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Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XX, Issue 3909, 8 May 1877, Page 2

The O/ac/o Daily Times in referring to the bombardment of Poti, Anaklea, and Galatz remarks : — The bombardment of these towns, though it is not stated in the telegrams, is in all probability being carried out by the Turkish fleet, and the impetuous Hobart Pasha and the British i officers under him are no doubt beginning I to strike terror into the dwellers on the Russian shore. It was Hobart Pasha who, about two months ago, suggested that Turkey should assume the offensive, ' and declare war if Russia did not withdraw her mobilised army from the vicinity of the Turkish frontier and reduce it to a I . peace footing. He offered to take upon himself to sweep the Russian squadrons > off the Black Sea, to destroy the Russian trade, and to blockade, and, if needed, to bombard the Russian ports. From the telegrams which have arrived it would ■ appear that this project is beginning to be , put into execution. Of the Turkish fleet an English naval organ recently said, " The Turks are benefiting by all the latest improvements in the construction of Her Majesty's ships ;" and a leading journal remarks that the Ottoman ! fleet, consisting of 24 powerful ironclad ships and five ironclad gunboats, besides unarmed vessels, have been ' ' cradled in ' the Thames." The Turkish navy has grown up under the paternal care of the ' British Admiralty. The Turks have had the services of English dock-yard officers in their ship-yards. Three of their vessels at the present moment are being built under the 1 supervision of an English Admiralty Officer, and were designed at the English ; Admiralty Office. Hobart Pasha, formerly Captain Hobart, R.N., is commander, and he is an officer of admitted ability. jSText to him is Druinmoncl Pasha, another officer of great ability. All their engineers > are Englishmen, and nearly every officer ■ is English. Seven of the 24 ironclads are belted frigates. Two of them are des- ! cribed in the Broad Arroio as " two of i the iinest vessels in existence." Then come nine corvettes, two of which are sisters to the Alexandra, which may be , classed with the Hercules and Sultan of ] the British navy. Then there are eight sloops, in the construction of which a ', maximum of speed has been combined with a minimum of draught. And be- • sides these, there are two large turret , vessels of the Royal Sovereign type, and the powerful ironclad Ibraenich, be- \ longing to the Viceroy of Egypt. Turkish , seamen are brave to a fault when fighting behind any kind of Avail, and there is little fear should war break out that tho , disaster of Sinope will be repeated. The guns on board these ships are as good as the world can produce.