both ships were well fought.
We were struck twenty-two times--pilot-house twice, turret nine
times, deck three times, sides eight times. The only vulnerable
point was the pilot-house. One of your great logs (nine by twelve
inches thick) is broken in two. The shot struck just outside of
where the captain had his eye, and disabled him by destroying his
left eye and temporarily blinding the other. She tried to run us
down and sink us as she did the Cumberland yesterday, but she got
the worst of it. Her horn passed over our deck, and our sharp,
upper-edged rail cut through the light iron shoe upon her stern and
well into her oak. She will not try that again. She gave us a
tremendous thump, but did not injure us in the least; we were just
able to find the point of contact. The turret is a splendid
structure. You were very correct in your estimate of the effect of
shot upon the man on the inside of the turret, when it struck near
him. Three men were knocked down, of whom I was one. The other two
had to be carried below, but I was not disabled at all, and the
others recovered before the battle was over. Captain Worden
(afterward admiral) stationed himself at the pilot-house. Greene
fired the guns, and I turned the turret until the captain was
disabled and was relieved by Greene, when I managed the turret
myself, Master Stoddard having been one of the two stunned men.

"Captain Ericsson, I congratulate you upon your great success;
thousands here this day bless you. I have heard whole crews cheer
you; every man feels that you have saved the nation by furnishing us
with the means to whip an iron-clad frigate that was, until our
arrival, having it all her own way with our most powerful vessels."

If space permitted, it would be interesting to trace the career of
Ericsson in detail after the success of the Monitor. There was an
imperative demand for armor-clads, and ere long several were built
by the inventor and his associates. Ericsson was never idle. In
connection with his labors upon war vessels he expended no small
amount of ingenuity on the improvement of heavy guns, his efforts in
this field being directed by a most exhaustive study into the
strength of materials, the operation of explosive forces, and the
laws governing the flight of projectiles. In 1869 he constructed for
the Spanish Government a fleet of thirty steam gunboats, intended to
guard Cuba against filibustering parties. In 1881 he devised his
latest war vesse