Her captain, the gallant Craven, was at the time in the pilot-house with the pilot. As the huge ironclad lurched heavily over and began to sink, both rushed to the narrow door, but there was only room for one to pass at a time. Craven stepped to one side, saying, "After you, pilot." The pilot leaped to a place of safety, but the noble captain went to the bottom in his iron coffin. The fleet now fought a desperate battle with the Confederate ironclads. The armored vessels were soon sunk or scattered. The Tennessee tried to ram our ships, but with little success. Then our ironclads gathered around our "wooden walls," steamed straight for the ram, and there was fought one of the most desperate naval fights of the war. Sharpshooters fired into the ram's ports, our ships successively poured in a terrific fire, and hammered at close range with huge solid shot and fifteen-inch bolts of iron, till the white flag went up, and once more the stars and stripes waved triumphantly over the harbor of Mobile. Thus ended the battle of Mobile Bay,--one of the most brilliant naval contests of modern times,--Farragut's crowning victory. Three hours elapsed from the time the first gun was fired until the great ram hauled down the Confederate flag. The port of Mobile was thenceforward closed against blockade runners, and the last channel of communication between the Confederacy and the outside world was cut off. =342. Farragut in the Rigging during the Battle.=--During the battle Farragut stood in the main rigging; but as the smoke increased he gradually climbed higher, until he was close by the maintop. The shots were flying thick and fast. There was great danger that he would lose his footing, and so the captain sent aloft one of the men with a rope who lashed him to the rigging so that he might not fall if wounded. [Illustration: FARRAGUT LASHED TO THE RIGGING.] When Farragut saw the danger from the approaching Tennessee, as he stood tied to the rigging, he said to his signal officer, who was lashed to the other mast:-- "Can you signal, 'For Heaven's sake'?" "I can signal anything," replied Kinney. "Well, signal to all the fleet, 'For Heaven's sake, go for the ram!'" The fact that the admiral was fastened to the main rigging during the greatest sea fight perhaps in our history gave him a unique reputation throughout the country. Farragut was amused and amazed at the notoriety of the incident. When a picture of the scene in one of the illustrated papers came to hand a few days after the battle, the admiral said to one of his captains in conversation, "How curiously some trifling incident catches the popular fancy! My being in the main rigging was a mere incident, owing to the fact that I was driven aloft by the smoke. The lashing was the result of your own fears for my safety."