There they found the Naval Academy in danger of attack,
and Old Ironsides--serving as a practice-ship for the future
midshipmen--also exposed. The call was now for seamen to man the old
craft and save her from a worse enemy than her prototype met in the
"Guerriere." Seamen? Of course! They were Marblehead men, Gloucester
men, Beverly men, seamen all, _par excellence_! They clapped on the
frigate to aid the middies, and by-and-by started her out into the
stream. In doing this their own pilot took the chance to run them
purposely on a shoal in the intricate channel. A great error of judgment
on his part! as he perceived, when he found himself in irons and in
confinement. "The days of trifling with traitors are over!" think the
Eighth Regiment of Massachusetts.
But there they were, hard and fast on the shoal, when we came up.
Nothing to nibble on but knobs of anthracite. Nothing to sleep on softer
or cleaner than coal-dust. Nothing to drink but the brackish water under
their keel. "Rather rough!" as they afterward patiently told us.
Meantime the Constitution had got hold of a tug, and was making her way
to an anchorage where her guns commanded everything and everybody.
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