the Southern cities. An officer of the "Merrimac," who was
despatched post-haste to Richmond with reports of the engagement, was
met at every station by excited crowds, who demanded that he tell the
story of the fight over and over again. At last the starving people of
the Confederacy saw the way clear for the sweeping away of the
remorseless blockade.

In the North, the excitement was that of fear. The people of seaboard
cities imagined every moment the irresistible iron ship steaming into
their harbors, and mowing down their buildings with her terrible
shells. The Secretary of War said, at a hastily called cabinet meeting
in Washington: "The 'Merrimac' will change the whole character of the
war: she will destroy every naval vessel; she will lay all the
seaboard cities under contribution. Not unlikely we may have a shell
or cannon-ball from one of her guns, in the White House, before we
leave this room."

In this excited state, wild with joy, or harassed with fear, the whole
country went to sleep that March night, little dreaming that the
morrow would change the whole face of the naval situation, and that
even then a little untried vessel was steaming, unheralded, toward
Hampton Roads, there to meet the dreaded "Merrimac," and save the
remnants of the Federal fleet. Then no one knew of the "Monitor;" but
twenty-four hours later her name, and that of her inventor Ericsson,
were household words in all the States of the Union and the
Confederacy.

[Illustration: "Merrimac" and "Cumberland."]

Capt. John Ericsson was a Swedish engineer, residing in this country,
who had won a name for himself by inventing the screw-propeller as a
means of propulsion for steamships. He and a Connecticut capitalist,
C. S. Bushnell by name, had ever since the opening of the war been
trying to induce the Government to build some iron-clads after a
pattern designed by Ericsson, and which afterwards became known as the
"monitor" pattern. Their labors at Washington met with little success.
After a long explanation of the plan before the wise authorities of
the Naval Board, Capt. Ericsson was calmly dismissed with the remark,
"It resembles nothing in the heavens above, or the earth beneath, or
the waters under the earth. You can take it home, and worship it
without violating any Commandment." Finally, however, leave was
obtained to build a monitor for the Government, provided the builders
would take all financial risks in case it proved a fa