of Mexico to the
China Sea. She captured "Yankees" within one day's steaming of
the New York Navy Yard as well as in the Straits of Sunda. West
of the Azores and off the coast of Brazil her captures came so
thick and fast that they might have almost been a flock of sheep
run down there by a wolf. Finally, to fill the cup of wrath against
her, she had sunk a blockader off the coast of Texas, given the
slip to a Union man-of-war at the Cape of Good Hope, and kept the
Navy guessing her unanswered riddles for two whole years.

Imagine, then, the keen elation with which all hands aboard the
U. S. S. _Kearsarge_ heard at their berth off Flushing that the
_Alabama_ was in port at Cherbourg on the Channel coast of France,
only one day's sail southwest! And there she was when the _Kearsarge_
came to anchor; and every Northern eye was turned to see the ship
of which the world had heard so much. The Kearsarges hardly dared
to hope that there would be a fight; for they had the stronger
vessel, and now the faster one as well. The _Alabama_ had been
built for speed; but she had knocked about so much without a proper
overhaul that her copper sheathing was in rags, while she was more
or less strained in nearly every other part. The _Kearsarge_, on
the other hand, was in good order, with mantlets of chain cable
protecting her vitals, with one-third greater horse power, with
fourteen more men in her crew, and with two big pivot guns throwing
eleven inch shells with great force at short ranges. Moreover,
the _Kearsarge_, with her superior speed and stronger hull, could
choose the range and risk close quarters. The Alabamas were also
keen to estimate respective strengths. But the French authorities
naturally kept the two ships pretty far apart; so the Alabamas
never saw the chain mantlets which the Kearsarges had cleverly
hidden under a covering of wood that appeared to be flush with the
hull.

The Kearsarges had a second and still more elating surprise when they
heard the _Alabama_ was coming out to fight. Semmes was apparently
anxious to show that his raider could be as gallant in fighting a
man-of-war as she was effective in sinking merchant vessels; so
he wrote his challenge to the Confederate Consul at Cherbourg, who
passed it on to the U. S. Consul, who handed it to Captain Winslow,
commanding the _Kearsarge_. Still, four days passed without the
_Alabama_; and the Kearsarges were giving up hope, when, suddenly,
on Sunday morning,