Both officers rushed down the stairs and jumped into the cutter, which steamed off at full speed and took them to their ships. Three-quarters of an hour later the tug mentioned in the beginning of the chapter appeared again at the entrance to the lagoon. Several men could be seen in the stern holding a large white sheet upon which a man was painting a large red cross, and when the symbol of human love and assistance was finished, the sheet was hoisted at the flagstaff. Two other tugs followed the example of the first one. But could the enemy have taken the three little tugs for torpedo-boats? It seemed so, for suddenly a shell, which touched the surface of the water twice, whizzed past and hit the first steamer amidships just below the funnel. And while the little vessel was still enveloped by the black smoke caused by the bursting of the shell, her bow and stern rose high out of the water and she sank immediately, torn in two. The thunder of the shot sounded far over the water and found an echo among the houses at Corpus Christi. "Now they're even shooting at the ambulance flag," roared Ben Wood, who was rushing about on the deck of the _President Cleveland_ and exhorting the crew to hoist the anchor as fast as possible so as to get out to the field of battle. But as the boiler-fires were low, this seemed to take an eternity. At last, about three o'clock in the afternoon, they succeeded in reaching a spot where a few hundred men were clinging to the floating wreckage. The rest had been attended to by the enemy's shots, the sea and the sharks. The enemy had wasted only a few shots on the transport-steamers, as a single well-aimed explosive shell was quite sufficient to entirely destroy one of the merchant-vessels, and the battle with the _Olympia_ had lasted only a very short time, as the distance had evidently been too great to enable the American shots to reach the enemy. That was the end of the _Olympia_, Admiral Dewey's flag-ship at Cavite! The two smaller cruisers had been shot to pieces just as rapidly. The results of this unexpected setback were terribly disheartening, since all idea of a flank attack on the Japanese positions in the South had to be abandoned. * * * * *