"The small boy was convalescing, and was engaged in playing on the floor with some tin ships, together with two or three pasteboard monitors and rams of my own manufacture. He was giving a vivid rendering of Farragut at Mobile Bay, from memories of how I had told the story. My pasteboard rams were fascinating—if a naval architect may be allowed to praise his own work—and as property they were equally divided between the little girl and the small boy. The little girl looked on with alert suspicion from the bed, for she was not yet convalescent enough to be allowed down on the floor. The small boy was busily reciting the phases of the fight, which now approached its climax, and the little girl evidently suspected that her monitor was destined to play the part of victim.
"Little boy. ‘And then they steamed bang into the monitor.’
"Little girl. ‘Brother, don’t you sink my monitor!’
"Little boy (without heeding and hurrying toward the climax). ‘And the torpedo went at the monitor!’
"Little girl. ‘My monitor is not to sink!’
"Little boy, dramatically; ‘And bang the monitor sank!’
“Little girl. ‘It didn’t do any such thing. My monitor always goes to bed at seven, and it’s now quarter past. My monitor was in bed and couldn’t sink!’” [26]
[26] “Autobiography,” p. 367.