we pipe to dinner
again.

"One bell had struck some time, when the attention of the
quarter-master on watch was drawn to an unusual appearance against the
fringe of woods away over in the Norfolk Channel. After gazing
intently some time, he approached the officer of the deck, and
presenting him the glass said,'I believe _that thing_ is a-comin' down
at last, sir.'

"Sure enough! There was a huge black roof, with a smokestack emerging
from it, creeping down towards Sewall's Point. Three or four
satellites, in the shape of small steamers and tugs, surrounded and
preceded her. Owing to the intervening land, they could not be seen
from Hampton Roads until some time after we had made them out; but,
when they did show themselves clear of the point, there was a great
stir among the shipping. But they turned up into the James River
channel instead of down toward the fort, approaching our anchorage
with ominous silence and deliberation.

"The officers were by this time all gathered on the poop, looking at
the strange craft, and hazarding all sorts of conjectures about her;
and when it was plain that she was coming to attack us, or to force
the passage, we beat to quarters, the "Cumberland's" drum answering
ours.

"By a little after four bells, or two o'clock, the strange monster was
close enough for us to make out her plating and ports; and we tried
her with a solid shot from one of our stern-guns, the projectile
glancing off her forward casemate like a drop of water from a duck's
back. This opened our eyes. Instantly she threw aside the screen from
one of her forward ports, and answered us with grape, killing and
wounding quite a number. She then passed us, receiving our broadside
and giving one in return, at a distance of less than two hundred
yards. Our shot had apparently no effect upon her, but the result of
her broadside on our ship was simply terrible. One of her shells
dismounted an eight-inch gun, and either killed or wounded every one
of the gun's crew, while the slaughter at the other guns was fearful.
There were comparatively few wounded, the fragments of the huge shells
she threw killing outright as a general thing. Our clean and handsome
gun-deck was in an instant changed into a slaughter-pen, with
lopped-off legs and arms, and bleeding, blackened bodies, scattered
about by the shells; while blood and brains actually dripped from the
beams. One poor fellow had his chest transfixed by a splinter of oak
as th