ur, and a first-class torpedo-boat with a speed
of twenty-three knots an hour. Besides these, five protected cruisers
had been authorized, but were not yet in process of construction.

[Illustration: Dynamite Cruiser "Vesuvius."]

The "Baltimore," "Charlestown," "Yorktown," and "Petrel" were given
their trial trips in 1889, and were accepted by the Navy Department.
The trip of the "Baltimore," in particular, was a brilliant success.
The horse-power proved to be in excess of the contract requirement,
and her highest speed for one hour was 20.39 knots--this result being
then unparalleled by any warship in the world of the "Baltimore's"
displacement.

When Benjamin F. Tracy became Secretary of the Navy, in 1889 he called
attention to the fact that, while the United States had secured a
number of excellent vessels of the cruiser type, it did not as yet
possess an efficient navy. He pointed out that the country had two
widely separated ocean frontiers to protect, and that there was only
one way to protect them, namely, by two separate fleets of armored
battle-ships. He said further that in addition to the battle-ships,
the condition of the country required at least twenty vessels for
coast and harbor defence, and, moreover, that the employment of these
ships as floating fortresses demanded that they be equipped with the
most powerful batteries and the heaviest of armor. It may be said
parenthetically that eight vessels of this type, five of which were
reconstructed monitors, were under construction or had been authorized
at that time. Secretary Tracy recommended the authorization by the
following Congress of eight armored battle-ships. He also said that
the United States could not afford to neglect torpedo-boats, with
which the foreign naval powers were well supplied, and he recommended
that appropriations be made for the construction of at least five of
these boats of the first and second class. The year before, the keel
of the first of the battle-ships, the "Texas," had been laid in the
navy-yard at Norfolk, Va., and in 1889 work was begun at the Brooklyn
navy yard upon another vessel of the same class, the "Maine." These
vessels are respectively of 6,314 and 6,648 tons displacement. The
construction of a third battle-ship, which had been provided for, had
not yet been begun.

Secretary Tracy's recommendations reveal clearly the naval condition
in 1889. Previous to that year the additions to the navy had consisted
chi