Paris, May 21—The Tocquevilles and Chrzanowski[1] drank tea with us.
We talked of the French iron floating batteries.
'I saw one at Cherbourg,' said Tocqueville, 'and talked much with her commander. He was not in good spirits about his vessel, and feared some great disaster. However, she did well at Kinburn.'
'She suffered little at Kinburn,' said Chrzanowski, 'because she ventured little. She did not approach the batteries nearer than 600 metres. At that distance there is little risk and little service. To knock down a wall two metres thick from a distance of 600 metres would require at least 300 blows. How far her own iron sides would have withstood at that distance the fire of heavy guns I will not attempt to say, as I never saw her. The best material to resist shot is lead. It contracts over the ball and crushes it.'
'Kinburn, however,' said Tocqueville, 'surrendered to our floating batteries.'
'Kinburn surrendered,' said Chrzanowski, 'because you landed 10,000 men, and occupied the isthmus which connects Kinburn with the main land. The garrison saw that they were invested, and had no hope of relief. They were not Quixotic enough, or heroic enough, to prolong a hopeless resistance. Scarcely any garrison does so.'
We talked of Malta; and I said that Malta was the only great fortification which I had seen totally unprovided with earth-works.
'The stone,' said Chrzanowski, 'is soft and will not splinter.'
'I was struck,' I said, 'with the lightness of the armament; the largest guns that I saw, except some recently placed in Fort St. Elmo, were twenty-four pounders.'
'For land defence,' he answered, 'twenty-four pounders are serviceable guns. They are manageable and act with great effect within the short distance within which they are generally used. It is against ships that large guns are wanted. A very large ball or shell is wasted on the trenches, but may sink a ship. The great strength of the land defences of Malta arises from the nature of the ground on which Valetta and Floriana are built, indeed of which the whole island consists. It is a rock generally bare or covered with only a few inches of earth. Approaches could not be dug in it. It would be necessary to bring earth or sand in ships, and to make the trenches with sand-bags or gabions.'