were sinking ships at the rate of 500,000 tons a month. Von Tirpitz, and other extremists of the German admiralty, held forth to their countrymen the pleasing promise that, freed from restraints which the neutrality of the United States imposed, they could easily sink a million tons a month and thus bring England to her knees. Had

they been able to accomplish this enormous execution, that result might fairly have followed, but the British and Amercan navies found at least a partial remedy for the submarine before it had brought famine very close to the people of the British Isles.

However, what the United States had to face was

the immediate necessity of a fleet of not less than 6,000,ooo tons, and the construction of new vessels at such a rate as would not merely replace all losses inflicted by submarines, but would at least double the effective size of the fleet during the period of the war, which, when the United States entered upon it, few people thought would be ended in less than two years. Some idea of the proportions of this problem may be derived from the record of ship construction and ship losses by the Allies during the period of the war ending in February, 1917-the date of the entrance of the United States. During that time the shipyards of Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy and Japan turned out 2,800,000 tons of new ships while the submarines took away a little more than 3,000,000. And this was the outcome of the contest between the builders and the sinkers of ships, during the period when the latter were just beginning to test out the efficacy of their almost untried submarines, and were still restrained to some extent by the insistence of the United States and other neutrals that the new weapon should not be used in a way revolting to humanity, and in flagrant violation of recognized principles of international law.

At the moment the shipping of the world in the hands of nations either neutral or at war with the Teutonic alliance amounted to 25,500,000 tons in Atlantic waters and 5,500,000 tons in the Pacific. Every hull was busy. It was the golden moment for ship owners. Old squarerigged wind-jammers that had been laid up for years, and that might never again hope to breast a blue sea, were outfitted and made fortunes for their owners. New wooden ships, hastily constructed, paid for themselves in their first voyage. Lake boats and harbor craft were sent out into the ocean and reaped golden rewards.

In the list of ship-owning nations the United States ranked second. But the rank was illusory. Great Britain came first with some 14,000,000 tons of ocean-going vessels available. The United States followed-a very bad second-with 2,400,000 tons, classed as "available" by

the Shipping Board. But much of our tonnage was of coastwise craft or vessels designed for special service like oil tanks. Moreover, it is a melancholy fact that our gross tonnage in 1917 was almost precisely what it

was in 1891. In that period the gross tonnage of other nations had more than doubled. For actual all-round ocean-going service the 2,300,000 tons of Norway, the 1,600,000 tons of Holland, the 1,800,000 tons of France or the 1,400,000 tons of Italy were more serviceable though ours stood higher in the statistical table.

The character of our fleet was unfortunate. What we needed was swift passenger vessels to carry troops to Europe of these we had not half a dozen-and commodious cargo ships for carrying supplies. The largest number of our modern ships were oil tanks, admirable for the purpose of carrying oil in tanks to all quarters of the world, but unfit for the passenger, or package

freight service which was war's first need. Many were fruit ships designed for navigation in the tropics. We had only two trans-Atlantic liners suitable for passenger use, and when the war broke out these had just been

reduced by the companies operating them to the grade of second-class ships. About one-eighth of our total fleet had passenger accommodations, and these were mainly coasters. It is proper, however, to note that because of the distance between our ports and the nature of the seas to be navigated the American coaster is a superior craft to those of the same class in European waters. For example, a ship sailing between New York and New Orleans or Galveston undertakes a voyage equal in possible peril to that of the average trans-Atlantic liner, and far exceeding anything in length which comes in the regular service of a British or French coaster. Many of these performed most efficient service as transports, two at least, the "Antilles" and the "Covington," going down before the deadly stroke of the submarines.

While but about 2,400,000 tons of our shipping in 1917 was classed by the Shipping Board as available for war purposes, the gross tonnage of the United States merchant marine was greater than this. We had at that time, of craft of over 100 gross tons each, about 8,600,000 tons. Of these 4,000,000 were in the Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and Pacific coast trade; about 3,000,000 tons on the Great Lakes and the rest in international trade. Our total tonnage was about one and one-half times as great as that of Germany, but hers was practically wholly made up of ships in international trade. Indeed, the German ships interned in American harbors and seized by us upon our declaration of war greatly exceeded in tonnage and value the entire United States fleet engaged in trans-Atlantic trade.

Such then stated in a broad and general way was the condition of the United States merchant marine when the sudden shock of war compelled the nation to take steps for building it up to proportions commensurate