(C) U. & U.

_A Coast Defense Anti-Aircraft Gun._]

The _Gymnote_ was built of steel in the shape of a cigar. She was 59
feet long, 5 feet 9 inches beam, and 6 feet in diameter, just deep
enough to allow a man to stand upright in the interior. The motive
power was originally an electro-motor of 55 horse-power, driven from
564 accumulators. It was of extraordinary lightness, weighing only
4410 pounds, and drove the screw at the rate of two thousand
revolutions a minute, giving a speed of six knots an hour, its
radius of action at this speed being thirty-five miles.

Immersion was accomplished by the introduction of water into three
reservoirs, placed one forward, one aft, and one centre. The water
was expelled either by means of compressed air or by a rotary pump
worked by an electro-motor. Two horizontal rudders steered the boat
in the vertical plane and an ordinary rudder steered in the
horizontal.

The _Gymnote_ had her first trial on September 4, 1888, and the
Paris _Temps_ described the result in the following enthusiastic
language:

She steered like a fish both as regards direction and depth; she
mastered the desired depth with ease and exactness; at full power
she attained the anticipated speed of from nine to ten knots; the
lighting was excellent, there was no difficulty about heating. It
was a strange sight to see the vessel skimming along the top of
the water, suddenly give a downward plunge with its snout, and
disappear with a shark-like wriggle of its stern, only to come up
again at a distance out and in an unlooked-for direction. A few
small matters connected with the accumulators had to be seen to,
but they did not take a month.

Following along the same lines as this boat another boat,
considerably larger, was built. Before it was completed, M. Zede
died and it was decided to name the new boat in his honour. The
_Gustave Zede_ was launched at Toulon on June 1, 1893; she was 159
feet in length, beam 12 feet 4 inches, and had a total displacement
of 266 tons. Her shell was of "Roma" bronze, a non-magnetic metal,
and one that could not be attacked by sea water.

The motive power was furnished by two independent electro-motors of
360 horse-power each and fed by accumulators. In order to endow the
boat with a wide radius of action a storage battery was provided.

The successive crews of the _Gustave Zede_ suffered much from the
poisonous fumes of th