FISHER AND THE NAVY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17336, 6 December 1919, Page 2 (Supplement)

FISHER AND THE NAVY.

x DEVELOPMENTS. I ADMIRAL IN HUMOROUS VEIN. In opening the first of a series of articles on changes made in the British Navy between 1902 and 1910 and their effect on the, war Lord Fisher gives ms readers some of his very typical Humour. "I confess to being imbued," he writes, " with admiration for one of Nelson's captains, killed in battle, whose "epitaph is * Death found him fighting,* and all must admire the exits of Nelson, Elijah, and —three, wondrous typical men who ' did not lag superfluous on the stage.' Nelson only 49, Elijah walking so rapidly with Elisha, Moses his ' eye not dim nor his natural force abated.' Personally, life would lose its charm for me the day I can't waltz to the best waltz tune in the world—one of Moody and Sankey's hymns. " As in the opening scene of ' Pinafore,' the sailors in 1900 were 'still polishing the brasswcrk. They did'not hit the target.' There were 2000 more misses than hits. Lastly, the fighting ships were the emanations of the —museums of guns and samples of hulls. Money was being squandered On keeping ships in commission in peace-time which in war-time could neither fight nor run away. And so the Dreadnought was born, and she paralysed shipbuilding amongst all the nations cf the world for 18 months. " The damned, thing was so different. "One result was that we had 2000 more hits than n.ises.

" Besides the Dreadnoughts, or ' Old Testament ships,' there were the real gemsthe battle-cruisers, or ' New Testament ships,' that sent Admiral von Spee to the bottom, and all his fleet. With regard to the guns of these battle-cruisers, we practised a jow form of cunning. "We put them down in the manufacturers' books to the Sultan of Turkey; and Abdul Hamid being the champion liar of his time, the more he denied it, the more sure the Germans were that he was lying when they broke open the safe and saw the Sultan s orider in the secret archives. " Also, the Germans stole some wrong plans which I had purposely left out on my table at the Admiralty, and wasted iaoO on the job. I congratulated the German Naval Attache on the Duke of fork's Steps next morning, and said to him, ' You could have had them for nothing.' " It's not my task (nor to my taste) to criticise the tactics of the Jutland battle. The fact remains that in spite of miserable ineptitude the navy won the war."