Mr. John Laird on Friday took the occasion of a
Volunteer -celebration to make a long and, in parts, very able speech on the national defences. He announced that he had broken the law in the matter of the Alabama with a gusto of which he might have been ashamed ; but much of his discourse was well worth hearing. He advocated strongly the mixed system of Government ship- building by contracts and dockyards, so that the State might have its own establishments, yet benefit by the vast private yards which would then learn how to do Government work. No single comp- troller, however able, could carry all the ship-building brains of the country in his head. For the same reason, he deprecated the monopoly granted to Sir William Armstrong, which had ended in .a gun not equal to the 68-pounder, and a loss to the nation of 240,0001.
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