The Navy Department realizes that annexation will necessitate a largely increased navy, and Secretary Long will ask Congress to arrange for the building of more cruisers and torpedo-boats. * * * * * On the occasion of the British naval review at Spithead, an illustration was given of the short time it takes to turn a merchant vessel into an armed cruiser. England, despite her large navy, often has use for more ships than she possesses. To meet this demand she has placed a certain number of merchant vessels on her Naval Reserve list. By this arrangement the Government has the right to call out any of these ships when she has need for them. At the time of the great naval review it was thought that it would be a good thing to put this system to a test, and so several of the Naval Reserve merchantmen were ordered to fit out as gunboats. One of the vessels thus put into use was the _Teutonic_ of the White Star line, one of the regular ocean steamers that ply between England and America. She arrived in Liverpool on June 21st, and immediately received orders to transform herself into a war-vessel, and take her place in the naval review at Spithead. As soon as her passengers and freight had been landed her crew set to work to take her war supplies on board. A British naval officer had been sent from Portsmouth to superintend the work, and under his direction magazines and armories were arranged, gun platforms were built, and sixteen guns were taken on board and mounted. In the crew of the _Teutonic_ were some fifty sailors who were members of the British Naval Reserve. To them rifles and cutlasses were supplied, and they in their turn were transformed into regular man-of-war's men. The rest of the crew was made up from sailors drafted from other warships, and then the _Teutonic_ was ready to take her place in the great Jubilee naval parade. So fine an appearance did she make that she was put at the head of one of the seven lines of vessels in the review, and Captain Cameron, her commander, received a flattering letter from the flag-officer of his division, congratulating him upon having the neatest merchant vessel in the parade. It took just forty hours to change the _Teutonic_ from a merchantman into a war-vessel. Captain Cameron is highly delighted at the praise he received. He also is a member of the Naval Reserve, having the rank of lieutenant. * * * * * Sandy Hook, which is the first point of land sighted in entering New York Harbor, has been again converted into an island. This strip of beach is a continuation of the New Jersey coast. The curious thing about it is that it has never been definitely settled whether it is a peninsula or an island, as it is continually changing its character.