she took fire and blew up. The
Minnesota was the third victim marked for destruction, and the Merrimac
began the attack upon her at once; but it was getting very late, and as
the water was shoal and she could not get close, the rain finally
drew back to her anchorage, to wait until next day before renewing and
completing her work of destruction.

All that night there was the wildest exultation among the Confederates,
while the gloom and panic of the Union men cannot be described. It
was evident that the United States ships-of-war were as helpless as
cockle-shells against their iron-clad foe, and there was no question
but that she could destroy the whole fleet with ease and with absolute
impunity. This meant not only the breaking of the blockade; but the
sweeping away at one blow of the North's naval supremacy, which was
indispensable to the success of the war for the Union. It is small
wonder that during that night the wisest and bravest should have almost
despaired.

But in the hour of the nation's greatest need a champion suddenly
appeared, in time to play the last scene in this great drama of sea
warfare. The North, too, had been trying its hand at building ironclads.
The most successful of them was the little Monitor, a flat-decked, low,
turreted, ironclad, armed with a couple of heavy guns. She was the first
experiment of her kind, and her absolutely flat surface, nearly level
with the water, her revolving turret, and her utter unlikeness to any
pre-existing naval type, had made her an object of mirth among most
practical seamen; but her inventor, Ericsson, was not disheartened in
the least by the jeers. Under the command of a gallant naval officer,
Captain Worden, she was sent South from New York, and though she almost
foundered in a gale she managed to weather it, and reached the scene
of the battle at Hampton Roads at the moment when her presence was
all-important.

Early the following morning the Merrimac, now under Captain Jones (for
Buchanan had been wounded), again steamed forth to take up the work she
had so well begun and to destroy the Union fleet. She steered straight
for the Minnesota; but when she was almost there, to her astonishment
a strange-looking little craft advanced from the side of the big
wooden frigate and boldly barred the Merrimac's path. For a moment the
Confederates could hardly believe their eyes. The Monitor was tiny,
compared to their ship, for she was not one fifth the size, and h