July 15th.–I need not speak much of the events of last night, which were not unimportant, perhaps, to some of the insects which played a leading part in them. The heat was literally overpowering; for in addition to the hot night there was the full power of most irritable boilers close at hand to aggravate the natural dèsagrémens of the situation. About an hour after dawn, when I turned out on deck, there was nothing visible but a warm grey mist; but a knotty old pilot on deck told me we were only going six knots an hour against tide and wind, and that we were likely to make less way as the day wore on. In fact, instead of being near Baltimore, we were much nearer Fortress Monroe. Need I repeat the horrors of this day? Stewed, boiled, baked, and grilled on board this miserable Elizabeth, I wished M. Montalembert could have experienced with me what such an impassive nature could inflict in misery on those around it. The captain was a shy, silent man, much given to short naps in my temporary berth, and the mate was so wild, he might have swam off with perfect propriety to the woods on either side of us, and taken to a tree as an aborigen or chimpanzee. Two men of most retiring habits, the negro, a black boy, and a very fat negress who officiated as cook, filled up the “balance” of the crew.
I could not write, for the vibration of the deck of the little craft gave a St. Vitus dance to pen and pencil; reading was out of the question from the heat and flies; and below stairs the fat cook banished repose by vapours from her dreadful caldrons, where, Medealike, she was boiling some death broth. Our breakfast was of the simplest and–may I add?–the least enticing; and if the dinner could have been worse it was so; though it was rendered attractive by hunger, and by the kindness of the sailors who shared it with me. The old pilot had a most wholesome hatred of the Britishers, and not having the least idea till late in the day that I belonged to the old country, favoured me with some very remarkable views respecting their general mischievousness and inutility. As soon as he found out my secret he became more reserved, and explained to me that he had some reason for not liking us, because all he had in the world, as pretty a schooner as ever floated and a fine cargo, had been taken and burnt by the English when they sailed up the Potomac to Washington. He served against us at Bladensburg. I did not ask him how fast he ran; but he had a good rejoinder ready if I had done so, inasmuch as he was up West under Commodore Perry on the lakes when we suffered our most serious reverses. Six knots an hour! hour after hour! And nothing to do but to listen to the pilot.
On both sides a line of forest just visible above the low shores. Small coasting craft, schooners, pungys, boats laden with wood creeping along in the shallow water, or plying down empty before wind and tide.
“I doubt if we’ll be able to catch up them forts afore night,” said the skipper. The pilot grunted, “I rather think yu’ll not.” “H____ and thunder! Then we’ll have to lie off till daylight?” “They may let you pass, Captain Squires, as you’ve this Europe-an on board, but anyhow we can’t fetch Baltimore till late at night or early in the morning.”
I heard the dialogue, and decided very quickly that as Annapolis lay somewhere ahead on our left, and was much nearer than Baltimore, it would be best to run for it while there was daylight. The captain demurred. He had been ordered to take his vessel to Baltimore, and General Butler might come down on him for not doing so; but I proposed to sign a letter stating he had gone to Annapolis at my request, and the steamer was put a point or two to westward, much to the pleasure of the Palinurus, whose “old woman” lived in the town. I had an affection for this weather-beaten, watery-eyed, honest old fellow, who hated us as cordially as Jack detested his Frenchman in the old days before ententes cordiales were known to the world. He was thoroughly English in his belief that he belonged to the only sailor race in the world, and that they could beat all mankind in seamanship; and he spoke in the most unaffected way of the Britishers as a survivor of the old war might do of Johnny Crapaud–”They were brave enough no doubt, but, Lord bless you, see them in a gale of wind! or look at them sending down top-gallant masts, or anything sailor-like in a breeze. You’d soon see the differ. And, besides, they never can stand again us at close quarters.” By-and-by the houses of a considerable town, crowned by steeples, and a large Corinthian-looking building, came in view. “That’s the State House. That’s where George Washington–first in peace, first in war, and first in the hearts of his countrymen–laid down his victorious sword without any one asking him, and retired amid the applause of the civilized world.” This flight I am sure was the old man’s treasured relic of school-boy days, and I’m not sure he did not give it to me three times over. Annapolis looks very well from the river side. The approach is guarded by some very poor earthworks and one small fort. A dismantled sloop of war lay off a sea wall, banking up a green lawn covered with trees, in front of an old-fashioned pile of buildings, which formerly, I think, and very recently indeed, was occupied by the cadets of the United States Naval School. “There was a lot of them Seceders. Lord bless you! these young ones is all took by these States Rights’ doctrines–just as the ladies is caught by a new fashion.”
About seven o’clock the steamer hove alongside a wooden pier which was quite deserted. Only some ten or twelve sailing boats, yachts, and schooners lay at anchor in the placid waters of the port which was once the capital of Maryland, and for which the early Republicans prophesied a great future. But Baltimore has eclipsed Annapolis into utter obscurity. I walked to the only hotel in the place, and found that the train for the junction with Washington had started, and that the next train left at some impossible hour in the morning. It is an odd Rip Van Winkle sort of a place. Quaint-looking boarders came down to the tea-table and talked Secession, and when I was detected, as must ever soon be the case, owing to the hotel book, I was treated to some ill-favoured glances, as my recent letters have been denounced in the strongest way for their supposed hostility to States Rights and the Domestic Institution. The spirit of the people has, however, been broken by the Federal occupation, and by the decision with which Butler acted when he came down here with the troops to open communications with Washington after the Baltimoreans had attacked the soldiery on their way through the city from the north.