oes far to prove that except a vessel be taken
unawares, it will be impossible for a torpedo to come into actual
contact with it. At the experiments last year the wooden booms were
unhinged and splintered under a much less violent shock. But the steel
booms employed, though somewhat bent, remained unbroken and in position,
and the joints were quite uninjured. All that is necessary for perfect
defense is that the booms should be made a little heavier.

The torpedo experiments against the Resistance were resumed on June 13,
when the old ironclad suffered some rough treatment. As the experiment
was understood to be the last of the second series, and was fully
expected to have a sensational termination, a considerable number of
interested spectators were attracted to the scene in Fareham Creek. The
torpedoists resorted to severe measures, but with a distinctly useful
purpose in view, having bound the ship hand and foot, so to speak, in
such a way that her name became a solecism. They exploded 95 lb. of gun
cotton 20 ft. below the water, and in contact with her double bottom.
This amount of explosive represents the full charge of the old pattern
16 in. Whiteheads; but as the hulk was, for prudential reasons, moored
close to a mud bank, and as the water was consequently much too shallow
to allow of a locomotive torpedo being set to run at the required depth,
a fixed charge was lashed fore and aft against the bottom plating of the
ship and electrically exploded from No. 95 torpedo boat.

In previous experiments this year the ironclad was attacked on the port
side, which had been specially strengthened for the occasion, and the
result was a victory for the defense. On June 13 the starboard side was
selected for attack, in order that a comparison might be instituted with
the effects produced under different conditions by a similar experiment.

Last year in the latter case the double bottom was filled with coal; and
after the charge, which was lashed against the ship in the same way, had
been exploded, it was found that the bilge keel had been shivered for a
length of 20 ft., while the lower plating had been much bulged above the
bilge keel. Four strakes of the skin plating extending up to the armor
shelf had also been forced inward and fractured where they crossed the
longitudinal frames. They had parted in the middle for a distance of 8
ft., while some of the butts had been opened so that gashes 2 in. or 3
in. wide appeared be