lectures on gunnery to the officers on the station. In prosecution of
the same line of professional work, he was soon after ordered to conduct
a series of experiments at Old Point Comfort, near Norfolk, to determine
certain questions connected with the endurance of iron cannon; the
discharges being continued with one or two of each class of service guns
until they burst. Some very important results were obtained; but the
circumstance connected with this duty which has now most interest, is
that in it Farragut was associated with Lieutenant Percival Drayton, who
was afterward his flag-captain and chief-of-staff at the battle of
Mobile Bay. The intimacy formed during this year of experimental duty at
Old Point lasted throughout their lives.

Soon after this the Crimean war broke out. Farragut's desire for his own
professional improvement and for the progress of the service led him to
make application to the Navy Department to be sent to the seat of war,
"to visit the fleets of England and France, and ascertain whether in the
outfits and preparation for war they possess any advantages over our own
ships-of-war, and, if so, in what they consist." The utility of such a
mission can not be doubted, and his occupations of the past few years
particularly prepared him for such an inquiry. Had the Navy Department
then had any systematic record of the aptitude shown by individual
officers, and of the work done by them, it must have recognized
Farragut's peculiar fitness for duties of this kind; which have since
his time been organized and given a most comprehensive scope under the
Intelligence Office of the Navy Department. As it was, his application
received no other reply than a polite acknowledgment. A commission,
consisting of three officers of the Engineer Corps of the army, was sent
by the War Department to visit Europe and the seat of war, and upon its
return made an elaborate report; but at this critical period of naval
progress, when sail was manifestly giving place to steam, when the early
attempts at iron-clad batteries were being made, and the vast changes in
armament that have since taken place were certainly, though as yet
dimly, indicated, it did not appear to the Government of the United
States a matter of sufficient importance to inquire, on the spot, into
the practical working of the new instruments under the test of war.

Although doubtless not so intended, the Navy Department emphasized its
decision not to sen