There is no protection to the machinery. The engines were built at Yokosuka.
Meanwhile, shipbuilding abroad had been proceeding apace, but disaster attended both the earlier vessels. The first, the Unebi, a cruiser of 3650 tons, with four 6-in. Q.F. as her principal armament, mysteriously disappeared while on her way out to Japan[15] and still in the contractors’ hands. Her loss was officially attributed to instability, and seems to have inspired the Japanese authorities with a profound distrust for French shipbuilding; at any rate, the Chiyoda, a vessel generally resembling the lost Unebi, was given to Thomson Yard at Clydebank for construction. She will be described in due course later on.
The second French-built ship, upon the same general plan as the French Milan and Japanese Yayeyama, was the Tschishima, of 750 tons displacement. In appearance she was nearly identical to the French Milan. She met with disaster in the Inland Sea almost immediately after the Japanese took her over (1892), and all her crew were drowned. The Tatsuta was ordered from Elswick to replace her.
The Itsukushima, the first of the “Bertin cruisers,” so-called after their designer, was launched at La Seyne in 1889. Captain Ingles, R.N., naval adviser to the Japanese, had strongly persuaded them against ironclads; they had been advised against the big gun also. However, they were bent on mounting a gun able to pierce any armour in the Chinese Navy or in foreign warships likely to come to the Far East. By the irony of fate, these big guns contributed nothing to the victory of the Yalu; however, the decision of the Japanese to have them cannot be condemned, in view of the fact that naval construction everywhere in ’88 was based upon the big gun. Having a full idea of their requirements, the Japanese settled upon the Italian Lepanto as embodying the most useful type of ship for them, and the Itsukushimas were ordered on that principle.
Particulars of the Itsukushima are as follows:—
| Displacement | 4278 tons. |
| Material of hull | Steel. |
| Length | 295 ft. |
| Beam | 50½ ft. |
| Draught (maximum) | 21¼ ft. |
| Armament | One 12.8-in. Canet. |
| Eleven 4.7-in. Q.F. Elswick of 32 cals. | |
| Five 6-pdr. Q.F. | |
| Eleven 3-pdr. Q.F. | |
| Six machine guns. | |
| Six torpedo tubes | |
| (bow, stern, and four on the broadsides). | |
| Horse-power (natural draught) | 3400. |
| Trial speed (natural draught) | 15.7 knots. |
| Horse-power (forced draught) | 5400. |
| Trial speed (forced draught) | 16.5 knots. |
| Screws | Two. |
| Engines | Triple expansion. |
| Boilers | Six cylindrical.[16] |
| Furnaces | 18. |
| Coal supply | 400 tons. |
| Complement | 360. |
TORPEDO GUNBOAT TSCHICHIMA—