We never catch all of "whatever happens," and neither Callender saw the brave men in gray who for one moment of horror fled from their own guns in water-battery and fort; but all at once they beheld the _Tecumseh_ heave, stagger, and lurch like a drunkard, men spring from her turret into the sea, the _Brooklyn_ falter, slacken fire and draw back, the Hartford and the whole huddled fleet come to a stand, and the rallied fort cheer and belch havoc into the ships while the _Tecumseh_ sunk her head, lifted her screw into air and vanished beneath the wave. They saw Mobile Point a semicircle of darting fire, and the _Brooklyn_ "athwart the _Hartford's_ hawse"; but they did not see, atom-small, perched high in the rigging of the flag-ship and demanding from the decks below, "why this?" and "why that?" a certain "plain sailor" well known to New Orleans and the wide world; did not see the torpedoes lying in watery ambush for him, nor hear the dread tale of them called to him from the _Brooklyn_ while his ship passed astern of her, nor him command "full speed ahead" as he retorted, "Damn the torpedoes!" They saw his ship and her small consort sweep undestroyed over the dead-line, the _Brooklyn_ follow with hers, the Mobile gunboats rake the four with a fire they could not return, and behind them Fort Morgan and the other ships rend and shatter each other, shroud the air with smoke and thresh the waters white with shot and shell, shrapnel, canister and grape. And then they saw their own _Tennessee_ ignore the monitors and charge the _Hartford_. But they beheld, too, the _Hartford's_ better speed avoid the fearful blow and press on up the channel and the bay, though torn and bleeding from her foe's broadside, while her own futilely glanced or rebounded from his impenetrable mail. Wisely, rightly their boat turned and slowly drew away toward Fort Powell and Cedar Point. Yet as from her after deck they saw the same exploit, at the same murderous cost, repeated by the _Brooklyn_ and another and another great ship and their consorts, while not a torpedo did its work, they tearfully called the hour "glorious" and "victorious" for the _Tennessee_ and her weak squadron, that still fought on. So it seemed to them even when more dimly, as distance and confusion grew and rain-clouds gathered, they saw a wooden ship ram the _Tennessee_, but glance off, and the slow _Tennessee_ drop astern, allow a sixth tall ship and small consort to pass, but turn in the wake of the seventh and all but disembowel her with the fire of her great bow gun.