A VICTORIOUS UNION The fog was coming and going in the distance, and at times the land could be just discerned.

In spite of the number and vigilance of the blockading fleet, several hundred blockade-runners had succeeded in making their way into Cape Fear River, though several hundred also had been captured, not to mention a very considerable number that had been run ashore or burned when escape became hopeless.
It was the policy of the Confederacy to send out vessels to prey upon the commerce of the United States.

Some of them began their depredations without making a port in the South, and a few of the swift steamers that succeeded in getting into Mobile, Wilmington, and other safe places, were fitted out for the work of destruction.

The fog that prevailed inshore was favorable to blockade-runners; and if there was a vessel of this character in Cape Fear River, the early morning had been such as to tempt her to try to make her way through the blockaders to sea.
"She is not one of the ordinary steamers that run in and out of the river," said Mr.Baskirk, while he and the commander were still watching the progress of the chase, and Paul Vapoor was warming up the engine as he had done before.
"She is larger than the St.Regis, but hardly equal in size to the Bellevite," added Christy.

"She cannot draw more than twelve or fourteen feet of water, or she could not have come out through those shallow channels at the mouth of Cape Fear River.