Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 21.djvu/174

 166 seas, whose track was marked by a line of fire around the earth, from the tropics to the Arctic, while she gave the whaling marine of the United States its fatal blow:

"On the evening of the 8th day of October, 1864," said he, "there met on Princesses dock, Liverpool, twenty-seven men. They were nearly unacquainted with each other, and knew nothing of their destination. All were officers of the Confederate navy, by commission or warrant, and each had his distinct order to report to this place at the same hour. My commission was that of assistant surgeon. A tug was waiting, and we were hurried upon its deck with great haste. In the stream lay the steam blockade-Runner Laurel. In the shortest time imaginable we were hustled on board this craft, and were steaming down the stream. At the same hour, casting off her lines from her London dock, and moving down the Thames, with her grim dogs of war concealed between her decks, ostensibly a merchantman, and bound for Bombay, sailed the English ship Sea King. One week later the ships met in the harbor of Funchal, Madeira. But the captain of the port ordering us out of his waters in the name of his Sovereign of Portugal, we raised anchor and found an offing beside the three great Desertas, massive rocks that rise out of the blue bosom of the Atlantic. Here the ships were lashed together, and the Sea King received from the Laural, which was loaded deep, arms, ordnance, and coal sufficient for an extended voyage of a man-of-war.

" This done the crews of both vessels were ordered on board the Sea King, when James I. Waddell, going down into her cabin, soon reappeared on deck clad in full uniform and bearing the side arms of a Confederate naval captain. Holding his commission for such office in his hand he read it to the assembled crews, and closed in a brief address, declaring that this ship, late the Sea King, of England, should now and forever be known as the Confederate States warship Shenandoah; that her object should be to prey upon and destroy the commerce of the United States, and that all of either crew, the Laurel's or the Sea King's, who wished to enlist their lives and services in the defence of the Confederate cause on board this ship might now do so.

"Jack shifted his quid, put his hands deeper than ever in his pockets, and thought long at this sudden turn in events. He finally shook his head. Some few asked what about bounty? Not being