As they neared the point they were edified by the sudden appearance of a serio-comic ally. The _Chancellorville_ at last had been unable to stand the strain, and had sent in her launch with an ensign, five seamen and a number of marksmen marines. She swept hot-foot around the point, bent on terrible slaughter; the one-pounder of her bow presented a formidable appearance. The _Holy Moses_ and the _Chicken_ laughed until they brought indignation to the brow of the young ensign. But he forgot it when with some of his men he boarded the _Chicken_ to do what was possible for the wounded. The nearest surgeon was aboard the _Chancellorville_. There was absolute silence on board the cruiser as the _Holy Moses_ steamed up to report. The blue-jackets listened with all their ears. The commander of the yacht spoke slowly into his megaphone: "We have--destroyed--the two--gun-boats--sir." There was a burst of confused cheering on the forecastle of the _Chancellorville_, but an officer's cry quelled it. "Very--good. Will--you--come aboard?" Two correspondents were already on the deck of the cruiser. Before the last of the wounded were hoisted aboard the cruiser the _Adolphus_ was on her way to Key West. When she arrived at that port of desolation Shackles fled to file the telegrams and the other correspondents fled to the hotel for clothes, good clothes, clean clothes; and food, good food, much food; and drink, much drink, any kind of drink. Days afterward, when the officers of the noble squadron received the newspapers containing an account of their performance, they looked at each other somewhat dejectedly: "Heroic assault--grand daring of Boatswain Pent--superb accuracy of the _Holy Moses'_ fire--gallant tars of the _Chicken_--their names should be remembered as long as America stands--terrible losses of the enemy----" When the Secretary of the Navy ultimately read the report of Commander Surrey, S.O.P., he had to prick himself with a dagger in order to remember that anything at all out of the ordinary had occurred. THE SERGEANT'S PRIVATE MADHOUSE The moonlight was almost steady blue flame and all this radiance was lavished out upon a still lifeless wilderness of stunted trees and cactus plants. The shadows lay upon the ground, pools of black and sharply outlined, resembling substances, fabrics, and not shadows at all. From afar came the sound of the sea coughing among the hollows in the coral rock. The land was very empty; one could easily imagine that Cuba was a simple vast solitude; one could wonder at the moon taking all the trouble of this splendid illumination. There was no wind; nothing seemed to live.