Of the result of a general fleet action the country had small doubt; it was the possibility of sudden and unexpected naval raids that caused concern. The words of the English naval critic, Steevens, applied with tenfold force to our own case: "It is tolerably obvious that no superiority in the world could guarantee our whole empire against raids by hostile cruisers. A fast cruiser could break the closest blockade possible in the days of torpedo boats, and though she would stand to meet and be engaged by a cruiser or cruisers of our own, yet she would also stand to elude them. She might then shell or lay under contribution unprotected coast towns, destroy shipping lying in their harbors, or making for or from them, besides landing small forces to do serious, if not vital damage." And this fact was recognized no better by any one than by Admiral Cervera himself, who, in a letter written in February, 1898, after deploring the lack of Spanish naval preparation, said: "Under such conditions, a campaign would be disastrous, if not an offensive one, and all that could be done in an offensive war would be to make some raids with a few fast vessels." Reduced to its lowest terms, the situation confronting the authorities was this: the Spanish naval list showed—either in commission or building—nine 20-knot cruisers,[1] heavily armed and armored, and theoretically able to run away easily from any armored ships in our establishment save the _Brooklyn_ and _New York_, while (still theoretically) capable of whipping without effort these two latter cruisers, if brought to bay. Furthermore, the operations of the army and navy, in the West Indies and the Philippines, imperatively required the services of every modern fighting-ship at our disposal, and thus the long stretch of Atlantic coast, with its teeming harbors and populous cities, practically was left at the mercy of any chance squadron of swift cruisers, or even—at least in the earlier days of the war—of possible raids by privateers or wandering torpedo-gunboats. There was, it is true, the hastily improvised and costly coast-patrol fleet, of something over forty vessels—monitor relics of the '60's, armed yachts, ferry-boats, and tugs—distributed along the coast at stations from Eastport to New Orleans, but this heterogeneous outfit was brought into existence rather for scouting than for fighting. As a factor in actual resistance to determined naval attack it called for no serious consideration, and as a matter of record its organization was not complete until the 16th of June, when the dreaded _Vizcaya_, with her sister ships, finally had been marked down and safely penned in the harbor of Santiago. Footnote 1: _Almirante Oquendo_, _Cardenal Cisneros_, _Cataluna_, _Cristobal Colon_, _Emperador Carlos V._, _Infanta Maria Teresa_, _Pedro d'Aragon_, _Princesa de Asturias_, _Vizcaya_.—"Brassey's Naval Annual," 1897.