Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/374



344 TIMb6 — ESTABELECIMENTO NOVO.

Piauhy (Captain Wandenkolk). Botli, second lieutenants when the war began^ are distinguished officers, especially the former, who, standing upon his quarter-deck, twice fronted the hot fire of the Humaita batteries. We inspected the Alagoas, a most efficient river-craft, drawing four feet ten inches, with high-pressure engines, which pant and puff like those of a railway, and armed like the Rio Grande and the Para, with 70-pounder muzzle-loading Whitworths, whilst the others had 120-pounders. The crews numbered thirty-six to thirty-nine men, of whom four work the turret and four the guns. The turret, whose in- vention belongs to Captain Cowper Coles, was made oval, an improvement, according to the Brazilians, upon the cir- cular tower. The thickness of the iron plates varied from a minimum of four and a half inches to a maximum of six inches about the gun, whose muzzle fitted tight to its port. This skin was backed by eighteen inches of Brazilian sucu- pira and peroba, more rigid and durable than our heart of oak. The bolts were often started, and the plates were deeply pitted by the 68-pounders, like plum-pudding from which the "plums" had been picked out. In some cases they were dented and even pierced by the Blakely steel- tipped shot, of which Marshal-President Lopez had but a small supply. Our naval officers have reported that the cast-iron projectiles impinging upon the armour, shivered into irregu- lar fragments, which formed a hail of red-hot iron, and left the gun without a gunner to work it. The battery men always knew when a ball struck the plates at night, by the bright Hash which followed the shock.

At this time the Brazilian squadron in the Paraguay River consists of a total of 39 keel, and 186 guns. Ten are ironclads, with plated batteries, some carrying wooden bulwarks, others stanchions and chains. There are six monitors, and three more building : in fact, every pro-