+---------------+---------+--------------+---------+---------------+ | NAME OF SHIP. | Displa- | Indicated | Speed. | Principal | | | cement. | Horse-power. | | Armament. | +---------------+---------+--------------+---------+---------------+ | | Tons. | | Knots. | Guns. | | Alexandrine | 2330 | 2400 |[38]15 | 10 of 4 tons. | | Arcona | 2330 | 2400 | 15 | 10 ” 4 ” | | Carola | 2160 | 2100 | 14 | 10 ” 4 ” | | Marie | 2160 | 2100 | 13½ | 10 ” 4 ” | | Olga | 2160 | 2100 | 14 | 10 ” 4 ” | | Sophie | 2160 | 2100 | 14 | 10 ” 4 ” | | Freya | 2000 | 2500 | 15 | 8 ” 4 ” | +---------------+---------+--------------+---------+---------------+ There are about a dozen other smaller and slower gun-vessels and gun-boats in the German navy, but they need not be considered here. As to sea-going torpedo-vessels, the German government took the lead in the production of this type of ship, and had the _Ziethen_ launched at Blackwall as a despatch-vessel ten years ago, for a torpedo armament, and with a speed of 16 knots—an example of naval enterprise worth remembering to the credit of Germany. The _Bletz_ and _Pfeil_, of 50 per cent. larger tonnage, have since been produced in Germany, but only with a speed about equal to the _Ziethen’s_. Two torpedo gun-vessels of 855 tons and nearly 2000 horse-power, and 15 knots speed (of which vessels the Admiralty Return makes no mention), were launched at Bremen in 1884. The following is the Admiralty statement as to German torpedo “boats:” _Completed_, 58 (43 over 100 feet in length). _Completing and building_, 2 torpedo division boats; 30 torpedo-boats over one hundred feet in length.—Total, 90. Money was voted in 1884-85 for seventy torpedo-boats. When these have been built, the number of German torpedo-boats will be one hundred and five, and these are to be increased to one hundred and fifty. Reviewing the condition of the German navy as set forth above, it becomes obvious that for some years past the policy of the imperial German government (contrary to that of the Prussian government, which, before the empire, built several large and powerful sea-going ships) has been to avoid all competition in naval matters with the great naval powers, and to apply its moderate expenditure to vessels of a defensive class, such as armored gun-boats and coast torpedo-boats—a policy which, in view of the limited interests of Germany in the Mediterranean and across the seas, has much to commend it.[39]