outside world, the need for a fleet
vastly exceeds that for coa