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The "Congress" was the first ship in range, and a puff of smoke from the "Merrimac's" bow-gun warned the crew of the frigate that danger was coming. All held their breath an instant, until, with a clatter and whiz, a storm of grape-shot rattled against her sides, and whistled through the rigging. Then came a sigh of relief that it was no worse.
Rifles and carbines were also used by some of our people to try to pick off the 'Merrimac's' crew when her ports were opened to fire, but of course the effect of the small-arms was not apparent to us. "It is useless to attempt to describe the condition of our decks by this time. No one who has not seen it can appreciate the effect of such a fire in a confined space.
The two shots of the "Monitor" would come banging one after the other against the "Merrimac's" armor, like the "one, two" of a skilled boxer. In this dancing battle the "Monitor" had an enormous advantage, on account of her size, greater speed, and the way in which she answered her helm. The "Merrimac" was like a huge hawk being chased and baited by a little sparrow.
On the other hand, the shot of the Monitor could not penetrate the Merrimac's tough sides. Accordingly, fierce though the struggle was, and much though there was that hinged on it, it was not bloody in character. The Merrimac could neither destroy nor evade the Monitor.
It seemed impossible for human life to exist in that deadly and concentrated fire. In the downpour of shot and shell the Merrimac's rudder was blown away and her stern anchor cut loose. The electric batteries were damaged to such an extent that only part of the torpedoes could be exploded. The result was that instead of sinking where intended, the vessel drifted with the tide past the narrow neck.
The officers in the fort, provided with glasses, could see the effect of the Merrimac's fire in the light patches that showed on the side of the Congress, but the Merrimac appeared entirely uninjured. She now approached the Cumberland, which poured several broadsides into her, but altogether without effect.
The Merrimac's shot glanced harmlessly off the round turret, while her attempts to run the Monitor down failed. Meanwhile the big guns in the Monitor's turret, firing every seven minutes, were pounding the ram's sides with terrible blows. The Merrimac's armor was at points crushed in several inches, but nowhere pierced, About noon the fight stopped, as if by mutual consent.
Anyhow, it's that going-home-to-sleep-on-it expression of the Merrimac's that I've been seeing in the Sappho." "You were on the Monitor, weren't you?" asked Powers cheerfully. The old man did not answer, but he was quite willing that Powers and Brett, and the whole world for that matter, should think that he had been. Powers and Brett, though in no cheerful mood, exchanged winks.
The old fellow was as nice as pie to Hobson and his men, told them they had done a fine thing, took them back to his ship, fed them, fitted them out with dry clothing, and then sent Captain Oviedo, his chief of staff, out to the New York, under a flag of truce, to report that the Merrimac's crew, though prisoners, were alive and well.
That same gale which had buffeted the Asia so rudely on the high seas, had raged yet more savagely shorewards: the Merrimac's antagonist, like a drowning paladin of the mail-clad days, had sunk under her mighty armor, and now, with half her crew in their iron coffin, lay at rest in the crowded burial-ground on which Cape Hatteras looks down.
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