vessels is to be of Russian production, and the company has pledged itself to roll its own armour-plates. At present over 1,200 hands are employed at the company's establishment, and fresh men are being taken on every day. By 1885, the date fixed upon for the completion of the two ironclads, the Government should possess, through the instrumentality of the company, a quasiState dockyard in fairly good working order. In excess, it is not improbable that it may build a dockyard of its own in the interval, for the use of the men-of-war wintering at Sevastopol.

So much for the Black Sea Steam Navigation Company, whose headquarters may be regarded as temporarily fixed at Sevastopol, although most of its trade is done at Odessa. Sevastopol also serves as the headquarters of the Moscow Cruiser Fleet, consisting of half a dozen powerful steamers purchased during the war scare of 1878, or since then, and which have performed a useful service in showing the Navigation Company how to open up the direct trade between Russia and the East. Towards the cruiser movement Russia subscribed half a

million sterling in 1878-79. The vessels this money enabled the promoters to secure were first used as transports, and then as merchantmen, the armaments being placed in store at Sevastopol while the vessels were engaged in commerce. In course of time, as might have been expected, the committee grew tired of its duties and neglected them, and the managers of the undertaking were beginning to run into debt, when, a few months ago, the Government stepped in and annexed the concern to the Black Sea Fleet; thereby adding materially to a branch in which it was deficient. The steamers are now used as troopships between South Russia and the Caucasus, and South Russia and the Pacific. One of them recently conveyed 3,800 timeexpired troops from Batoum to Sevastopol.

SIR E. J. REED AND THE RUSSIAN FLEET.

47

It is impossible to quit the subject of the naval progress of Sevastopol without saying a few words about. the Black Sea Fleet. The public have not yet forgotten. the wolf-cry Sir Edward Reed raised in 1872, and again in 1875, respecting the frigate Peter the Great and the circular ironclads or popoffkas. For years Sir Edward Reed posed as a naval Professor Holloway; Admiral Popoff was his patent pill. By jumbling up matters which were correct with matters which were wholly imaginary-to put the advertising in no stronger light -Sir Edward Reed conferred naval prestige on Russia which that country did not deserve, and which disappeared in smoke the moment the imaginary armaments of the northern Power were summoned to confront a real enemy.

I have no space to deal with all the causes that led to this impotence, so humiliating to Russia, so contrary to the traditions of a fleet which Englishmen had helped to establish, and with whose triumphs so many English names are associated. If Sir Edward Reed's gross laudation of the fleet had been advantageous to Russian diplomacy during the period preceding the war, its collapse directly afterwards gave a blow to its prestige from which it has not yet recovered. The very praises heaped so unstintedly upon the fleet helped to deepen the disgrace attending its failure. Russians could not bear to hear the names of Popoff and Reed mentioned, for they were conscious that but for the support given by the English constructor to his Russian confrère, the latter would have never gained such an ascendency at the Admiralty, and acquired power to dissipate the naval funds over unspeakably foolish hobbies. Had Sir Edward Reed shown himself at Cronstadt in 1877 he would have been grossly insulted, perhaps lynched. As far as the Press dared, it unsparingly assailed the Popoff régime, and exposed the gross maladministration which, in effect,

was more to blame for Russia's impotence than climatic drawbacks, and the absence of cheap iron, cheap coal, and skilled labour. But, in spite of the protests of the Golos and other papers, things went on from bad to worse, and the fleet had become a by-word in Russia for disorganization and disorder when Alexander II. suddenly died, and a sweeping change took place in all the departments of State. The brothers of the old Tsar retired from office; the brothers of the new one took their place. Vladimir succeeded Nicholas in the control of the army; Constantine gave up to Alexis the charge of the fleet. The change was gladly welcomed in Russia, and the public expectation of improvement was speedily justified by events. The Russian Admiralty was exposed to a thorough reorganization. Admiral Popoff was first to go. So great was the confusion found to be, that considerable time was needed to put things to rights, without attempting to develop the fleet. As Minister of Marine, the Grand Duke Alexis chose Admiral Shestakoff, who had been commander of the Svetlana, the frigate which had taken him to America ten years earlier, when the old Emperor wished to break off a secret marriage he had contracted with the niece of the Minister of Finance, Baron Reutern. More recently, Shestakoff had acted as naval attaché in Southern Europe, and before taking office had made a tour of inspection of the great dockyards of the West, including those of this country. Directly afterwards, Admiral Pestchuroff, another energetic officer, was sent to the Black Sea to supersede Admiral Arkas, a man who had let things drift, and had covered himself with ridicule during the Turkish war by continually issuing magniloquent despatches on dry land, signed "Arkas, Commander-in-Chief of all the Russian ports and squadrons in the Black Sea "-a title hardly suited to times when no squadron existed, and no port was free from the Turkish blockade.

RUSSIA'S NAVAL POSITION IN THE BLACK SEA. 49

Having at length restored a little order in the navy, the Grand Duke Alexis began to think of creating a new Russian fleet. Two armoured frigate cruisers were commenced on the Neva, of which one, the Vladimir Monomarchus, is already in commission, and the second, the Dmitri Donskoi, soon will be; and then the order was given for four ironclads for the Black Sea Fleet-two, as stated, to be built at Sevastopol, and two at Nicolaeff. Orders were also given for half a dozen sea-going torpedo boats to firms abroad.

To sum up, the position in the Black Sea is this: that Russia will possess in two or three years' time a fullgrown town at Sevastopol, with a subsidized dockyard capable of turning out ironclads, and probably a State dockyard as well; together with the old large granite docks restored, and an iron floating dock capable of sustaining the largest ship of war. By the beginning of 1886 she will have afloat at Sevastopol a squadron of four ironclads, incomparably stronger than the vessels of the Ottoman fleet, and collectively able, with the projected six new gunboats and twelve sea-going torpedo boats, to prevent any Turkish squadron entering the Black Sea. For cruiser or transport purposes she will have at least twelve ocean-liners, comprising the steamers already constructed or projected of the Navigation Company and the vessels of the Moscow Fleet. What aims Russia may have in view in developing her Black Sea Fleet need not be discussed. Suffice it to call attention to the fact that Turkish naval supremacy in the Black Sea, which contributed so materially to prolong the last struggle, is rapidly dying away, and that ere long the power will pass completely to Russia, who, with her masked stronghold at Batoum, her railway to Kars-also to be finished in a few years' time-and her dominant position in the Balkans, may be expected to adopt a very much more

E

arrogant attitude in regard to Turkish affairs than she is content to do to-day.

But whatever may be the power and the prestige of armaments, I have always considered that Turkey has to dread more the material rather than the naval and military progress of Russia. Sevastopol, in excess of recovering its position as a dockyard, is becoming a great commercial outlet. This is the case also with Nicolaeff, where trade has developed with such remarkable strides of late years that the place could forego the support of the navy. In 1880 the exports from Sevastopol were valued at 5,943,022 roubles; the chief article being corn. Last year the total was 9,888.706 roubles. At present the shipping arrangements are very bad, but improvements are impending, and these may be expected to be accelerated by the growth of the new line of communication which is rendering Sevastopol the Brindisi of Russia.

A glance at the map will show that Sevastopol is the nearest Russian port for Batoum, and many Russians already prefer taking their departure from it instead of from Odessa, which latter involves twenty hours' additional sea journey. A few months ago an express service was started between Moscow and Sevastopol, the distance, 945 miles, being done in forty-seven hours. More recently, the enterprising and unsubsidized Greek firm of Rodokanaki conceived the idea of running steamers direct between Sevastopol and Batoum, instead of taking passengers round to Kertch and coasting slowly down to that port, as is at present the practice with the Navigation Company. Three steamers have been ordered in England for this service, and when they are placed on the line nearly all the passenger traffic between Russia and Transcaucasia, Central Asia, and Persia, may be expected to pass through Sevastopol.

Thus Sevastopol has a great future before it, and will