We arrived off the town, with its imposing battlements frowning on either side of the harbor, about dusk, and immediately hoisted a jack, and fired a gun, for a pilot. In the course of half an hour, or so, this indispensable individual appeared, but it was too late, he said, for us to attempt the entrance, that night. He would come off, the first thing in the morning, and take us in. With this assurance we rested satisfied, and lay off, and on, during the night, under easy steam. But we were not to gain entrance to this quaint little Dutch town, so easily, as had been supposed. We were to have here a foretaste of the trouble, that the Federal Consuls were to give us in the future. We have already commented on the love of office of the American people. There is no hole, or corner of the earth, into which a ship can enter, and where there is a dollar to be made, that has not its American Consul, small or large. The smallest of salaries are eagerly accepted, and, as a consequence, the smallest of men are sometimes sent to fill these places. But the smaller the place, the bigger were the cocked hats and epaulettes the officials wore, and the more brim-full were they of patriotism.
At the time of which I am writing, they called one Wm. H. Seward, master, and they had taken Billy's measure to a fraction. They knew his tastes, and pandered to them, accordingly. His circular letters had admonished them, that, in their intercourse with foreign nations, they must speak of our great civil war, as a mere _rebellion_, that would be suppressed, in from sixty, to ninety days; insist that we were not entitled to belligerent rights, and call our cruisers, "corsairs," or "pirates." Accordingly, soon after the pilot had landed, from the _Sumter_, carrying with him to the shore, the intelligence that she was a Confederate States cruiser, the Federal Consul made his appearance at the Government-House, and claimed that the "pirate" should not be permitted to enter the harbor; informing his Excellency, the Governor, that Mr. Seward would be irate, if such a thing were permitted, and that he might expect to have the stone, and mortar of his two forts knocked about his ears, in double quick, by the ships of war of the Great Republic.