e line, her men were yelling at
the top of their voices; and when their cheers died away everything
became quiet, and the fleet settled down to business.

The first shot was fired at eleven o'clock. It was from a
hundred-pounder on the leading vessel, and was directed against Fort
Bartow. It was the signal for the opening of the contest, and was
quickly followed by such an uproar that Marcy Gray could hardly hear
himself think. He had always thought that a twenty-four pound howitzer
made a pretty loud noise, but it was nothing to the deafening and
continuous roar of the heavy guns that in a moment filled the air all
about him. He thought he ought to be badly frightened, and he expected
to be; but somehow he was not, and neither was he killed by the shell
from Fort Bartow that struck the water close alongside and exploded, it
seemed to him, almost under his feet. He was in full possession of his
senses, and the hand with which he levelled his glass at the Confederate
fleet was as steady as he had ever known it to be. He was particularly
interested in the movements of that fleet, for he was acquainted with
some of the sailors who manned it. As soon as the action was fairly
begun it left its sheltered position under the guns of the fort and
steamed down the channel. Its leading boats came on at such a rate of
speed that Marcy thought they must know of some opening in the lines of
obstructions, and that they intended to come through and demolish the
Union fleet without aid from the guns on shore; but if that was their
object they failed to accomplish it. Their heaviest ship, the _Curlew_,
was whipped so quickly that her rebel commander must have been
astonished; and so badly crippled was she by the solid shot that crashed
through her sides, that it was all she could do to haul out of the fight
and seek refuge under the guns of the nearest fort. In the end both the
ship and the fort were blown up together.

About this time something happened that the young pilot might have
expected, but which he had never once thought of. The smoke of battle
settled so thickly about his vessel that his eyes were of little use to
him; and, to make matters worse, Captain Benton shouted in his ear:

"Keep a bright lookout, and if you see us getting into less than
fourteen feet of water, don't fail to let me know it."

"I declare, I don't know whether there are fourteen or fourteen hundred
feet of water under our keel at this moment!" was the