he outside with grease and tallow. Her enormous weight
made her draw more than twenty feet of water and when she was moving
slowly through the bay or river her appearance suggested the mansard
roof of a vast house. From what has been said it will be noted that the
_Merrimac_ was a genuine ironclad, something which had never been heard
of before.

[Illustration: BLOCKADE RUNNER--THE "MONITOR"--CAPTAIN ERICSSON.]

Regular news of the building of the _Merrimac_ (called the _Virginia_ by
the Confederates) was telegraphed to Washington by friends of the
Government. The authorities felt some uneasiness, but were far from
suspecting the terrible power for destructiveness possessed by the
monster. Captain Ericsson, the famous Swedish inventor, was constructing
on Long Island an ironclad about one-fourth the size of the _Merrimac_,
and he was urged to all possible speed in its completion. He kept his
men busy night and day and had it finished a day or two before the
completion of the _Merrimac_.

The _Merrimac_ carried ten guns, which fired shells and had a crew of
300 men, under the command of Commodore Franklin Buchanan, a former
officer of the United States navy. Late in the forenoon of March 8,
1862, a column of black smoke rising over the Norfolk Navy Yard gave
notice that the _Merrimac_ had started out at last on her mission of
destruction and death. As the enormous craft forged into sight it was
seen that she was accompanied by three gunboats ready to give what help
they could.

Five Union vessels were awaiting her in Hampton Roads. They were the
steam frigates _Minnesota_ and _Roanoke_ and the sailing frigates
_Congress_, _Cumberland_ and _St. Lawrence_, all of which immediately
cleared for action. Turning her frightful front toward the _Cumberland_,
the _Merrimac_ swept down upon her in grim and awful majesty. The
_Cumberland_ let fly with her terrific broadsides, which were powerful
enough to sink the largest ship afloat, but the tons of metal hurled
with inconceivable force skipped off the greased sides of the iron roof
and scooted away for hundreds of yards through the startled air.

The prodigious broadsides were launched again and again, but produced no
more effect than so many paper wads from a popgun. The iron prow of the
_Merrimac_ crashed through the wooden walls of the _Cumberland_ as if
they were cardboard, and, while her crew were still heroically working
their guns, the _Cumberland_ went down, with the