This pleasant period of instruction passed all too quickly, and the boy, now grown to man's estate, after some further service in the Mediterranean, was, on January 1, 1821, at the age of nineteen and a half years, promoted to the rank of lieutenant, and ordered to duty on the West India station. In 1824 he was assigned to duty at the Norfolk navy-yard; and with the exception of a two years' cruise in the Vandalia, on the Brazil station, remained at Norfolk till 1833. Here he married a lady of highly respectable family, and during the long years of suffering through which she was called to pass, from a hopeless physical malady, he proved one of the most tender and affectionate of husbands, never wearying of administering all the relief and comfort to the sufferer in his power. When death at last terminated her protracted distress, he mourned her tenderly and long. He subsequently married another lady of Norfolk, Miss Virginia Loyall, the daughter of one of the most eminent citizens of that city. In 1860 he had spent nearly nineteen years afloat--eighteen years and four months on shore duty, and ten years and ten months either waiting orders or on leave of absence. Forty-eight of his fifty-eight years had been spent in the naval service. In April, 1861, came the rebellion. Captain Farragut was at his home in Norfolk, surrounded by those who were sympathizers with the rebellion, and who were already maturing plans for the seizure of the Government property and its conversion to rebel uses. No more loyal heart ever beat than his, and in frank and manly terms he denounced the whole proceedings of the traitors, and gave expression to his abhorrence of them. This roused all the hatred of the plotters of treason, and they told him at once, in tones of menace, that he could not be permitted to live there if he held such sentiments. "Very well," was his prompt reply, "then I will go where I can live and hold such sentiments." Returning to his home, he informed his family that they must leave Norfolk for New York in a few hours. They immediately made their preparations, and the next morning, April 18, 1861, bid adieu to Norfolk. The Navy Department was, however, anxious to give him employment, and in default of anything else he served for a time as a member of the Naval Retiring Board, which shelved the incompetent officers of the navy, and promoted the active, loyal, and deserving. Meantime, the Government had resolved on the capture of New Orleans, and entered with zeal upon the work of fitting out a squadron, as well as an army, for its reduction. The squadron was to consist of a fleet of armed steamers, and twenty bomb-schooners, each carrying gigantic mortars, fifteen-inch shells.