eight o’clock in the evening
The escort of boats and tenders still followed the frigate and only left us when we came abreast of the lightship , whose two signal lights mark the entrance of the narrows to Upper New York Bay . Three o'clock then sounded . The harbor pilot went down into his dinghy and rejoined a little schooner waiting for him to leeward . The furnaces were stoked ; the propeller churned the waves more swiftly ; the frigate skirted the flat , yellow coast of Long Island ; and at eight o'clock in the evening , after the lights of Fire Island had vanished into the northwest , we ran at full steam onto the dark waters of the Atlantic . Ned Land COMMANDER FARRAGUT was a good seaman , worthy of the frigate he commanded . His ship and he were one . He was its very soul .