Shortly after four bells (six o'clock) on the evening of the day on which the accident occurred, the boatswain's mate sent the shrill piping of his whistle echoing through the ship, following it with the words, doleful and long drawn out: "All hands shift-ft-ft into clean-n-n blue and stand by to bury the dead-d-d!" When the crew assembled on the gun deck in obedience to the call, the sun was just disappearing beyond the edge of the distant horizon. Its last rays entered the open port, showing to us the dead man's figure outlined under an American flag. The body had been placed upon a grating in front of an open port, and several men were stationed close by in readiness to launch it into the sea. The ceaseless swaying of the ship in the trough of the sea, the engines having been stopped, set the lines of blue uniformed men swinging and nodding, and, as the surgeon, Dr. McGowan, read the Episcopal service, it seemed in the half light as if every man were keeping time with the cadence. The words of the service, beautiful and impressive under such novel circumstances, echoed and whispered along the deck, and at the sentence, "We commit this body to the deep," the grating was raised gently and, with a peculiar _swish_, the body, heavily weighted, slid down to the water's edge and plunged sullenly into the sea. A moment more and the service was finished, the bugler sounding "pipe down." A salute, three times repeated, was fired by sixteen men of the marine guard. * * * * * The voyage down the coast was utilized in making good men-o'-war's men of the "Yankee's" crew. Captain Brownson believes thoroughly in the efficacy of drill, and he lost no time in living up to his belief. When all the circumstances are taken into consideration, the task allotted to the captain of the "Yankee" by the fortunes of war, was both peculiar and difficult. On his return from Europe, where he had been sent to select vessels for the improvised navy, he was ordered by the Navy Department at Washington to take command of the auxiliary cruiser "Yankee." This meant that he was to assume charge of a ship hastily converted from an ordinary merchant steamer, and to fight the battles of his country with a crew composed of youths and men whose whole life and training had hitherto followed totally different lines. It was a "licking of raw material into shape" with a vengeance. When the "Chesapeake" sailed forth to fight her disastrous battle with the British ship "Shannon," her crew was made up of men untrained in the art of war. The result was the most humiliating naval defeat in the history of the United States. The same fate threatened Captain Brownson. There was this difference in the cases, however. The "Chesapeake" had little time for drilling, while the "Yankee" was fully six weeks in commission before her first shot was fired in action. Every minute of those six weeks was utilized.