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 three 'Rovers' for the cost of two ships of the 'Shah' type. In discussing the propositions laid down by Mr. Barnaby. Sir Spencer Robinson did, indeed, assert that a speed of 16½, knots in some unarmoured vessels of the British navy is essential to our success upon the seas, and an absolute necessity in order to prevent the commerce of the country from being destroyed. But, as Lord Lauderdale truly said, that necessity can only arise where the privateers which threaten our trade with destruction have themselves a speed of 16½ knots. If their speed does not exceed 13 knots, and no vessels available for privateering at present exist that can cruise at anything like so high a rate, we may be satisfied with a speed of 14 knots for our own cruisers. By avoiding the too prevalent idea that every man-of-war must be able to steam at an extreme rate of speed, we may be able for the same expenditure to build a much larger number of vessels.

In his speech of 1869, Mr. Childers enumerated among the vessels of the navy, efficient for the protection of commerce, twelve corvettes of the 'Blanche' class, with a speed of 13 knots, and carrying 6½-ton guns, two of the 'Druid' class, with the same speed and armament, twelve gun-vessels with a speed of 11 knots and with 6½-ton guns, and seventeen new composite gunboats, with a speed of 10 knots and 6½-ton guns. The total unarmoured fleet consisted of 66 vessels, all of which were put forward, and rightly