d. On the 17th of April the Essex came in sight of Chatham
Island, one of the largest, and remained cruising in the neighborhood of
the group till the beginning of June, when want of water compelled her
to go to Tumbez, a port on the continent just abreast of the Galapagos.
In this period seven British whalers were taken; so that on the 24th of
June there were anchored in Tumbez Bay, including the frigate and the
Barclay, nine vessels under Porter's command. Of these, he commissioned
one--the fastest and best, somewhat less than half the size of the Essex
herself--as a United States cruiser, under his command. She was named
the Essex Junior, carried twenty guns, of which half were long
six-pounders and half eighteen-pounder carronades, and was manned by
sixty of the Essex's crew under her first lieutenant.

The first service of the Essex Junior was to convoy to Valparaiso the
Barclay and four of the British prizes. The occasion was one of great
importance and interest to Farragut; for, though but a boy of twelve, he
was selected to command the party of seamen detailed to manage the
Barclay during this long passage. The captain of the Barclay went with
his ship, but in great discontent that the command of the seamen was
given not to himself, but to such a lad from the ship-of-war. Being a
violent-tempered old man, he attempted by bluster to overawe the boy
into surrendering his authority. "When the day arrived for our
separation from the squadron," writes Farragut in his journal, "the
captain was furious, and very plainly intimated to me that I would
'find myself off New Zealand in the morning,' to which I most decidedly
demurred. We were lying still, while the other ships were fast
disappearing from view, the commodore going north and the Essex Junior,
with her convoy, steering to the south for Valparaiso. I considered that
my day of trial had arrived (for I was a little afraid of the old
fellow, as every one else was). But the time had come for me at least to
play the man; so I mustered up courage and informed the captain that I
desired the maintopsail filled away, in order that we might close up
with the Essex Junior. He replied that he would shoot any man who dared
to touch a rope without his orders; he 'would go his own course, and had
no idea of trusting himself with a d--d nutshell'; and then he went
below for his pistols. I called my right-hand man of the crew and told
him my situation. I also informed him that I