would be a disaster of more or less consequence to your country."

22 "I hardly think I shall fall in with the Scotian and the Arran, so I will not consider the question of running away from them," said Christy laughing.

22

"You have not received your orders yet, but they will probably require you to report at once to the flag-officer in the Gulf, and perhaps they will not permit you to look up blockade runners on the high seas," suggested Captain Passford. "These vessels may be fully armed and manned, in charge of Confederate naval officers; and doubtless they will be as glad to pick up the Bronx as you would be to pick up the Scotian or the Arran. You don't know yet whether they will come as simple blockade runners, or as naval vessels flying the Confederate flag. Whatever your orders, Christy, don't allow yourself to be carried away by any Quixotic enthusiasm."

"I don't think I have any more than half as much audacity as Captain Breaker said I had. As I look upon it, my first duty is to deliver my ship over to the flag-officer in the Gulf; and I suppose I shall be instructed to pick up a Confederate cruiser or a blockade runner, if one should cross my course."

23 "Obey your orders, Christy, whatever they may be. Now, I should like to look over the Bronx before I go on shore," said Captain Passford. "I think you said she was of about two hundred tons."

23

"That was what they said down south; but she is about three hundred tons," replied Christy, as he proceeded to show his father the cabin in which the conversation had taken place.

The captain's cabin was in the stern of the vessel, according to the orthodox rule in naval vessels. Of course it was small, though it seemed large to Christy who had spent so much of his leisure time in the cabin of the Florence, his sailboat on the Hudson. It was substantially fitted up, with little superfluous ornamentation; but it was a complete parlor, as a landsman would regard it. From it, on the port side opened the captain's state room, which was quite ample for a vessel no larger than the Bronx. Between it and the pantry on the starboard side, was a gangway leading from the foot of the companion way, by which the captain's cabin and the ward room were accessible from the quarter deck.

Crossing the gangway at the foot of the steps, 24 Christy led the way into the ward room, where the principal officers were 

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