olcano, the
schooner blew up. Huge timbers, stones, and barrels were sent flying
high into the air. The lieutenant and ten men from the frigate, who
were on the "Eagle" at the time, were blown to atoms; and the timbers
and missiles, falling on all sides, seriously injured many men in the
boats near by. Had the frigate been alongside, where her commander had
endeavored to place her, she would have gone to the bottom, with all
her crew.

An attempt so nearly successful as this could not be long in leading
others to make similar ventures. Sir Thomas Hardy, the commander of
the "Ramillies," was kept in a constant fever of apprehension, lest
some night his ship should be suddenly sent to the bottom by one of
the insidious torpedoes. Several times the ship was attacked; and her
escapes were so purely matters of accident, that she seemed almost to
be under the protection of some sailors' deity. A Norwich mechanic,
who had invented a submarine boat with a speed of three miles an hour,
succeeded in getting under the bottom of the blockader three times,
but was each time foiled in his attempt to attach a torpedo to the
ship's hull. Another American, a fisherman, succeeded in getting
alongside in a whale-boat, unobserved, but was driven away before he
could get his torpedo in position. Such constant attacks so alarmed
Hardy, that at last he gave up bringing his ship to anchor, keeping
her continually under way, and, as a further precaution, causing her
bottom to be swept every two hours throughout the day and night.

The use of torpedoes was not confined to the people of New England.
New York Harbor was closed with a row of them. The British
seventy-four "Plantagenet," lying off Cape Henry, Virginia, was nearly
sunk by one in the charge of Mr. Mix, an American naval officer. The
attack was made near ten o'clock, on an unusually dark night. Mix and
his associates pulled in a heavy boat to a point near the bow of the
menaced vessel. The torpedo was then slipped into the water, with the
clockwork which was to discharge it set in motion. The rushing tide
carried the destructive engine down toward the frigate; and the
Americans pulled away into the darkness, to await the explosion. But
the clockwork had been badly adjusted, and the torpedo exploded just
before it reached the ship. A huge column of water, gleaming with a
ghostly sulphurous light, was thrown high in the air, falling with
terrific force on the deck of the frigate, which