It is clear that steam has rendered the operation of
sealing up an enemy's fleet by a system of blockade a very difficult, if not an impossible operation. On Monday, England learned that by a brilliantly executed stratagem half the ships of the hostile fleet in Bantry Bay had managed to escape, and that the blockade had thereupon been raised. The fact that one of the enemy's squadrons was at large, made it immediately necessary to abandon the blockade of the other—if not, the English force at Lough Swilly might have been crushed between the ships it had been watching and a relieving squadron—and accordingly the two English fleets were sum- moned to a common rendezvous, whence they might concert means to protect our coasts. The enemy's ironclads thus let loose to work their will upon our ports and commerce have not been idle. Oban, Greenock, and Ardrossan, on the West Coast, have been raided by hostile cruisers. Aberdeen has suffered bombardment from four ironclads, Edinburgh has been threatened and the Forth Bridge destroyed, and Tyneinouth, Sunderland, Scarborough, and several other ports have been made to realise what is meant by the visits of a hostile fleet.
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