Turning now to the other side of the picture it will be found that hidden enemies are always the most dreaded, and that the history of naval operations affords many examples of their moral influence hindering the carrying out of certain operations. In the actions off Charleston, in the American Civil War, the mines and obstructions so influenced Admiral Dupont that he was content to maintain the blockade instead of risking his ships against them. One of the clearest cases of the moral influence of submarine mines occurred during the Franco-Prussian War, when the French fleet were prevented from entering Prussian harbours simply through fear of submarine dangers. The naval campaign of 1870 consisted solely of the watching by a strong French squadron of North German ships which had taken refuge behind a reputed impassable barrier of subaqueous defences. “The power of the French steamships,” writes Admiral Cyprian Bridge, “to stand in within practicable range of their heavy guns, and do enormous mischief to the rising naval establishment of the Bund as it then was, was completely set at nought by the subaqueous defensive system which the weaker force had devised to redress the inequality between it and its rival. We shall do well to mark the results; the stronger navy did and could do practically nothing; the smaller one preserved itself from injuries, and at the close of the war still existed intact, as a nucleus for that splendid force, which is now (October, 1878) third amongst the navies of the world.” During the Franco-German war the French fleet was kept off a fort by a harbour protected by dummy mines. The story goes, that when the mines arrived, the burgomaster was afraid to charge them, and laid them out empty. At the completion of the war, when the dummies were taken up, the burgomaster was congratulated by several consuls on the masterly way in which he had performed his perilous task, no loss of life having been caused. There are so many instances of mines failing to explode or if exploding, doing no damage, that naval officers may well declare that the submarine mine is nothing but a “military bugbear.” In 1863, during the American Civil War, the _New Ironsides_ halted off Fort Sumner, and just over a submarine mine containing 2,000 lbs. of powder, which failed to explode when fired from the battery, as one of the wires had been accidentally severed by a waggon passing over it. Instances of the moral influences of the torpedo are afforded by the two most recent naval wars, the Chino-Japanese and the Spanish-American, and by the manœuvres of the fleets of Great Britain, France, Germany, and Russia. Although the Chinese officers were quite unable to use the torpedo with any effect, and evidently regarded the weapon as of more potential danger to themselves than to the enemy, the Japanese commanders on more than one occasion decided against certain movements, owing to a fear of the Chinese torpedo flotilla.