ther way, and take the lead upstream again. Every now and then
he looked at the pocket compass that hung from his watch chain;
though, for the most part, he tried to scan a scene of action lit
only by the flashes of the guns. The air was dense and very still;
so the smoke of guns and funnels hung like a pall over both the
combatants while the desperate fight went on.

At last the fleet fought through and reached the clearer atmosphere
above the forts; all but the last three gunboats, which were driven
back by the fire. Then Farragut immediately sent word to General
Benjamin F. Butler that the troops could be brought up by the bayous
that ran parallel to the river out of range of the forts. But the
General, having taken in the situation at a glance from a transport
just below the scene of action, had begun to collect his men at
Sable Island, twelve miles behind Fort St. Philip, long before
Farragut's messenger could reach him by way of the Quarantine Bayou.
From Sable Island the troops were taken by the transports to a
point on the Mississippi five miles above Fort St. Philip.

After a well-earned rest the whole fleet moved up to New Orleans
on the twenty-fifth, turning the city's lines five miles downstream
without the loss of a man, for the simple reason that these had
been built only to resist an army, and so lay with flanks entirely
open to a fleet. General Lovell (the able commander who had so
often warned the Confederate Government of the danger from the sea)
at once evacuated the defenseless city. The best of the younger men
were away with the armies. The best of the older men were too few for
the storm. And so pandemonium broke loose. Burning boats, blazing
cotton, and a howling mob greeted Farragut's arrival. But after the
forts (now completely cut off from their base) had surrendered
on the twenty-eighth a landing party from the fleet soon brought
the mob to its senses by planting howitzers in the streets and
lowering the Confederate colors over the city hall. On the first
of May a garrison of Federal troops took charge of New Orleans
and kept it till the war was over.

New Orleans was a most pregnant Federal victory; for it established a
Union base at the great strategic point where sea-power and land-power
could meet most effectively in Mississippi waters.

But it was followed by a perfect anti-climax; for the Federal
Government, having planned a naval concentration at Vicksburg,
determined to put the