had no chance when opposed to the smallest ironclad. This conclusion was strengthened by the success of the 'Monitor,' and led to a number of similar vessels being constructed with great rapidity. For service in the numerous rivers and inlets of the coast, they had to draw little water. The late Mr Eads designed and constructed several for the Government which only drew 6 ft. Some were propelled by paddle-wheels, and were more like locomotive rafts on which guns were mounted and housed in with iron plates – Captain Cowper Coles’s original idea, in fact, carried into practical execution. Then a larger type of monitor was designed by Ericsson as a seagoing ship, and one called the 'Dictator' was completed. Work on another, the 'Puritan,' was suspended in consequence of some error having been made in the calculation of her weights. After a lapse of many years, she is to be now completed with a modern equipment.
At the end of the war it was decided to construct four seagoing turret ships, the 'Miantonomoh,' 'Monadnock,' 'Terror,' and 'Amphitrite.' Only the first named was completed and crossed the Atlantic. She was about 4000 tons and had two turrets. She was of low freeboard, and in a moderate sea her upper deck was swept by the waves.
When the war ceased, retrenchment was the order of the day; the monitors were laid up, where they gradually fell into decay, and only a few wooden ships were annually kept in commission to carry the flag on foreign stations. Though obsolete they were not re-
