which I tried my best to make out, so that
I might be able to avail myself of the knowledge of the blockade signals
at some future time; but I could not manage to make head or tail of
them.

Suddenly the firing ceased, and our pioneer turned out to sea again. As
we were by this time very near inshore, we stopped the engines and
remained quite still, but unluckily could not make out our exact
position.

The blockading cruisers were evidently very close in, so we did not like
moving about; besides, the pilot was confident that we were close enough
to the entrance of the river to enable us to run in when day broke,
without being in any danger from the enemy.

Thus for the remainder of the night we lay quite close to the beach.
Unfortunately, however, about an hour before daylight we struck the
shore, and all our efforts to free the vessel were of no avail.

As the day dawned we found that we were about a mile from Fort Fisher,
and that two of the American vessels nearest the shore were about a mile
from us when we first made them out, and were steaming to seaward,
having probably been lying pretty near to the river's mouth during the
darkness of the night. They were not slow to make us out in our unhappy
position. I ordered the boats to be lowered, and gave every one on board
the option of leaving the vessel, as it seemed evident that we were
doomed to be a bone of contention between the fort and the blockaders.
All hands, however, stuck to the ship, and we set to work to lighten her
as much as possible. Steam being got up to the highest pressure, the
engines worked famously, but she would not move, and I feared the sand
would get into the bilges. And now a confounded vessel deliberately
tried the range with her Parrot gun, and the shot splashed alongside of
us. Her fire, however, was promptly replied to by Fort Fisher. The shot
from the fort's heavy artillery passed right over and close to the
cruiser, and made her move further out, and thus spoiled the accuracy of
the range of our devoted little craft, which the man-of-war had so
correctly obtained. We made a frantic effort to get off our sandy bed,
and on all hands running from one extremity of the vessel to the other,
to our delight she slipped off into deep water.

But our troubles were not yet over. To get into the river's mouth it was
necessary to make a _detour_, to do which we had to steer out towards
the blockading fleet for a quarter of a mile before we co