Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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But about nine o’clock that evening Ericsson’s battery, the Monitor,20 arrived in Hampton Roads, and hope revived in the breasts of the despondent Northerners. She was not a very formidable-looking craft, for, lying low on the water, with a plain structure amidships, a small pilot-house forward, and a diminutive funnel aft, she might have been taken for a raft. It was only on board that her real strength might be discovered. She carried armour about five inches thick over a large part of her, and had practically two hulls, the lower of which had sides inclining at an angle of 51° from the vertical line. It was considered that no shot could hurt this lower hull, on account of the angle at which it must strike it. The revolving turret, an iron cylinder, nine feet high, and twenty feet in diameter, eight or nine inches thick everywhere, and about the portholes eleven inches, was moved round by steam-power. When the two heavy Dahlgren guns were run in for loading, a kind of pendulum port fell over the holes in the turret. The propeller, rudder, and even anchor, were all hidden.