Well, to go on with their story,—­when they had taken their prize, they drove her straight down-stream to Annapolis, the nearest point to Washington.  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.  Good and true men chuckled greatly over this.  The stars and stripes also were still up at the fort at the Naval Academy.

Our dread, that, while we were off at sea, some great and perhaps fatal harm had been suffered, was greatly lightened by these good omens.  If Annapolis was safe, why not Washington safe also?  If treachery had got head at the capital, would not treachery have reached out its hand and snatched this doorway?  These were our speculations as we began to discern objects, before we heard news.

But news came presently.  Boats pulled off to us.  Our officers were put into communication with the shore.  The scanty facts of our position became known from man to man.  We privates have greatly the advantage in battling with the doubt of such a time.  We know that we have nothing to do with rumors.  Orders are what we go by.  And orders are Facts.

We lay a long, lingering day, off Annapolis.  The air was full of doubt, and we were eager to be let loose.  All this while the Maryland stuck fast on the bar.  We could see them, half a mile off, making every effort to lighten her.  The soldiers tramped forward and aft, danced on her decks, shot overboard a heavy baggage-truck.  We saw them start the truck for the stern with a cheer.  It crashed down.  One end stuck in the mud.  The other fell back and rested on the boat.  They went at it with axes, and presently it was clear.

As the tide rose, we gave our grounded friends a lift with a hawser.  No go!  The Boston tugged in vain.  We got near enough to see the whites of the Massachusetts eyes, and their unlucky faces and uniforms all grimy with their lodgings in the coal-dust.  They could not have been blacker, if they had been breathing battle-smoke and dust all day.  That experience was clear gain to them.