A Victorious Union | Page 4

the foretop and on the top-gallant forecastle were attending closely to their duty, doubtless with a vision of more prize money floating through their brains.
The Bellevite, with the fires banked in the furnaces, was at anchor off the entrance to Mobile Bay, about two miles east of Sand Island Lighthouse, and the same distance south of the narrow neck of land on the western extremity of which Fort Morgan is located. Her commander had chosen this position for a purpose; for several weeks before, while the Bellevite was absent on a special mission, a remarkably fast steamer called the Trafalgar had run the blockade inward.
Captain Passford, Senior, through his agents in England, had some information in regard to this vessel, which he had sent to Captain Breaker. Unlike most of the blockade-runners built for this particular service, she had been constructed in the most substantial manner for an English millionaire, who had insisted that she should be built as strong as the best of steel could make her, for he intended to make a voyage around the world in her.
Unfortunately for the owner of the Trafalgar, who was a lineal descendant of a titled commander in that great naval battle, he fell from his horse in a fox chase, and was killed before the steamer was fully completed. His heir had no taste for the sea, and the steamer was sold at a price far beyond her cost; and the purchaser had succeeded in getting her into Mobile Bay with a valuable cargo. She was of about eight hundred tons burden, and it was said that she could steam twenty knots an hour. She was believed to be the equal of the Alabama and the Shenandoah. The Bellevite had been especially notified not to allow the Trafalgar to escape. She had recently had her bottom cleaned, and her engine put in perfect order for the service expected of her, for she was the fastest vessel on the blockade.
When Captain Breaker had assured himself that he was out of hearing of the officer of the deck, he invited Christy to take a seat at his side. He spoke in a low tone, and was especially careful that no officer should hear him.
"Perhaps I meddle with what does not concern me, Christy; but I cannot help having ideas of my own," said the commander, when he was satisfied that no one but the executive officer could hear him. "There is Fort Morgan, with Fort Gaines three miles from it on the other side of the channel. Mobile Point, as it is called at this end of the neck, extends many miles to the eastward. It is less than two miles wide where it is broadest, and not over a quarter of a mile near Pilot Town."
"I have studied the lay of the land very carefully, for I have had some ideas of my own," added Christy, as the commander paused.
"If Fort Morgan had been Fort Sumter, with bad memories clinging to it, an effort would have been made to capture it, either by bombardment by the navy, or by regular approaches on the part of the army," continued Captain Breaker. "They are still pounding away at Fort Sumter, because there would be a moral in its capture and the reduction of Charleston, for the war began there. Such an event would send a wave of rejoicing through the North, though it would be of less real consequence than the opening of Mobile Bay and the cleaning out of the city of Mobile. Except Wilmington, it is the most pestilent resort for blockade-runners on the entire coast."
"Then you think Fort Morgan can be reduced from the land side?" asked Christy, deeply interested in the conversation.
"I have little doubt of it; and while I believe Farragut will resort to his favorite plan of running by the forts here, as he has done by those of the Mississippi, the army will be planted in the rear of both these forts. As we have lain here for months, I have studied the situation, and I want to know something more about the land on the east of Mobile Point."
"I should say that it would be easy enough to obtain all the information you desire in regard to it," suggested Christy.
"There is an unwritten tradition that the commander must not leave his ship to engage in any duty of an active character, and I cannot explore the vicinity of the fort myself."
"But you have plenty of officers for such duty."
"I have no doubt there are pickets, and perhaps a camp beyond the rising ground, and the exploration would be difficult and dangerous. The two officers I have mentioned before lack the dash and ingenuity such an enterprise requires; and a blunder might involve me in difficulty, for