THE WAR.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVI, Issue 12, 22 July 1898, Page 19

THE WAR.

(From various sources.) THE TWO NAVIES. The World Almanac gives the Spanish navy as follows Armoured ships, 11 ; unarmoured ships, 634: ; armoured gunboats' 2 ; unarmoured gunboats, 40 ; dispatch vessels, 2 ; torpedo boats No. 1, 60 torpedo boats No. 2, 19. The American navy, according to the same, consists of • Armoured ships, 33 ; unarmoured ships, 33 ; unarmoured gunboats] 28 ; dispatch vessels, 1 ; torpedo boats No. 1, 18 ; torpedo boats No! Many ships, says the Monitor have been added to this list since the war broke out. WAR EXPENDITURE. According to the Los Angeles Tidings, the United States have expended in warfare since 1776 the round sum of 10,000,000.000 dols The Revolutionary war cost us 13.>,5)83,703, and 30,000 lives • the war of 1812, 107,1.VJ,000, and 2000 lives; the Indian wars 'and other minor wars, 1, 000,000.000 and 49,000 lives, and the war betwien the States, 8,500.000,000, and 544,000 lives. In this last struggle is included the loss entailed upon both sides. THE IRISH IN THE WAR. A striking example of Irish patriotism comes from Delaware. The National Guard of that State, while in camp was asked to volunteer. About two-thirds of the men refused to enlist and went back to their homes. One company alone voted solidly for enlistment. This company is the only distinctively Irish organisation in the Delaware National Guard. A correspondent writing from Tampa, Fla., where the troops are being mobilised, says : ' The flag of Ireland has already appeared in the camps. It is only a bit of a one, though, painted on a button. Occasionally a soldier can be seen » ith one of tne buttons pinned on his hat. ' I've been knocking around the camps for two weeks and by the blue smoke, I believe a third of the soldiers are Irish,'' said' an old Kentucky colonel last night. 'There must be as many Irish in the army as there are in the navy.' Father Chidwick who was chaplain aboard the Maim when she was destroyed in Havana Harbour, and is now chaplain of the cruiser Cincinnati, attached to Admiral Sampson's squadron, told the correspondent that 40 per cent, of the Maine's sailors were Irish. Captain Robley D. (' lighting Bob') Evans, commander of the battleship lowa, of which Father Dorney is chaplain, is a former pupil of Gonzaga College, Washiugton, D.C. FIGHTING-TOP 3. Fighting-tops have played a prominent part in the present war. They are by no means new inventions. They have been used in men-of-war as far back as the sixteenth century, and the deadly fire which can be poured from them is illustrated in the death of the great Nelson. Drawings of the Egyptian and Asiatic warships of 2000 B.C. show us the vessels fitted with military fighting-tops. The Mora, William the Conqueror's ship, is shown in the wellknown Bayeux tapestry as having a construction at the masthead which looks very much like a fighting-top. The French led the way in regard to the present-day fortified fighting-top, and many of their battleships are fitted with the most remarkable creations of this kind.