“In these Italian vessels the only thick armor is used to protect the gun-stations, the pilot-tower, and the communications from those important parts to the magazines and spaces below the protective deck. The strong deck, besides forming a base of the cellular subdivision, is of course a defence to the vital parts of the ship lying below it. “Between these two types of ships come the _Admiral_ class of the English navy and the belted vessels of the French navy, whose resemblances and differences have been described above. “In addition, there are not a few authorities who maintain that the development of the swift torpedo-cruiser, or the swift protected cruiser, makes the continued use of armor at least questionable, seeing that to attempt to protect ships by thick armor either on decks or sides, and to secure high speeds and heavy armaments, involves the construction of large and expensive vessels, which are necessarily exposed to enormous risks in action from forms of under-water attack, against which their armor is no defence. In view of such differences of opinion, and of the heated controversies which have arisen therefrom, the time seems certainly to have arrived when some competent body should be assembled by the Admiralty for the purpose of considering the designs of our war-ships, and enabling our constructors to proceed with greater assurance than they can at present. Questions affecting the efficiency of the Royal Navy clearly ought not to be decided except in the most calm and dispassionate manner. The work done by the Committee on Designs for Ships of War fourteen years ago was valuable, and has had important results. What is now wanted, I venture to think, is a still wider inquiry into the condition of the navy, and one of the branches of that inquiry which will require the most careful treatment is embraced in the question, ‘What are the uses of armor in modern war-ships?’