The official trial of H.M.S. Ferret (length 199 feet, beam 19 feet 3 inches, draught 9 feet; displacement 280 tons) built by Messrs. Laird Brothers of Birkenhead, for the British Government, took place on the Clyde on the 20th of June 1894; the average speed achieved during the three-hour trial was 27.51 knots, at 361 revolutions per minute. There was a remarkable absence of vibration when running at full speed, and no hitch of any kind occurred in the machinery. The speed for the six runs over the measured mile was the highest recorded at that time for any vessel for Her Majesty's Navy on an Admiralty official trial, and given that the speed of the engines was only 310 revolutions per minute it was anticipated that there would be no difficulty in maintaining this in the future when the vessel was commissioned.