Lissa, Devastation, and reliable steam

Lissa encouraged interest in presenting a narrow target while concentrating guns forward. A line abreast with strong forward fire could theoretically answer an enemy line crossing ahead, the crossing-the-T geometry later seen at Tsushima and Jutland. The manoeuvre demanded more shiphandling skill than fleets could reliably deliver, and the battlecruisers' death ride at Jutland is only a possible, imperfect comparison. HMS Devastation represented a more mature turret ship: a low-profile hull with heavy guns and no need to retain sails as a backup. This confidence in steam came from improved boilers, pipes, and materials, not from a sudden new understanding of engine theory. An engine can work on paper before metallurgy makes its boilers, pipes, and other components dependable. Experimental physicists, chemists, and materials engineers therefore belong to the long history of naval power, rather than to a field that began in the Second World War.