By tea-time they were again on board the Dolphin, which lay at anchor through the night in Maumee Bay. It was a delightful evening, clear and slightly cool on the water, the stars shining, and a gentle breeze stirring; and they sat upon the deck for an hour or more.
"Where are we going to-morrow, papa?" asked Grace in a pause in the conversation, which had been running upon the scenes and adventures of the day.
"To Erie, to view it as the scene of some of Commodore Perry's doings—if that plan suits the wishes of those present," returned her father. "What do you say, mother?"
"That I highly approve," answered Mrs. Travilla's sweet voice.
"As no doubt we all do," added Mrs. Lilburn.
"Yes," said her husband—"even to the one who may be suspected of belonging to the British side. But what doings there have you to tell of, captain?"
"It was there that Perry's fleet was made ready for the celebrated
Battle of Lake Erie," said Captain Raymond—"Perry's victory was won
September 10, 1813."
"Just a few weeks after the fight at Fort Stephenson," remarked
Lucilla.
"Yes," said her father; "and at that time the fleet was nearly ready. What we now speak of as Erie was then called Presqu' Isle. The harbor is a large bay, one of the finest on the lake. A low, sandy peninsula juts out some five miles into the lake. It has sometimes been an island, when storms have cleft its neck; and it was a barren sand bank, though now it has a growth of timber upon it. In Perry's time the harbor was a difficult one to enter, by reason of having a tortuous channel, shallow and obstructed by sand bars and shoals."
"Was Erie a city at the time Perry's fleet was built there, papa?" asked Grace.