A country Reuben, who saw a giraffe for the first time at a circus, looked the animal over, and, finding that it did not conform to his ideas of what an animal ought to be, remarked, "By gum, there ain't no sich critter!" Likewise, the naval experts at Washington did not believe that there could be any such fighting-ship. After that fight, however, the _Monitor_ was quickly purchased, and hurried orders were given for more _Monitors_. The patriotism and pluck of the warship-builders saved the country. The pacifists are strongly urging what they term the nationalization of all manufacture of war-materials; that is to say, that all such materials should be made at government plants. Their object is to have the work done by disinterested persons, who will not be tempted to promote war in order to make a market for those materials. By admirable inconsistency, the pacifists would, in so doing, place the manufacture of war-materials in the hands of army and navy officers, whom they pronounce the most pernicious of all promoters of war. Before Congress acts upon the suggestion of the pacifists to nationalize the manufacture of all war-materials, it would be well to see what would have happened in the past, had the thing been done sooner. We can judge from that concerning the advisability of adopting the measure now. If it had been adopted at the time of the Civil War, Ericsson's _Monitor_ never would have been built, because its building depended upon private personal patriotism and private enterprise. If the measure had been adopted twenty-five years ago, then naturally, during that period, private invention and private enterprise would have been eliminated, and the government would not have profited from civilian genius and energy. Let us see, then, what private invention and private enterprise have done for the government for the past quarter-century, since the advent of smokeless powder. Colonel E. G. Buckner, vice-president of the du Pont Powder Company, in an article in _Harper's Weekly_, of June 27, 1914, places the credit for the four most important inventions in the development of smokeless powder--first, to Vieille, of France, who produced gun-cotton; second, to Mendeléeff, of Russia, who told us how to colloid it; third, to Francis G. du Pont, who eliminated danger in the manufacture; and, fourth, to Hudson Maxim, who invented the multi-perforated grain that gave absolute control over the burning.