CHAPTER XXIV.

THE SUMTER OFF CADIZ-THE PILLARS OF HERCULESGIBRALTAR -CAPTURE OF THE ENEMY'S SHIPS NEA

POLITAN AND INVESTIGATOR-A CONFLAGRATION BETWEEN EUROPE AND AFRICA

THE SUMTER ANCHORS

IN THE HARBOR OF GIBRALTAR· THE ROCK; THE TOWN; THE MILITARY; THE REVIEW AND THE ALAMEDA.

HE afternoon was bright and beautiful as the Sumter, emerging from the harbor of Cadiz, felt once more the familiar heave of the sea. There was no sail in sight over the vast expanse of waters, except a few small coasting-craft, and yet what fleets had floated on the bosom of these romantic waters! The names of Nelson, Collingwood, Jervis, and others, came thronging upon the memory. Cape St. Vincent and Trafalgar were both in the vicinity. The sun, as he approached his setting, was lighting up a scene of beauty, peace, and tranquillity, and it was difficult to conjure those other scenes of the storm, and the flying ships, and the belching cannon, so inseparably connected with those great names.

It was too late to attempt the run to Gibraltar that night, with the hope of arriving at a seasonable hour, and so we "held on," in nautical phrase, to the light—that beautiful red flash which I have before described until midnight, when we gave the ship her steam, and turned her head in the direction of the famous Strait, or Gut, as the sailors sometimes less euphoniously call it. The weather, in the meantime, had changed, the wind had died entirely away, and the sea was calm, but rifts of cloud were passing over the moon, indicating an upper current in the higher atmosphere, that might portend storm or rain on the morrow. We steamed along the

bold Spanish coast, at a distance of only a few miles, and entered the Strait before daylight, passing the Tarifa light at about five A. M.

The Pillars of Hercules, that for so many centuries bounded the voyages of the ancient mariners, rose abruptly and majestically on either hand of us, softened and beautified by the moonlight. We had the Strait all to ourselves, there being no sail visible. The Genius of the ancient time seemed to hover over the scene, so solemn and mysterious did everything appear. But no! the Genius of the ancient time could not be there, for the quiet waters were broken by the prow of the steamship, from a hemisphere of which the Genius had not conceived. And that steamship, what flag did she bear? A flag that neither Phoenician, nor Carthaginian, nor Roman had dreamed of. It had arisen amid the wreck and ruin of a new empire, that had decayed before its time, was floating above a thousand dead nationalities, and was struggling, as the polished Greek had struggled, long centuries before, against the "longhaired" barbarian of the North, who was repeating history by overrunning the fair lands of the South.

We made the light at Gibraltar just as the day was dawning, and, hurried on by the current, moved rapidly up the Strait. Several sail that were coming down the Mediterranean became plainly visible from the deck as the twilight developed into day. We could not think of running into Gibraltar before overhauling these sails; we might, perchance, find an enemy among them, and so we altered our course and gave chase; as so many barks, ancient and modern, heathen, Christian, and Moor had done before us, in this famous old Strait. The telescope soon revealed the secret of the nationality of two of the sails; they being, as plainly as symmetry and beauty of outline, the taper and grace of spars, and whiteness of canvasproduced upon our own cotton-fields-could speak, Ameri

can.

To these, therefore, we directed our attention. It was a couple of hours before we came up with the first of these ships. She was standing over toward the African side of the Strait, though still distant from the land, some six or seven miles. We hoisted our own colors, and fired the usual gun. She hauled up her courses, and backed her maintopsail at

once, and in a moment more, we could see the brightest of stars and stripes fluttering in the breeze, and glittering, in very joyousness, as it were, in the rays of the morning's sun; for the captain of the prize had evidently treated himself to a new ensign. The cat ran close enough to parley with the mouse, before she put her paw upon it. The bark, for such the prize was, proved to be the Neapolitan, of Kingston, Mass., from Messina, in the island of Sicily, bound for Boston, with a cargo of fruit, dried and fresh, and fifty tons of sulphur. She had been freshly painted, with that old robber, the bald eagle, surrounded by stars, gilded on her stern; her decks looked white and sweet after the morning's ablution which she had just undergone; her sails were well hoisted, and her sheets well home; in short, she was a picture to look at, and the cat looked at her, as a cat only can look at a sleek mouse. And then only to think, that the sly little mouse, looking so pretty and so innocent, should have so much of that villanous material called sulphur in its little pouch!

The master stated in his deposition, that the entire cargo belonged to the British house of Baring Bros., it being consigned to an agent of theirs in Boston. The object of so wording the deposition was, of course, to save the cargo as neutral property, but as I happened to know that the Boston house of the Barings, instead of being an agent merely, was a partner of the London house, the master took nothing by his deposi tion. Besides, if there had been no doubt as to the British ownership, sulphur going to an enemy's country is contraband of war; and in this case the contraband of war was not only condemnable of itself, but it tainted all the rest of the cargo, which belonged to the same owner. The master, who was as strongly marked in his Puritan nationality, as the Israelite is in the seed of Abraham, feeling himself securely intrenched behind the Baring Bros., was a little surprised when I told him that I should burn his ship, and began to expostulate. But I had no time for parley, for there was another ship demanding my attention; and so, transferring the prisoners from the doomed ship to the Sumter, as speedily as possible, the Neapolitan was burned; burned in the sight of Europe and Africa, with the turbaned Moor looking upon the conflagra

tion, on one hand, and the garrison of Gibraltar and the Spaniard on the other. Previously to applying the torch, we took a small liberty with some of the excellent fruit of the Barings, transferring a number of drums of figs, boxes of raisins and oranges, to the cooks and stewards of the different

messes.

We now steamed off in pursuit of the other sail. This second sail proved also to be American, as we had supposed. She was the bark Investigator, of Searsport, Maine, from one of the small ports of Spain, bound for Newport, in Wales, with a cargo of iron ore. The cargo being properly documented as British property, we could not destroy her, but were compelled to release her under ransom bond. The capturing and disposing of these two ships had occupied us several hours, during which the in-draught of the Strait had set us some miles to the eastward of the Rock. We now, at half-past two P. M., turned our head in the direction of Gibraltar, and gave the ship all steam. By this time the portent of last night had been verified, and we had an overcast sky, with a strong northwester blowing in our teeth. With the wind and current both ahead, we had quite a struggle to gain the anchorage.

It was half-past seven P. M., or some time after dark, that we finally passed under the shadow of the historical rock, with the brilliant light on Europa Point throwing its beams upon our deck; and it was a few minutes past eight o'clock, or evening gun-fire, when we ran up to the man-of-war anchorage, and came to. We had no occasion to tell the people of Gibraltar who we were. They were familiar with our Cadiz troubles, and had been expecting us for some days; and accordingly, when the signal-man on the top of the Rock announced the appearance of a Confederate States' steamer in the Strait, every one knew that it was the Sumter. And when, a short time afterward, it was announced that the little steamer was in chase of a Yankee, the excitement became intense. Half the town rushed to Europa Point and the signal-station, to watch the chase and the capture; and when the flames were seen ascending from the doomed Neapolitan, sketch-books and pencils were produced, and all the artists in the crowd went busily to work to sketch the extraordinary spectacle; extraor dinary in any age, but still more extraordinary in this.

Here were two civilized nations at war, at the door of a third, and that third nation, instead of mitigating and soften. ing, as much as possible, the barbarities of war, had, by her timidity, caution, or unfriendliness, whichever to the reader may seem more probable, ordered, directed, and decreed that one of the parties should burn all the ships of the other that it should capture! The spectacle of the burning ship which the inhabitants of Gibraltar had witnessed from the top of their renowned rock, was indirectly the work of their own Government. Why might not this Federal ship, when captured, have been taken into Gibraltar, there to await the disposition which a prize-court should make of her, instead of being burned? Because Great Britain would not permit it. Why might she not have been taken into some other neutral port, for this purpose? Because all the world had followed the lead of Great Britain, the chief maritime power of the earth. Great Britain knew when she issued her orders in council, prohibiting both the belligerents in the American war, from bringing their prizes into her ports, precisely what would be the effect of those orders. She knew that the stronger belligerent would shut out the weaker belligerent from his own ports, by means of a blockade. She knew that if she denied this weaker belligerent access to her ports, with his prizes, all the other nations of the earth would follow her lead. And she knew that if this same weaker belligerent should have no ports whatever into which to carry his prizes, he must burn them. Hence the spectacle her people had witnessed from the top of her rock of Gibraltar.

In a few minutes after anchoring, we were boarded by a boat from the English frigate, which had the guard for the day. The officer made us the usual "tender of service" from the Port Admiral. We sent a boat ourselves to report our arrival on board the health ship, and to inquire if there would be any quarantine; and after a long day of excitement and fatigue, for I had not turned in since I left the Cadiz light, the night before-I sought my berth, and slept soundly, neither dreaming of Moor or Christian, Yankee or Confederate. John spread me the next morning a sumptuous breakfast, and brought me off glowing accounts of the Gibraltar market, filled