The Blockade Runner — page 28: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE BLOCKADEHK RUNNER. 29 above deck in ruins, so that the black smoke blew shoreward on a level with the shattered bulwarks. -The boats at the davits were perfect wrecks. Indeed, the Foxhound had been terribly cut up, and had many nasty-looking shot-holes in her hull. But her machinery had escaped injury; one shot in the engine-room would most lkely have settled her fate for good and all. Near on to six bells the blockade runner had come to anchor close in shore, ready to steam up to her dock after sunrise. The good people of Wilmington slept in ignorance of the arrival of a cargo of precious freight, but the newspapers were already preparing accounts under flaring headlines of her wonderful escape, for the news had been long since telegraphed from Fort Caswell, and reporters had flocked down the bay and boarded her almost as soon as the night lights of the city sprang into view. By eight o’clock in the morning the Foxhound was moored to her dock, and a large crowd was already gathered to survey the ruin wrought by the Yankee gunners. By this time the news of her arrival and thrilling experience was all over the city, and a stream of curi- osity seekers and patriotic idlers were en route for the dock. The scene on the wharf beggared description. Men shouted and danced for very joy, and women waved their handkerchiefs and joined their voices to the loud cheers that soared skyward. | The city bells were set a-ringing, and whistles were tooted, until there was not a soul, young or old, in the / CONnnicloOolkkxs.c©