Away go the English war ships in line, like a quartette of geese crossing a mill pond, the _Hermes_, Captain Percy, in the van. The fleet rounds the lower extremity of Mobile Point, out of range from Fort Bowyer, and lands Colonel Nichols with a force of foot soldiers and a howitzer. This military feat accomplished, the fleet, still like geese in line, bear up until abreast of the Fort, which is a musket shot away.
There is no time wasted. The _Hermes_ lets go her anchors and swings broadside-on to the Fort. The others follow suit. Then, with a crashing discharge of big guns by way of overture, the fight is on.
Five minutes, ten minutes, twenty minutes go by; shots fly and shells burst, and Major Lawrence still holds the fort. Evidently Captain Percy cut his time too fine! Then, one hour, two hours follow, and Major Lawrence's twenty-four pounders are making matches of the _Hermes_.
As the merry war progresses, Colonel Nichols, with much ardor and no discernment, drags his howitzer to a strategic sand hill, and fires one shot at Fort Bowyer. It is a badly considered movement, the instant effect being to draw the Fort's horns his way. The southern battery of the Fort opens upon him like a tornado, and he and his fellow artillerists retire--without their howitzer. The most discouraging feature is that a stone, sent flying from the strategic sand hill by a cannon ball, knocks out one of Colonel Nichols's eyes. After this exploit, the one-eyed proclamationist, much saddened, but with wisdom increased, is content to stand afar off, and leave the down-battering of Fort Bowyer to the fleet.
This down-battering Captain Percy and his sailormen do their tarry best to bring about. But, as hour after hour drifts to leeward in the smoke of their broadsides, and the stubborn Lawrence continues to send his hail of twenty-four-pound shot aboard, it begins to creep upon Captain Percy, like mosses upon stone, that Fort Bowyer is a nut beyond the power of even his iron teeth to crack. As a red-hot shot sets fire to the _Hermes_ and explodes her magazine, the impression deepens to apprehension, which, when the _Sophia_ is reported sinking, ripens rapidly into conviction. Major Lawrence, with his “Don't give up the Fort!” all but blots Captain Percy--who has tenfold his force--off the face of the Gulf, and he does it with a loss of eight men killed and wounded to an English loss of over three hundred.