“It was more by good luck than by good management that Mr. Whitney secured those particular drawings which proved to be of such superior character. They were offered to our Naval Attaché, who happened to be abroad in England at that time, by the Armstrong Company. They had designed the two vessels which subsequently became the ‘Baltimore’ and ‘Charleston’ of our navy. The design of the ‘Baltimore’ was made in competition with Thompson for the Spanish government. For certain reasons, which I need not mention here, the designs of Thompson were accepted and the contract for the construction of the ship was awarded to them. She was known as the ‘Reina Regente.’ It was at this point that the Armstrongs presented their rejected drawing and the drawings for the ‘Naniwa Khan’ for sale to our Naval Attaché there. They had already built two vessels like the ‘Naniwa Khan’ for the Japanese navy. These vessels were looked upon by the experts of the naval world as being the two best specimens of their type that had ever been built up to that time. “At the time the sale was made, the Armstrongs, knowing nothing of the capabilities of this country and having, like most British ship-builders and many Americans at that time, a very mean and very poor opinion of every ship-builder in this country, they suggested that, in awarding the contract, a condition should be inserted providing for the payment of superintendents whom they should send over from their works to superintend the building, and designing of the engines, and operating them after their completion. Considering what to them appeared a barbarian incapacity on our part, they were loath to risk their reputation without protection. “We accepted the condition at the time, anxious to get the contracts, feeling sure that it would never be needed, and that we could prevail upon Mr. Whitney and the naval people as to the impropriety of it. “After the contract was awarded and the work was started, Mr. Whitney concluded that, notwithstanding the provision was there, he would never use it, and never require it of us. “In fact, we made a great many improvements in the boilers of the ‘Baltimore,’ and some improvements in the engines. These improvements in the boilers of the ‘Baltimore’ formed the basis and the standard of construction of all the Scotch boilers that have been built for the navy since that time. “At the beginning of our work on these ships we did not get much co-operation on the part of some of the Bureaus, in view of the foreign character of most of the work, and in view, too, of the fact that some of it was of our own, both being equally obnoxious, as they originated outside of the Bureaus. We met with a great deal of opposition at the beginning in getting up the specifications and plans.