315 CHAPTER XXII.

HOBSON AND THE "MERRIMAC."

THE first impulse of sailors placed in the position of Sampson and Schley must have been to use the enormous force now concentrated before Santiago in order to force the entrance and destroy the enemy's fleet inside the harbour. But this apparently obvious course presented very serious difficulties. If there had been a broad deep channel such as that through which Dewey steered his fleet past Corregidor to Manila and victory, doubtless Sampson would not have hesitateda moment about following his splendid example. But here the path lay through a narrowrift in the rocks, where the leading ship, whichevershe might be,wouldhave to face, alone and unsupported, the plunging fire of high batterieson the cliffs, the horizontalconverging fire of the Spanish cruisers moored just inside the dangerous pass,the attacks of the destroyers lurking under the rocks, and the explosion of the submarine mines whichCerverahad fixed in the passage. He might face all this if there was a fair chance that the destruction of the leading battleship would clear the way for her consorts, but the difficulty of the problem was that not only would the first ship be very likely to be sunk, but if she sank or got aground she would hopelessly block the way for all that fdllowed. Cervera's fleet would be bottled up by such a result, though not destroyed,and a voung officer in the fleet, Lieutenant Hobson, a skilled naval constructor, suggested to the Admiral that it would be better to attempt the bottling-up process at a cheaper cost bysendingin and sinking a large unarmed steamer in the entrance.

He suggested a detailed plan of operations, and volunteered tocarry it through himself, with the help of a few bravemen.

His plan was accepted, and on this very first of June hebegan his preparations. But before telling the story of his gallant exploit it will be well to say something of the personal career and character of the man. Richmond Pearson Hobson came from Alabama, and was a son of one of the old planter families of the South. Born in 1870,he had graduated at the Southern University at the age of seventeen, and then passed into the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. As a boy, he hadbeen remarkable for quiet,reserved and studious ways:but he was goodat all games in whichhe took part, though he always seemed to care forbooksmore than games. Making ship-models and sailing them was his chief recreation as a boy, and local tradition in his home at Greensboro' tells of oneof his few juvenile battles, when " Master Rich " fairly thrashed a bigger boy who had interfered with and badly damaged one of his little fleet. This was Hobson's first naval engagement. With such antecedents no wonder, as a student at Annapehs,he showed a markeel predilectionfor the subject of naval architecture, in which he later on became a specialist. His time at Annapolis was, in some respects, unhappy. He had a strong, almost a stern sense of duty, and when he was appointed monitor, at the beginning of his second year, he paidno attention to a kind of unwritten traditionallaw among the young men that various breaches of discipline were not to be mentioned in the monitor's report. Hobson sent in a complete record, and was promptly boycotted by his aggrieved comrades. But he managed to pass his lonely hours of recreation comfortably enough with his books and his favourite problems in ship construction, and at the end of thecourse passed out first of his year. He was sent to France to make a special study of naval architecture,and returned to be a popular professor at Annapolis. The directors of Cramps' Shipbuilding Company, who are among the chief builders of warships in America, offered him a post on their staff, witha salaryof 10,000 dollars(_2,ooo) to start with;but he determined to stick to his naval career, and on the declaration of war he was posted to Sampson's fleet, where it was expected that his special professional skill would enable him to do good service in dealing with the accidents and injuriesto the ships that could be repairedon the spot, without sending them back to the navy yartls. Brave without ostentation, determined,