of the French had apparently been somewhat similar to our own. In both countries the use of iron for warships received a sudden check and, in England at any rate, the idea of unarmoured wood was once again accepted. In both countries the opinion was widely held that iron was unsuitable either for construction or protection, and that the view of General Paixhans, that vessels might be made proof even against shells by being “cuirassées en fer,” was preposterous and impracticable.[161] Potentially, as it now seems, wooden sailing ships were so weak in defensive qualities that the new artillery, if only it could be adequately protected, had them at its mercy. Actually it required the rude test of war to establish the unpalatable truth. In November, 1853, such proof was given. At Sinope a squadron of Turkish frigates armed with solid-shot guns was almost blown out of the water by shell fire from a powerful Russian squadron; the latter were practically uninjured, while the Turkish fleet was set on fire and a terrible mortality inflicted among the crews in a short time. General Paixhans, who had lived to see his invention fulfil in actual warfare his early predictions, was able to emphasize, in the columns of the official _Moniteur_, the arguments against large ships and the advantages which would accrue to France especially by the subdivision of force and the substitution of small protected steamers armed with heavy guns for the existing wooden ships-of-the-line. The concentrated fire of a few such steamers would overpower the radiating fire of the largest three-decker. The type of naval warfare imposed on the allies in the Crimean War lent special force to Paixhans’ arguments. For the attack of fortresses and coasts whose waters were exceptionally shallow it was at any rate clear that the orthodox form of warship, unarmoured, of large size and of deep draught, was of very limited value. Some special form was necessary; France made a rapid decision. Napoleon III issued an order for the construction of a flotilla of floating batteries, light-draught vessels capable of carrying heavy shell guns and of being covered with iron armour strong enough to resist not only solid shot but the effects of explosive shell.