[23] It will be instructive to repeat here, before leaving this question of partially armored ships, a comparison resembling that which I employed in a paper read at the Royal United Service Institution, in which are set down in one column the displacements of certain British and French ships, eleven of each, built and building, possessing maximum armor on the water-line of at least fifteen inches. As all the French ships given have complete or all but complete armor-belts, it is proper to reckon their whole displacement tonnages as armored tonnage. But in the case of all the British ships which carry such thick armor they are deprived of armor altogether except amidships, and it is therefore misleading, and even absurd, to reckon their whole displacement tonnages as armored tonnage. For this reason I am obliged to give two tonnages for them, _viz._, the armored and the unarmored, as I do below: +-------------------------++----------------------------------------+ | FRENCH SHIPS. || BRITISH SHIPS. | +----------------+--------++-------------+--------+--------+--------+ | |Armored.|| Unarmored.|Armored.| Total. | +----------------+--------++-------------+--------+--------+--------+ | | Tons. || | Tons. | Tons. | Tons. | | Amiral Baudin | 11,141 || Inflexible | 5,210 | 6,670 | 11,880 | | Amiral Duperré | 10,486 || Ajax | 4,160 | 4,350 | 8,510 | | Dévastation | 9,639 || Agamemnon | 4,160 | 4,350 | 8,510 | | Formidable | 11,441 || Colossus | 4,580 | 4,570 | 9,150 | | Courbet | 9,639 || Edinburgh | 4,580 | 4,570 | 9,150 | | Hoche | 9,864 || Collingwood | 4,580 | 4,570 | 9,150 | | Magenta | 9,864 || Rodney | 4,800 | 4,900 | 9,700 | | Marceau | 9,864 || Home | 4,800 | 4,900 | 9,700 | | Neptune | 9,864 || Camperdown | 4,900 | 5,100 | 10,000 | | Caïman | 7,239 || Benbow | 4,900 | 5,100 | 10,000 | | Indomptable | 7,184 || Anson | 4,900 | 5,100 | 10,000 | +----------------+--------++-------------+--------+--------+--------+ | Total |106,225 || Total | 51,570 | 54,180 |105,750 | +----------------+--------++-------------+--------+--------+--------+ I have not thought it necessary to alter these figures in repeating this comparison, as they are sufficiently near the truth for the only purpose for which I employ them, which is that of exhibiting the fact that whereas the above eleven British iron-clads (so called) figure in the official tables of the British government as constituting an armored tonnage of 105,750 tons, nearly equal to that of the eleven French ships, they really represent but little more than half that amount of armored tonnage.—E. J. R. [24] For the reason before stated, the _Brennus_ and _Charles Martel_ are omitted from this table.