THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR. 380 steam, and with her narrow deck strewn with dead and wounded, drifted helplessly towards the shore. Her consort, the Pluton, did not survive her many minutes. The F'uror sank under the rocky coast near Cabanas Bay, and the Pluton kept her engines going just long enough to run ashore beyond the west point ot the littleinlet.

Like thetwo smallerboats that were sunk by Dewey during the fight in Manila Bay, these fine torpedo craft had courted the destruction that thus overtook them by coming out inbroad when the Furor and Pluton dashed out of the harbour the Gloucester was able to make for them with a speedofseventeen knots, sendinga shower of well-aimed shells into them— shells that, light as they were, coulddo deadly damage to the torpedoboats. 'How much of the injury the two boatsreceivedwas due to the Gloucester, how much to the guns of the Indiana, which were also turned upon them, and to the New York, whichsent themsome long-ranging shots as she came up,it is impossible to say. Certain it is that the yacht had a large share in their THE BURNING WRECK OF THE ".MARIA TERESA.''

destruction, and, according to the narrative of the Spanish lieutenant who was second in command of the Furor, it was the Gloucester preventedhergetting away, turning to the eastward outside Morro Point. If theFuror could have got within torpedorange of Wainwright's little steamer, a single torpedomight have blown the Gloucester out of the water. But the torpedo boat was quickly crippled by the Gloucester's shells. One of the first shells that hit her destroyed the main ventilator of the Furor's engine-room anddisorganised the forced draught, bringing the pressure of steam down rapidly.

Another cut the helmsman in two, a third shattered the steering gear. Yet anotherpenetrated into the engine-room, breaking several steampipes. The Furor, without propelling or steering power,enveloped in clouds of escaping daylight to run the gauntlet of a fleet armed with quick-firing guns. There was only one way in which Cervera and Villamil might perhaps have used them with effect. They might have crept out close under the starboard side of two cruisers, reached the sea sheltered between them and theland, and then they could perhapshavebeen convoyedinto themidstof the enemyby their protectors,only dashingout from under coverat thelast moment. Inthis waythey might have done something. Fighting as they did was an act of self-destruction.

Within a few minutes of the loss of Villamil's little vessels, Cervera's flagship had shared their fate. Coming out first, she hadreceived the fire of the Brooklyn and the four battleships, a convergingrushofshells ofallcalibres. TheIndiana, the Texas, and the Oregon then concentrated