the United States, with whom England was at peace. Mr. Adams informed Lord John Russell that English sailors were being secured to man the Enrica, and called upon the British Government to prevent her departure. The evidence was so strong that Lord John Russell saw he must do something, or the United States would have good ground for complaint. He did not, however, hurry in the matter, but delayed several days. Captain Bulloch, who had charge of the Enrica, made all haste to get to sea. "I received," he says, "information from a private but most reliable source that it would not be safe to leave the ship in Liverpool another forty-eight hours."

It was a select party of ladies and gentlemen which gathered by invitation on the deck of the Enrica for a trial trip of the vessel down Liverpool harbor. It is quite probable that not many on board knew that she never would again drop anchor in the Mersey. The vessel was followed by the tug-boat Hercules with a strange company on board: from eighty to one hundred men and women; the men mostly English sailors, with Frenchmen, Italians, and dark - featured Malayans - some of them boys-all gathered from the slums of Liverpool; the women hard-featured, from whose cheeks beauty had long since faded, from whose brows the light of heaven had forever departed. Of the crew Captain Semmes, who commanded the Alabama, has this to say: "These boys had been taken from the slums and haunts of vice about Liverpool, and were as great a set of scamps as any disciplinarian could desire to lick into shape."(") While sherry and champagne were quaffed on board the Enrica, there was much drinking of rum on board the Hercules. The Enrica ran into the calm waters of Moelfa Bay. The steward of the Enrica had his stewpans steaming and smoking with soup to feed the hungry crowd. Captain Bulloch, agent of the Confederate Navy, called the boozy sailors around him, asked them if they would like to ship for a cruise to the West Indies, provided they could have a month's pay in advance; and all but two or three agreed to go. He gave them and the women each a parting glass of grog, and the Hercules, with the ladies and gentlemen, and the women from the dens and alleys, steamed back to Liverpool, while the Enrica sailed away, shaping her course to the Azores, where, a few days later, she dropped anchor alongside the bark Agrippiana, from which cannon, shot, shell, powder, muskets, pistols, and swords were transferred to the Enrica. The Confederate steamer Bahama came with a lot more scapegraces who had been gathered from the lowest sailors' dens of a great commercial city.

On a Sunday morning the two vessels steamed out from the harbor of

the little town of Angra, on the Island of Terceira, till more than three miles from land. Standing upon the quarter-deck of the Enrica, Captain Raphael Semmes; in a Confederate uniform, with his officers around him, read the commission which Jefferson Davis had given him, appointing him captain in the Confederate Navy, and his order from Mr. Mallory, Secretary of the Navy. The crew uncovered their heads. The English flag was flying above them, but at a signal it came down and a ball of bunting at the mast-head fluttered out into the Confederate flag. The ship was no longer the Enrica, but the Alabama-built in England by English ship-builders, English workmen, mounted with English cannon, supplied with shot and shell and powder from English manufacturers, every anchor, cable, mast, halyard, and belaying-pin supplied by England, manned by an English crew in part, all cunningly transferred to the Confederacy, to begin a work of destruction which would be beneficial to English shipbuilders, masters, merchants, but disastrous to the people of the United States; which would bring poverty to homes where there had been plenty; which would drive the commerce of the United States for a third or half a century from the sea and build up that of Great Britain, and arouse an angry feeling towards that country which would not be allayed even by the acknowledgment on the part of Great Britain of the accountability of that Government, and the payment of fifteen million dollars as damages --a destruction which would in no way be of benefit to the Confederacy.

During the summer months schools of whales may be seen around the Azores. Captain Semmes was sure that he would soon find a large fleet of whaling-vessels there; nor was he disappointed. On the afternoon of September 4th, a sailor in the main-top of the Alabama gave the cry of "Sail, ho!" and, in a short time, this swift-sailing vessel, new, neat, trim, and bright from an English ship-yard, was alongside the American ship Ocmulgee, the crew of which had captured a whale, and were cutting out the blubber. The Alabama came up with the English flag flying, but Captain Semmes, when alongside, hauled it down, and ran up the Confederate flag. In the morning the torch was applied, and a pillar of smoke rose heavenward from the burning oil. He ran in towards the Island of Flores, and landed the captured crew without money or means to sustain them.

While the prisoners were being sent ashore, "Sail, ho!" came from the mast-head. Up went the English colors over the Alabama, and the ship Starlight of Boston fell into the hands of Captain Semmes, with its crew of seven men.

Captain Semmes had previously commanded the Sumter, a Confeder

ate cruiser, and had already burned many ships. The Sumter had reached Cadiz, and the paymaster of the vessel went to Tangier, in Africa, to obtain some supplies that were needed, when he was arrested by the authorities, at the request of the United States consul, under a treaty between the United States and Morocco, and was harshly treated, having been put in irons. Captain Semmes determined to have his revenge, and the captain and crew of the Starlight soon found themselves in irons on board the Alabama. Although there were several women on board the vessel who had taken passage to Boston, their discomfort, disappointment, and trouble did not deter him from carrying out his work of destruction. Nor did the putting of the seven men in irons satisfy his desire for revenge for the indignity to the paymaster of the Sumter. These his words:

"I pursued this practice, painful as it was, for the next seven or eight captures, putting the masters, mates of ships, as well as the crews, in irons."(1)

For the next few days the ocean around the Azores was lighted with burning vessels, set on fire by Captain Semmes-officers and crew enriching themselves with whatever they could find upon the unresisting and helpless whaling-vessels, manned by the peaceful toilers of the seas.

NOTES TO CHAPTER II.

(1) Mason to Benjamin, Confederate State Papers.

(2) Russell to Lyons, diplomatic correspondence.

(3) Mason to Benjamin, unpublished Confederate State Papers.

(1) Wilkes's report to the Secretary of the Navy.

() George Kimball, member of regiment, to author.

() Martin, "Life of the Prince Consort," vol. v., p. 423.

(") "Life of Thurlow Weed," vol. ii., p. 347.

() Mason to Benjamin, unpublished Confederate State Papers. (2) Idem.

(1) Slidell to Benjamin, July 25, 1862.

(1) Corwin to Seward, diplomatic correspondence, June 29, 1861.

(12) Slidell to Benjamin, October 28, 1862.

(13) Bulloch, "Confederate Secret Service," p. 238.

(14) Semmes, "Memoirs of Service Afloat," p. 454. (15) Idem, p. 429.

CHAPTER III.

IN THE SOUTH-WEST.

THE HE year 1863 opened with victory for the Army of the Cumberland at Stone River, but with disaster to the Union cause at Galveston, in Texas, held by three companies of the Forty-second Massachusetts regiment, commanded by Colonel Burrell. In the harbor was a naval force the Harriet Lane, Owasco, Westfield, and Clifton. The two last were old ferry-boats, fitted up for blockaders, carrying heavy guns. Captain Renshaw commanded the fleet. He took possession of the city before the arrival of the troops, and assured Colonel Burrell that the Confederates would not dare to make an attack.

General Magruder was in command of the Confederates in Texas. He fitted up two steamers-the Bayou City and the Neptune-filling them with bales of cotton, with embrasures for his cannon. He had one heavy gun-a 68-pounder-but his other cannon were field-pieces. One hundred and fifty sharp-shooters were placed on each vessel, to pick off the gunners of the Union fleet.

It was three o'clock in the morning New-year's-day when the Union pickets discovered between four and five thousand Confederate troops advancing to attack the town held by the handful of men who had built a barricade of cotton-bales on a wharf. The Union vessels-Sachem, a small steamer, Corypheus, a yacht, and the Owasco-opened fire, which with the musketry kept the Confederates at bay. Twice they attempted to charge, but were repulsed, with many killed and wounded.

At daylight the two Confederate steamers came down the river, and the Harriet Lane steamed up the channel to meet them, firing with her bow gun, which burst at the third discharge, steering straight for the Bayou City, striking her wheel-house, pouring in a broadside, being struck in turn by the Neptune, which did little injury to the Harriet Lane, but which opened her own seams so wide that the water rushed in, and a few moments later she went to the bottom. The Bayou City ran alongside the Union vessel, and the sharp-shooters began to pick off the men at the