Very soon the Albemarle showed that it was no laughing matter. It sunk one gunboat and made another run away in great haste. Then it had a fight with four of them at once and drove one of these lame and limping away. The others did not come too near. After that it went back to the town of Plymouth and was tied up at the wharf.
There was another iron-clad being built, and the Albemarle was kept waiting, so that the two could work together. That was a bad thing for the Albemarle, for she never went out again.
This brings us back to the gallant deed I spoke of, and the gallant fellow who did the deed. His name was William B. Cushing. He was little more than a boy, just twenty-one years old, but he did not know what it meant to be afraid, and he had done so many daring things already that he had been made a lieutenant.
He wanted to try to destroy the Albemarle, and his captain, who knew how bold a fellow he was, told him to go ahead and do his best.
So on a dark night in October, 1864, brave young Cushing started up the river in a steam launch, with men and guns. At the bow of this launch was a long spar, and at the end of this spar was a torpedo holding a hundred pounds of dynamite. There was a trigger and a cap to set this off, a string to lower the spar and another to pull the trigger. But it was a poor affair to send on such an expedition as that.
And this was not the worst. Some of the newspapers had found out what Cushing was going to do, and printed the whole story. And some of these newspapers got down South and let out the secret. That is what is called "newspaper enterprise." It is very good in its right place, but it was a sort of enterprise that nearly spoiled Cushing's plans.
For the Confederates put lines of sentries along the river, and stationed a lookout down the stream, and placed a whole regiment of soldiers near the wharf. And logs were chained fast around the vessel so that no torpedo spar could reach her. And the men on board were sharply on the watch. That is what the newspapers did for Lieutenant Cushing.
Of course, the young lieutenant did not know all this, and he felt full of hope as his boat went up stream without being seen or heard. The night was very dark and there were no lights on board, and the engines were new and made no noise.
So he passed the lookout in the river and the sentries on the banks without an eye seeing him or his boat.
But when he came up to the iron-clad his hopes went down. For there was the boom of logs so far out that his spar could not reach her.