the city were thronged by at least as many more. The shipping at the Navy Yard was gayly dressed with bunting, and the harbor was filled with steamers and pleasure boats crowded with people. It was a beautiful day, with a clear blue sky, bright sunshine, and a gentle westerly breeze.
All the staging used in the construction of the ship had been removed, leaving her in full view as she rested upon the ways. Her long black hull had no ornament except a beautifully carved eagle's head where the sweep of her raking stem and the sharp lines of her bow intersected, and across her handsome stern the American eagle with extended wings, under which her name and port of hail were carved in plain block letters. She had the same graceful sheer, finely formed midship section, and beautifully moulded ends that had been seen in this yard in the Stag-Hound, Flying Cloud, Bald Eagle, Westward Ho, Flying Fish, and Sovereign of the Seas, only on a much larger scale; indeed, from end to end she looked the out-and-out clipper. Spars were erected at the mast partners, and from the main she carried a long coach-whip pennant and a large white flag with the arms of the United States in the centre; from the other three spars she flew large United States ensigns, and from a staff on her bowsprit, the Union Jack.
The sun gleamed and sparkled upon her smooth, bright yellow-metal sheathing, when at twelve o'clock the signal was given and the shores fell, to the wild chorus of topmauls, so well known in every Atlantic port fifty years ago. She moved slowly at first; then, gathering way, fairly leaped
