pennants were flying, paddle-wheels
began to turn and plash, the bands played gay music, and the fleet drew
off, in a long line of countless steamers and sailing vessels, down the
Severn, and down the Chesapeake.

All day, through a cold, drizzling rain, the fleet sailed on, the
transports still keeping in sight of each other, in a line extending for
miles along the bleak, inhospitable bay.

The next morning, Frank went on deck, and found the schooner at anchor in
a fog. The steamer lay alongside. No other object was visible--only the
restlessly-dashing waters. The wild shrieking of the steamer's whistle,
blowing in the fog to warn other vessels of the fleet to avoid running
down upon them, the near and far responses of similarly screaming
whistles, and of invisible tolling bells, added impressiveness to the
situation.

At nine o'clock, anchors were weighed again, and the fleet proceeded
slowly, feeling its way, as it were, in the obscurity. There was more or
less fog throughout the day; but towards sundown a breeze blew from the
shore, the fog rolled back upon the sea, the clouds broke into wild
flying masses, the blue sky shone through, and the sunset poured its
placid glory upon the scene.

Again the troops crowded the decks. The fleet was entering Hampton Roads.
Upon the right, basking in the golden sunset as in the light of an
eternal calm, a stupendous fortress lay, like some vast monster of old
time, asleep. Frank shivered with strange sensations as he gazed upon
that immense and powerful stronghold of force; trying to realize that,
dreaming so quietly there in the sunset, those gilded walls, which seemed
those of an ancient city of peace, meant horrible, deadly war.

"By hooky!" said Seth Tucket, coming to his side, "that old Fortress
Monroe's a stunner--ain't she? I'd no idee the old woman spread her hoop
skirts over so much ground."

"You can see the big Union gun there on the beach," said Atwater. "To
look at that, then just turn your eye over to Sewell's Point there, where
the rebel batteries are, makes it seem like war." And the tall, grave
soldier smiled, with a light in his eye Frank had seldom seen before.

The evening was fine, the sky clear, the moon shining, the air balmy and
spring-like. The fleet had come to anchor in the Roads. The bands were
playing, and the troops cheering from deck to deck. The moonlight
glittered on the water, and whitened the dim ships riding at anchor, and
lay mistily