The capture of a small Spanish schooner, the Mascota, near Havana, by the torpedo-boat Foote, closed the record of the month of April.
Anxiously awaiting some word from Manila were the people of the United States, and it was as if everything else was relegated to the background until information could be had regarding that American fleet which sailed from Mirs Bay, in the China Sea, on the afternoon of April 27th.
CHAPTER IV.
THE BATTLE OF MANILA BAY.
May 1. “Manila, May 1.—The squadron arrived at Manila at daybreak this morning. Immediately engaged the enemy, and destroyed the following Spanish vessels: Isla de Cuba, Isla de Luzon, Reina Christina, Castilla, Don Antonio d’Ulloa, Don Juan d’Austria, Velasco, General Lezo, El Correo, Marques del Duero, Isla de Mindanao, and the water-battery at Cavite. The squadron is uninjured. Few men were slightly injured. The only means of telegraphing is to American consulate, Hongkong. I shall communicate with him.
“Dewey.”
All the world loves a hero, but idolises him when he performs his deeds of valour without too many preliminaries, and, therefore, when on the seventh of May the telegram quoted above was flashed over the wires to an anxiously expectant people, it was as if all the country remembered but one name,—that of Dewey.
April 25. It was known to the public that the Asiatic Squadron had sailed from Hongkong on the [pg 65]25th of April to avoid possible complications such as might arise in a neutral port, and had rendezvoused in Mirs Bay, there to await orders from the government at Washington.