The _Siva_ had been built at the Union Iron Works in San Francisco, from plans and models furnished by engineers employed by Morning, and no expense had been spared to make her the largest, swiftest, and best-appointed war vessel afloat. Indeed, every other consideration had been sacrificed to speed, and, as a result, a ship was constructed of ten thousand tons’ burden, drawing but twenty-one feet of water when fully loaded, and able, when under a full head of steam, to make twenty-six knots an hour. Relying upon her speed to keep out of range of the guns of an enemy, and intended rather for a carrier of torpedo boats than a war vessel, she was, for her size, neither heavily armed nor heavily armored, yet she was covered with steel plates of sufficient thickness to resist the largest ordnance, and she was equipped with rifled cannon and pneumatic dynamite guns, equal in size and range to any constructed. Her cost was $8,000,000, and it was Morning’s avowed intention to present her to the alliance of nations which he expected would result from the dynamic exposition. The _Siva_ rode the seas like a gull, and was as graceful and beautiful as a swan. Forward of her engines the hull of the vessel was devoted to accommodations for housing, launching, and rehousing the two torpedo boats, the _Etna_ and _Stromboli_. Each of these was cigar-shaped, one hundred feet in length and twenty feet in diameter. They were built of steel, with an inner and outer shell. The admission of water between these shells would cause the submersion of the boat to any depth required for the purposes of destroying an enemy, while by the expulsion of water they were enabled to ascend to the surface. In the inner shell was an electric engine, with sufficient power stored in its dynamos to propel the boat under water at a speed of twenty-five miles an hour for a period of five hours. Enough compressed air was stored in steel tanks to supply the needs of ten men for eight hours, and the _Etna_ had, on several occasions, as a test, remained submerged with her crew for four hours without coming to the surface.