In the _Majestics_, except in the first two, all-round loading positions for the big guns were introduced in place of the cumbersome old system whereby, after firing, the guns had to return to an end-on position, tilt up, and at a fixed angle take their charges at what was little but an adaption for breechloaders of the loading system evolved twenty years before for the old _Inflexible_. Details of these ships:-- Displacement--14,900 tons. Length--(between perpendiculars) 390ft., (over-all) 413ft. Beam--75ft. Draught--(mean), 27½ ft., (maximum) about 30ft. Armament--Four 12-inch 35 cal., twelve 6-inch 40 cal., sixteen 12-pounders, twelve 3-pounders. Torpedo tubes (18-inch), four submerged and one above water in stern. Armour (Harvey)--Belt, (220ft. by 16ft.) 9in. Bulkheads, 14in. Barbettes, 14in. with 10in. turrets. Casemates, 6in. Horse-power--12,000 = 17.5 knots. Coal--(normal) 1,200 tons; (maximum) 2,200 tons = nominal radius of 7,600 miles at 10 knots and 4,000 at 15 knots. The ships were built, etc., as follows:-- ================+============+=============+================== Name. | Laid down. | Builder. | Engined by ----------------+------------+-------------+------------------ _Magnificent_ | Dec. ’93 | Chatham | Penn _Majestic_ | Feb. ’94 | Portsmouth | Vickers _Hannibal_ | April, ’94 | Pembroke | Harland & Wolff _Victorious_ | May, ’94 | Chatham | Hawthorn, Leslie _Mars_ | June, ’94 | Laird | Laird _Prince George_ | Sept. ’94 | Portsmouth | Humphrys _Jupiter_ | Oct. ’94 | Clydebank | Clydebank _Cæsar_ | March, ’95 | Portsmouth | Maudslay _Illustrious_ | March, 95 | Chatham | Penn ================+============+=============+================== Mostly they were completed inside two years, the only ones which took appreciably longer being the _Hannibal_ and the _Illustrious_. In these and the _Cæsar_ an innovation introduced in the others--the placing of the chart house round the base of the foremast with the conning tower well clear ahead--was done away with, and the old system of the bridge over the conning tower reverted to. In the _Cæsar_ and _Illustrious_, laid down later than the others, an improvement was effected by the introduction of circular instead of pear-shaped barbettes. The _Majestic_, _Magnificent_, and _Cæsar_ were built in dry dock instead of on slips--the first instance of this since the days of early coast-defence monitors. The total cost was approximately a million per ship. On trials most of them exceeded the designed speed, but all were light on trials. They proved very handy ships, with circles of 450 yards at fifteen knots. Coal consumption was always high. Compared to the _Sovereigns_, the following figures are of interest:--