At length, on the twenty-third, the volunteers for the perilous enterprise mustered at the Grand Battery, whence the boats were to set out. Brigadier Waldo, who still commanded there, saw them with concern and anxiety, as they came dropping in, in small squads, without officers, noisy, disorderly, and, in some cases, more or less drunk. “I doubt,” he told the general, “whether straggling fellows, three, four, or seven out of a company, ought to go on such a service.”[126] A bright moon and northern lights again put off the attack. The volunteers remained at the Grand Battery, waiting for better luck. “They seem to be impatient for action,” writes Waldo. “If there were a more regular appearance, it would give me greater sattysfaction.”[127] On the twenty-sixth their wish for action was fully gratified. The night was still and dark, and the boats put out from the battery towards twelve o’clock, with about three hundred men on board.[128] These were to be joined by a hundred or a hundred and fifty more from 120 Gorham’s regiment, then stationed at Lighthouse Point. The commander was not Vaughan, but one Brooks,--the choice of the men themselves, as were also his subordinates.[129] They moved slowly, the boats being propelled, not by oars, but by paddles, which, if skilfully used, would make no noise. The wind presently rose; and when they found a landing-place, the surf was lashing the rocks with even more than usual fury. There was room for but three boats at once between the breakers on each hand. They pushed in, and the men scrambled ashore with what speed they might.