Ordered under the Naval Defence Act of 1889, which established the "Two-Power Standard", the class was contemporary with the first torpedo boat destroyers.

On 21 February 1897, she joined the British battleship HMS Revenge and torpedo gunboat HMS Dryad, the Russian battleship Imperator Aleksandr II, the Austro-Hungarian armored cruiser SMS Kaiserin und Königin Maria Theresia, and the German protected cruiser SMS Kaiserin Augusta in the International Squadron's first direct offensive action, a brief bombardment of Cretan insurgent positions on the heights east of Canea (now Chania) after the insurgents refused the squadron′s order to take down a Greek flag they had raised.

Commander Cyril Everard Tower was appointed in command on 11 March 1901, following which she again returned to the Mediterranean Station,[8] and in late November 1901 replaced the Mariner-class gunvessel Melita as the special service vessel at Constantinople.

[9] She visited the Danube in early 1902, and was ordered to the Persian Gulf on special service in June that year.

[7] At the outbreak of war she was converted at Portsmouth, in common with most of the rest of her class, to the minesweeping role.