e country should not be dependent
upon foreigners for these necessary implements of warfare, because
they are contraband in time of war, and consequently could not then be
obtained abroad. Secretary of the Navy Whitney, who succeeded
Secretary Chandler, stipulated, in his advertisements for bids for the
contracts of making the armor for the ships under construction, that
this armor should be of domestic manufacture. Correspondence was also
opened with the leading steel manufacturers of the country, offering
them inducements to take the matter up. Interest was awakened, and it
was found upon investigation that armor could be made in the United
States as advantageously as abroad. A contract was drawn up with the
Bethlehem Iron Company, under which a plant for the production of
armor and gun steel was erected at Bethlehem, Pa., which was designed
to be second to none in the world. In the matter of the second
batteries, the policy of insisting upon home manufacture was also
pursued, with the desired result.

Congress had authorized, in 1885, the construction of two additional
cruisers and two gunboats. In 1886 there was further authorization of
two armor-clad vessels, each of about six thousand tons, and each to
cost, exclusive of armament, not more than $2,500,000. In 1887 the sum
of $2,000,000 was appropriated for harbor and coast defence vessels.
As a result of this reawakening on the part of Congress to the
necessity of a respectable navy, and the manifestations of
enlightenment in the form of substantial appropriations, Secretary
Whitney was able to state in his report of 1888 that upon the
completion of the ships under construction, the United States would
rank second among the nations in the possession of unarmored cruisers
or commerce-destroyers possessing the highest characteristics--namely,
size of three thousand tons and upward and a speed of nineteen knots,
and more. The vessels, inclusive of the monitors, completed and
uncompleted, then composing the navy, were as follows: The "Dolphin,"
"Boston," "Atlanta," "Chicago," whose keels were laid in 1883; the
"Charleston" "Baltimore," "Newark," "Philadelphia," "San Francisco,"
protected cruisers, whose keels were laid in 1887 and 1888; and the
gunboats "Yorktown," "Petrel," "Concord," "Bennington," whose keels
were laid in 1887 and 1888. In addition to these, there were under
construction the dynamite cruiser "Vesuvius," with a guaranteed speed
of twenty knots an ho