On her quarter-deck, an elderly flag-officer was pacing to and fro, with
a self-conscious dignity to which a touch of the gout or rheumatism
perhaps contributed a little additional stiffness. He seemed to be a
gallant gentleman, but of the old, slow, and pompous school of naval
worthies, who have grown up amid rules, forms, and etiquette which were
adopted full-blown from the British navy into ours, and are somewhat too
cumbrous for the quick spirit of to-day. This order of nautical heroes
will probably go down, along with the ships in which they fought
valorously and strutted most intolerably. How can an admiral condescend
to go to sea in an iron pot? What space and elbow-room can be found for
quarter-deck dignity in the cramped lookout of the Monitor, or even in
the twenty-feet diameter of her cheese-box? All the pomp and splendor of
naval warfare are gone by. Henceforth there must come up a race of
enginemen and smoke-blackened cannoneers, who will hammer away at their
enemies under the direction of a single pair of eyes; and even heroism--
so deadly a gripe is Science laying on our noble possibilities--will
become a quality of very minor importance, when its possessor cannot
break through the iron crust of his own armament and give the world a
glimpse of it.
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