And there we stood on that hot July afternoon, watching the noble craft as she sat like a duck on the water, the Mackerel crew sitting aft picking a marrow-bone, and the venerable Commodore tilted back on his stool upon the quarter-deck, fishing for bass. Presently we could see the treacherous Confederacy stealing down to where his iron-plated monster lay hidden. Softly he removed the covering of hay, and cautiously did he place the ram in the water, carefully examining the priming of the old-fashioned blunderbuss he carried under his arm, as he stepped into this new Merrimac, and quietly raising his umbrella with one hand, while he paddled off with the other. The distance between our fleet and the spectator being fully two yards, Villiam had thoughtfully provided bits of smoked glass for our party, and we now brought them to bear upon the scene of approaching slaughter. The Mackerel crew on board our squadron appeared to be wholly absorbed in the pleasing experiment of following, with a straw, the motions of a fly whose wings he had just pulled off, and Commodore Head had fallen into a refreshing slumber in the midst of his fishing. In fact, no means had been left unemployed to guard against a surprise. Now, it happened that the nautical Confederacy did his paddling with his back to the bow of his iron-plated monster, and before he knew it, his ram went smack against the Mackerel fleet, with a sound like the smashing of many dinner-plates. So tremendous was the shock, that the stool upon which Commodore Head was tilted, gave way beneath his weight, and he came down upon the deck with a crash like muffled thunder. Simultaneously, the Confederacy discharged his blunderbuss two points to windward, and would have followed up his advantage by boarding at once; but by this time the Mackerel crew had recovered his presence of mind, and poured such a shower upon the intruder from a watering-pot which he found in the stern-sheets, that the latter retreated in great disorder. Meanwhile, our gallant old naval hero had regained his feet, and having carefully put away his fishing tackle and box of bait, he made his appearance on the starboard, with his spy-glass under one arm, his speaking trumpet under the other, and his log-book between his teeth. No sooner did the now thoroughly exasperated Confederacy behold his venerable figure, than he hastily shut up his umbrella and violently cracked him over the head with it, knocking off his spectacles, and greatly damaging his new white hat. "Batter my armor!" thundered the commodore, picking up his spectacles and bending them straight again. "I don't want you to do that again." "Scorpion!" roared the Confederacy, dropping his umbrella, and dancing up and down in his ram, with his arms in a boxing attitude. "Come on, base old being!"