A few weeks before this an event took place which came near making serious trouble for the United States. The Confederate government had appointed two commissioners, John Slidell and James Mason, to go to England to see if they could not get help from that country. As it would be dangerous for them to sail in a Confederate vessel, they went to Havana, Cuba, where they took passage in an English vessel named the _Trent_. Although they had tried to do this very secretly, Captain Wilkes, commanding a warship of the United States, heard about it, and determined to capture these men, if possible. So he pursued the _Trent_ and obliged her to stop. The Confederate commissioners refused to leave the _Trent_, and, therefore, Captain Wilkes sent an armed force on board and carried them off. He then took them to Boston harbor, where they were imprisoned in a fort of the United States. This act caused great indignation in England, and it was only through the prompt and wise action of President Lincoln and Congress that war was averted. An apology was made and the Confederate commissioners were allowed to proceed on their voyage without further molestation. VIII.--THE CAPTURE OF NEW ORLEANS. On the 2d of February, 1862, Captain Farragut sailed from Hampton Roads in his flagship, the _Hartford_. This was one of the new sloops of war having both steam and sails. All the vessels of this expedition were to meet at Ships Island, about one hundred miles from the mouth of the Mississippi. When Captain Farragut arrived there on February 20th, he found only a part of his fleet awaiting him. The other vessels arrived one by one. This was the most powerful squadron that had ever been under an American commander. It consisted of steam sloops, gunboats, and mortar boats, forty-eight vessels in all. An army of fifteen thousand men was at hand to assist Captain Farragut. This army had been brought from the North on transports, and was under the command of General Benjamin F. Butler. [Illustration: THE HARTFORD.] In the channel, at the mouth of the Mississippi, were heavy mud banks, made of deposits brought down by the stream. To take the large vessels over this bar was Captain Farragut's first great task. The water was so shallow that the keels of the ships would sometimes stick in the mud, and then it was with the greatest of difficulty that they could be hauled off. It was the 18th of April before all the vessels were in the river and ready to attack the forts; and in the meanwhile, a great naval battle had been fought in other waters. The Confederates had captured the Norfolk navy yard, and with it the United States vessel _Merrimac_, which was there at the time. They removed the masts of this vessel, and then fitted her with an iron prow, and built sloping sides over the deck, covering them with iron rails laid closely together side by side. Five of the best Northern war vessels lay in the bay outside of the harbor.