It may be objected that it is not reasonable to consider a ship’s energy of motion as an element of naval power, in the mechanical sense in which we have been using the word “power,” for the reason that it could be exerted only by the use of her ram, an infrequent use.  To this it may be answered that energy is energy, no matter to what purpose it is applied; that a given projectile going at a given speed has a certain energy, whether it strikes its target or misses it; and that a battleship going at a certain speed must necessarily have a certain definite energy, no matter whether it is devoted to ramming another ship or to carrying itself and its contents from one place to another.

Besides the mechanical power exerted by the mere motion of the ship, and often superior to it, there is the power of her guns and torpedoes.

Perhaps the most important single invention ever made was the invention of gunpowder.  Why?  Because it put into the hands of man a tremendous force, compressed into a very small volume, which he could use instantaneously or refrain from using at his will.  Its first use was in war; and in war has been its main employment ever since.  War gives the best field for the activity of gunpowder, because in war, we always wish to exert a great force at a definite point at a given instant; usually in order to penetrate the bodies of men, or some defensive work that protects them.  Gunpowder is the principal agent used in war up to the present date.  It is used by both armies and navies, but navies use it in larger masses, fired in more powerful guns.

Of course this does not mean that it would be impossible to send a lot of powder to a fort, more than a fleet could carry, and fire it; but it does mean that history shows that forts have rarely been called upon to fire much powder, that their lives have been serene, and that most of the powder fired on shore has been fired by infantry using muskets—­though a good deal has been fired by field and siege artillery.

Leaving forts out of consideration and searching for something else in which to use gunpowder on a large scale, we come to siege-pieces, field-pieces, and muskets.  Disregarding siege-pieces and field-pieces, for the reason that the great variety of types makes it difficult to compare them with navy guns, we come to muskets.

Now the musket is an extremely formidable weapon, and has, perhaps, been the greatest single contributor to the victory of civilization over barbarism, and order over anarchy, that has ever existed up to the present time.  But the enormous advances in engineering, including ordnance, during the last fifty years, have reduced enormously the relative value of the musket.  Remembering that energy, or the ability to do work, is expressed by the formula:  E=1/2 MV^2, remembering that the projectile of the modern 12-inch gun starts at about 2,900 f. s. velocity and weighs 867 pounds, while the bullet of a musket weighs only 150 grains and starts with a velocity of 2,700 feet per second, we see that the energy of the 12-inch projectile is about 47,000 times that of the bullet on leaving the muzzle.  But after the bullet has gone, say 5,000 yards, its energy has fallen to zero, while the energy of the 12-inch projectile is nearly the same as when it started.