“Hardly,” replied the Marquis, “for, with the aid of a corps of observation air ships, and of international detectives in every center of population, the world, both savage and civilized, could be adequately policed at a very small cost.”
“And what, in your lordship’s opinion, will be the condition in or before the Congress of Nations, of a people who desire separate government and who have been unable to obtain it?” said Mr. Michael Davitt, who was standing by.
The Marquis looked the Irishman squarely in the eye and replied slowly: “I think it will be quite out of the power of any government to retain by force under its rule any considerable number of people, who, with or without, a grievance, are practically unanimous for a separate government. The Congress of Nations will, or at least ought to, require that any people seeking separation shall be nearly unanimous. But do you think, Mr. Davitt, to be candid, that the people of Ulster and the people of Galway would ever be brought to agree to any proposition on earth?”
“Begorra, your lordship, if you don’t mind me takin’ the answer to your question out of the mouth of Misther Davitt,” said the Honorable Bellew McCafferty, Home Rule member from Mayo—“begorra, there’s one great principle upon which Oireland is, and ever will be, united. Catholic and Protestant, Fardowner and Corkonian, Priest and Peeler are all heart and soul agreed”—
“To do what?” queried his lordship.
“Never,” replied the McCafferty, “never to pay any rint.”
CHAPTER XXVI.
“’Tis less to conquer than to make wars cease.”
The Siva steamed out of San Diego harbor at nine o’clock on an April morning in the year 1896, carrying as passengers the naval and ordnance officers commissioned by the various European and American governments to examine and report upon the result of the dynamic exposition. The civil and diplomatic representatives were apportioned among the different members of the fleet, which had gathered from the Pacific squadrons of every naval power in the world, and was now lying in San Diego Bay. The success of the air ship the day before in almost obliterating the Coronado Islands, filled every mind with eager anticipation of the results likely to be achieved by the torpedo boats, and there was an especial pressure for places on board the Siva, which carried the novel engines of destruction.
The Siva had been built at the Union Iron Works in San Francisco, from plans and models furnished by engineers employed by Morning, and no expense had been spared to make her the largest, swiftest, and best-appointed war vessel afloat. Indeed, every other consideration had been sacrificed to speed, and, as a result, a ship was constructed of ten thousand tons’ burden, drawing but twenty-one feet of water when fully loaded, and able, when under a full head of steam, to make twenty-six knots an hour. Relying upon her speed to keep out of range of the guns of an enemy, and intended rather for a carrier of torpedo boats than a war vessel, she was, for her size, neither heavily armed nor heavily armored, yet she was covered with steel plates of sufficient thickness to resist the largest ordnance, and she was equipped with rifled cannon and pneumatic dynamite guns, equal in size and range to any constructed. Her cost was $8,000,000, and it was Morning’s avowed intention to present her to the alliance of nations which he expected would result from the dynamic exposition. The Siva rode the seas like a gull, and was as graceful and beautiful as a swan.
Forward of her engines the hull of the vessel was devoted to accommodations for housing, launching, and rehousing the two torpedo boats, the Etna and Stromboli. Each of these was cigar-shaped, one hundred feet in length and twenty feet in diameter. They were built of steel, with an inner and outer shell. The admission of water between these shells would cause the submersion of the boat to any depth required for the purposes of destroying an enemy, while by the expulsion of water they were enabled to ascend to the surface. In the inner shell was an electric engine, with sufficient power stored in its dynamos to propel the boat under water at a speed of twenty-five miles an hour for a period of five hours. Enough compressed air was stored in steel tanks to supply the needs of ten men for eight hours, and the Etna had, on several occasions, as a test, remained submerged with her crew for four hours without coming to the surface.