Europe, which had treated the American fleets with derision, began to take a tolerant and amused interest in American naval construction when it became known that the new navy had been decided upon. The European powers only mustered eight 16-knot vessels among them, and when three American ships of that speed appeared, Europe became profoundly interested. These ships and the _Yorktown_, built later, constituted the White Squadron which visited Europe about 1891, and showed the Old World what the New World could do. The _Charleston_, the designs for which were purchased abroad, was provided with machinery and boilers supposed to embody the best features of the boilers and machinery of various foreign cruisers, but they had to be altered considerably before she was considered to meet American requirements. She was the first vessel of the new navy to be employed on a warlike service. The supposed filibustering steamer _Itata_, at the time of the Chilian insurrection in 1891, escaped from the custody of the U.S. marshal at San Diego, and the _Charleston_ was successful in the mission of overtaking her, which she did at Iquique, after steaming 6,000 miles. The _Charleston_ was wrecked off Luzon in 1900. In 1886 the United States made another extraordinary advance by authorising the construction of the second-class battleship _Texas_, the armoured cruiser _Maine_, the protected cruiser _Baltimore_, the dynamite cruiser _Vesuvius_, and the torpedo boat _Cushing_. The _Texas_ and the _Maine_ were the first modern armoured cruising ships constructed in the United States. They were decided upon as the result of the knocking to pieces in half an hour of China’s wooden fleet by the French in the Min River, in August, 1884.