In a few minutes the _Merrimac_ came gliding up and struck the _Cumberland_ a frightful blow with her iron nose, tearing through the thick oaken timbers and making a great hole in her side. Then she backed off and the water rushed in. In a minute the good ship began to sink, while the _Merrimac_ poured shot and shell into her wounded ribs. "Do you surrender?" asked one of the officers of the _Merrimac_. "Never!" said Lieutenant Morris, who commanded the _Cumberland_. "I'll sink alongside before I pull down that flag." He was a true Yankee seaman; one of the "no surrender" kind. Down, inch by inch, settled the doomed ship. But her men stuck grimly to their guns, and fired their last shot just as she sank out of sight. Then all who had not saved themselves in the boats leaped overboard and swam ashore, but a great many of the dead and wounded went down with the ship. She sank like a true Yankee hero, with her flag flying, and when she struck bottom, with only the tops of her masts above water, "Old Glory" still fluttered proudly in the breeze. That was the way it went when iron first met wood in naval warfare. The victor now turned to the _Congress_ and another fierce battle began. But the wooden ship had no chance. For an hour her men fought bravely, but her great guns were of no use, and a white flag was raised. She had surrendered, but the Confederates could not take possession, for there were batteries on shore that drove them off. So they fired hot shot into the _Congress_ and soon she was in a blaze. It was now five o'clock in the afternoon, and the _Merrimac_ steamed away with the Confederate flag flying in triumph. She had finished her work for that day. It was a famous trial trip. She would come back the next and sink the vessels still afloat--if nothing hindered. For hours that night the _Congress_ blazed like a mighty torch, the flames lighting up the water and land for miles around. It was after midnight when the fire reached her magazine and she blew up with a terrific noise, scattering her timbers far and near. The men on the _Merrimac_ looked proudly at the burning ship. It was a great triumph for them. But they saw one thing by her light they did not like so well. Off towards Fortress Monroe there lay in the water a strange-looking thing, which had not been there an hour before. What queer low ship was that? And where had it come from? The sun rose on the morning of Sunday, March 9, and an hour later the _Merrimac_ was again under way to finish her work. Not far from where the _Congress_ had burnt lay the _Minnesota_. She had run aground and looked like an easy prey. But close beside her was the floating thing they had observed the night before, the queerest-looking craft that had ever been seen.