The demand from the steamer to heave to was answered by a defiant pressing on of every stitch of canvas, and a still more jaunty display of the stars and stripes at the mizzen. The chase was then continued for a few seconds longer; but at no time was the issue of it uncertain. The Alabama seemed to cut the waters with prodigious speed, and a blank charge from one of her big guns brought the Sea Bride to a full stop. The Confederate, puffing off her steam in enormous volumes, moved gently round her fated victim, and seemed to gaze upon her with the complacent satisfaction a cat might show after the seizure of a tempting mouse, or a hawk which in swift descent had pounced on its unsuspecting prey. A boat was sent to go on board the bark--a few minutes longer and it was impossible to judge what was happening; until at last the stars and stripes were struck, and the Northern bark Sea Bride was manifestly proclaimed a Confederate prize. When the Alabama anchored in the bay, she was surrounded by boats, the occupants all eager to view ship, officers and crew; and the Confederates found themselves the heroes of the hour. The history of their captures and the battle with the Hatteras had to be related over and over again, with various grades of embellishment, according to the veracity or imagination of the narrator. The newspaper account continues: Next day the excitement in town was if possible still greater. The day was to all intents and purposes a general holiday. The weather was favorable, charming; the bay was as smooth and sparkling as a sheet of glass, and every man, woman and child in Cape Town seemed to have made up their minds to get on board the Alabama in some; way or other. * * * The Alabama took in and discharged a living freight at the rate of about sixty in the minute from eight o'clock in the morning till four or five in the afternoon. * * * The boatmen quarreled, roared and swore, as their eager living cargoes tumbled in and out of large boats into little ones, utterly reckless of their lives in their mad haste to get into the ship. The ladies' crinolines blocked the ladders and gangways. * * * The great center of attraction was Captain Semmes. "Where is he?" "Might we just have a look at him?" "Do let us down," "Do make a little room," begged and prayed ladies and gentlemen all day long at the head of the companion ladder leading down to the cabin.