Across the channel, which runs close to Morgan, several lines of torpedoes were planted, and just beyond them to the northward of the fort, in line abreast waiting their opportunity, was the rebel squadron, comprising the Tennessee, flagship of Admiral Buchanan, and the gunboats Morgan, Gaines, and Selma, carrying in the aggregate twenty-two guns--eight rifles and fourteen smooth-bores. The Tennessee, the most powerful ship that ever flew the Confederate flag, was two hundred and nine feet in length, and forty-eight feet in width, with a heavy iron spur projecting from the bow some two feet under water. Her sides "tumbled home" at an angle of forty-five degrees and were clad in armor of five and six inches thickness, over a structure of oak and pine of twenty-five inches. Her guns, six heavy Brooke's rifles, were arranged, by port and pivot, for an effective all-round fire, and her speed was six knots. [Illustration: THE TENNESSEE.] All was ready for the attack on the evening of the fourth of August, and at half-past five the next morning the signal was thrown out to weigh, and fall into the order prescribed; the wooden ships in couples, and the ironclads in line by themselves; the Tecumseh in the van and the Chickasaw in rear, according to the rank of their commanding officers. At half-past six the fleet was across the bar and in order of battle. No starlight or favoring clouds now, to partially mask its movements as at the passage of Forts Jackson and St. Philip, but the joyous sunshine, flooding land and sea with its brightness, and mirroring its revealing gleams upon fort and ship and pennon, serving friend and foe alike impartially. Alas! for the brave souls to whom that gracious morning light was the last of earth, but we may hope they awoke in a light of still more radiance and glory, and amid paeans of a joyous host, choiring "Well done, thou good and faithful servants, that didst give thy lives to God and country!"