+------------------------+---------------+--------------+--------+ | NAME OF SHIP. | Displacement. | Indicated | Speed. | | | | Horse-power. | | +------------------------+---------------+--------------+--------+ | | Tons. | | Knots. | | Liberal | 500 | 500 | 16 | | Zaire | 500 | 500 | 16 | | Alfonso de Albuquerque | 1100 | 1360 | 13.3 | +------------------------+---------------+--------------+--------+ All the rest are very slow, and available for little else than harbor defence in time of war. This concludes our review of the navies of the Continent. The impressions which it has made upon my own mind are mainly these: The minor naval powers are falling more or less completely out of the lists of naval competition. Spain and Portugal have ceased to be, and Greece has not become, of any naval importance—Spain alone making some small effort to keep respectable, but even that effort is chiefly expending itself—as that of the United States government is about to expend itself, by-the-bye—in the production of very fast vessels, which may be useful in preying upon commerce, but which are scarcely fit to fight even pirates, and which a real war-ship would dispose of with a single round of her battery fire. They will be efficient in running away, no doubt, when danger arises; but “running away” was not the method by which the United States won naval distinction, nor that by which Spain once became great and Greece immortal. The naval policy of Germany is defensive; she is almost without pretensions upon the open sea. Turkey is slowly but surely succumbing to Russia, and in the near future the Russian Black Sea fleet will hold unquestioned mastery over Turkey. Italy has a naval rôle of her own to play in Europe, and on the whole is playing it well. Austria would do well to hesitate in her present naval condition before again exposing herself to the swift and destructive onslaughts which the tremendously armed and excessively fast Italian ships could make upon her. France is a really great naval power, and there are circumstances which would make a naval conflict between her and England one of the most uncertain in the history of the world. The French have very largely abandoned the protection of their guns by armor; we, most unhappily, have still more largely abandoned the protection of our ships, and it remains to be seen which has been the most foolish. In such a conflict the French would have this advantage over England—the overthrow of their guns, or the destruction of their gunners at them, would not prevent their ships themselves from withdrawing from action and repairing their injuries. What would become of our _Ajaxes_, _Agamemnons_, our _Collingwoods_ and _Benbows_ (both these latter with guns as much exposed as the