A popular history of the United States of America, Vol. 2 (of 2)

by Mary Howitt

ARTICLE VII.

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact, tried by jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

ARTICLE VIII.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

ARTICLE IX.

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

ARTICLE X.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

ARTICLE XI.

The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States, by citizens of another state, or by citizens or subjects of any foreign state.

ARTICLE XII.

The electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot, for president and vice-president, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name, in their ballots, the person voted for as president, and, in distinct ballots, the person voted for as vice-president; and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as president, and of all persons voted for as vice-president, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit, sealed, to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the president of the senate. The president of the senate shall, in the presence of the senate and house of representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall then be counted. The person having the greatest number of votes for president shall be the president, if such a number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have such a majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers, not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as president, the house of representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the president. But, in choosing the president, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the house of representatives shall not choose a president, whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the vice-president shall act as president, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the president.

The person having the greatest number of votes as vice-president shall be the vice-president, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the senate shall choose the vice-president—a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice.

But no person, constitutionally ineligible to the office of president, shall be eligible to that of vice-president of the United States.

CHAPTER XVI.
EMIGRATION TO THE WEST—WASHINGTON, THE FIRST PRESIDENT.

While the convention at Philadelphia occupied themselves with the new constitution, the vast territory north of the Ohio River was formed, by the congress at New York, into a territorial government under the name of the North-Western Territory. Among other provisions of the government of this new territory was the carrying out of an important republican principle which some of the older states had not yet adopted; this was the equal division of all landed as well as personal property between the children of persons dying intestate. The fullest religious freedom was also insured; provision made for schools and for justice and humanity towards the Indians, and a strong protest entered against slavery, inasmuch as it was declared that there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than as punishment of crimes of which the party shall have been duly convicted.

Seventeen millions of acres on the northern bank of the Ohio were now in possession of the United States, in consequence of the already mentioned treaties with the Six Nations. These formerly powerful and warlike tribes now retained but a small hold upon the lands which had once been their own. They were beginning, like their more feeble eastern brethren, to pass away from before the white man. The entire Mohawk nation emigrated in a body into Canada, and other Indian nations followed their example.

The pressure of war being removed from the eastern states, their restless and adventurous sons now went forth to explore and establish peaceable settlements, with all the amenities of domestic life and civilisation, in the wilderness. The State of New York located her disbanded soldiers on the land-bounties which she had promised them, upon such western lands as she retained after resigning her larger claims to the Union; Pennsylvania followed this example. Occupation was thus given to the unemployed, and a source of vast wealth opened to the impoverished. In July of this same busy year, the Ohio Company was formed, for the settlement of portions of this great territory, with the Rev. Manasseh Cutler, Winthrop Sargeant, and other citizens of New England, at its head.

In September, the Kentuckians, now holding their fourth convention at Danville, once more applied to congress for admission into the Union; but though they had now advanced so far as to have a spokesman in congress, in the person of one of the Virginian delegates, a Kentucky lawyer, and were possessed of a newspaper, the “Kentucky Gazette,” printed and published at Lexington, they were again unsuccessful in their application.

General St. Clair was elected governor of the new territory north-west of the Ohio, and thither flowed the great tide of emigration from the New England states, which had hitherto poured into Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. All New England was now astir with the movement westward, and again we have chronicles of migration and early settlement, as in the days of the Pilgrim Fathers. Quaint and beautiful are the details which exist of these movements. The plans were drawn in Boston, and at Providence in Rhode Island, of great cities to be erected on the banks of rivers flowing as yet through the wilderness; the intending emigrants met to draw lots for their future homes in these cities, each “town-lot to be ninety feet front and 180 feet in depth;” the centre street of the city to be 150 feet wide. As in the old times, “the Mayflower” set sail with the pioneer settlers; and on the 7th of April, 1788, General Rufus Putnam, the leader of this party, landed at the mouth of the Muskinghum, opposite Fort Harmer. Nothing can be pleasanter than the records of these early Ohio settlements. Captain Pipes, the chief of the Delawares, with about seventy of his tribe, came down for the purpose of trading with the garrison of Fort Harmer, shook hands with the new-comers, and welcomed them cordially to the shores of the Muskinghum, on the head waters of which river they themselves resided. The settlers arriving from the stern climate of New England, where they had left frost and snow, were struck by the contrast presented by the vegetation of their new home. The pea-vines, say they, and buffalo-clover, with various other plants, were nearly knee high, and afforded a rich pasture for their hungry horses. The trees had commenced putting forth their foliage, the birds warbled a welcome song from their branches, and all nature smiled at the approach of the strangers.

On these auspicious shores the settlers immediately commenced felling trees for their log-houses, and for the clearing of the land; while General Putnam resided in a tent which they had brought with them. In five days they had cleared and sown several acres of land. A month later one of the settlers wrote—“This country for fertility of soil and pleasantness of situation exceeds all our expectations. The climate is exceedingly healthy; not a man sick since we have been here. We have started twenty buffaloes in a drove. Deer as plenty as sheep in other places. Beaver and other animals abundant. I have known one man to catch twenty or thirty in one or two nights. Turkeys are innumerable; they come within a few rods of us in the fields. We have already planted a field of 150 acres of corn.” In July, another writer says—“The corn has grown nine inches in twenty-four hours for two or three days past.”

The city, which was laid out according to the great plan already formed, and including within its area the remains of an ancient fortified town, somewhat similar to those since discovered in Central America, and which were here carefully preserved, received the name of Marietta. This name was an abbreviation of Marie Antoinette, the name of the young queen of France, and was intended as a mark of respect to that sovereign, in consequence of the attention and kindness with which she had treated Franklin when at the court of Louis XVI., and of the interest which she had taken in the American struggle. The leaders of this settlement were principally old soldiers, and it was natural in them to remember with gratitude the kind offices which this young and beautiful woman had rendered to their cause; nor is their veneration for the classics less distinguishable. There was the “Capitolium” of the city, and the “Via Sacra,” while the garrison, with block-houses at the corners, was called “Campus Martius,” “as if,” says the historian, “in anticipation of the Indian war, which soon commenced, and continued for five years, during which time it was strictly a military camp.” Every feature of the infant colony bore the stamp of sylvan prosperity; the early regulations for the government were written out and posted on the smooth trunk of a large beech-tree. The 4th of July, the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, was celebrated by “a sumptuous dinner, eaten under a bowery which stretched along the banks of the Muskinghum.” The table, we are informed, was supplied with venison, buffalo and roast-pigs, with a variety of fish. Among the latter was a pike weighing 100 pounds, which was caught at the mouth of the Muskinghum, by Judge Gilbert Devoll and his son Gilbert, and the tail of which dragged on the ground when suspended upon a pole between the shoulders of two tall men. On this occasion an oration was made by one of the judges, the first political oration ever made in Ohio.

On the 9th of July, General St. Clair arrived as governor of the colony, and was received in “the bowery” with Arcadian honours, and the firing of fourteen guns. So rapid was the progress of this settlement, that before the end of the summer the city-lots, with their streets and open public spaces, covered an area extending one mile on the Ohio River, and one mile and 120 perches on the Muskinghum. A substantial bridge was built over the creek which falls into the Muskinghum, in the southern part of the city, called, with their love of classical history, “Tiber Creek,” and three other bridges were also built over smaller streams. A road was cut through the forest to the Campus Martius, and the clearing and planting of land went on vigorously. Again and again wrote the settlers of the prosperity and plenty which surrounded them; the harvest was cut in the autumn, and in some cases yielded 104 bushels of ears to the acre, some of these ears yielding a pint and a half of shelled corn each. “As for beans, turnips, pumpkins, squashes, cabbages, melons, cucumbers, etc., they are,” says the exultant writer, “the very finest in flavour I ever tasted, and the great production is truly surprising.” The district of Marietta was called Washington county.

Emigration and colonisation was now the order of the day. It supplied the want of employment and excitement caused by the cessation of the war, and was a healthy outlet for the energies of the people. Among other emigrants who went out to the western settlements of New York was Daniel Shays, who had been included in a bill just passed of general pardon and indemnity for all concerned in the late insurrection. Shays lived to be very old, supported in his latter days by his pension as a revolutionary soldier. In October, John Symmes, one of the judges of Marietta, purchased a large tract of land between the great and little Miami rivers, and in the following month the first settlement within that purchase, and the second within Ohio, was commenced at Columbia at the mouth of the little Miami, five miles above the site of the present Cincinnati. All went on prosperously; towns were laid out, forests cleared, roads opened, mills and bridges built, and population flocked in. Nor was this alone the case on the Ohio. Within twelve months, more than 10,000 emigrants passed through Marietta on their way to Kentucky and other parts of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. The West, the “great West,” the boast of the American, was putting forth its vast attractions and luring tens of thousands even then.

At the close of 1787, it was doubtful what would be the fate of the Federal Constitution in the States. It was received with distrust and jealousy by a great body of the people, who feared that the extensive powers given by the new Constitution to the federal government would place them under oppressions as grievous as those of the mother-country, which they had just shaken off. On the other hand, it was supported by the wealthy portion of the community, by the public creditors and merchants, the former of whom saw in it their only chance of payment, while the latter hoped everything from the extension and regulation of commerce. In the midst of this doubt and uncertainty, an able series of articles appeared in a New York paper, written by Hamilton, Madison and Jay, advocating the new constitution, and these so completely meeting all objections, helped greatly to settle the question.

Delaware was the first state to adopt the Constitution, on December 7th; five days later Pennsylvania followed the example; and soon after New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut. Massachusetts weighed and deliberated, with able men on either side, the friends of the Union looking anxiously on, well knowing that on the decision of that important state would depend the decision of others; and at length, on February 7th, the new Constitution was ratified by her, the majority in its favour being nineteen. Maryland gave in her adhesion in April, South Carolina in May, and in June New Hampshire. The Constitution was earnestly advocated and opposed by the different parties in the conventions of Virginia and New York, but both ratified it, the one in June, the other in July.

Eleven states had now adopted the Constitution, and though North Carolina still hesitated, and Rhode Island obstinately held no convention, measures were immediately taken for the organisation of the new government. As was to be expected, Washington received at the appointed time the unanimous vote of the electors, and became president-elect; the next highest number of votes was for John Adams, who was in consequence entitled to the office of vice-president; and senators and representatives under the new Constitution were chosen also in the eleven ratifying states.

The 4th of March was the day appointed for the new government to commence operations, but so many impediments occurred that it was not until the 30th of April that this took place. Some of the causes of this delay are curious. By the help of several public-spirited citizens of New York, who advanced the necessary funds, the old City Hall was prepared for the occasion. The important day was ushered in by the firing of cannon and the ringing of bells. But after all, the building was not ready, and more than that, eight senators only and thirteen representatives made their appearance, not enough to form a quorum in either house. The fact was, that most of the members, many of them from great distances, having to travel to New York on horseback, had found, at that early season of the year, the roads in many places impassable by floods, especially where rivers had to be forded. On the last day but one of March, thirty members, sufficient to form a quorum, being present, business commenced. The vice-president Adams arrived in New York, escorted by a troop of horse, on April 21st, and Washington, as president, proceeded from Mount Vernon in Virginia, to New York, in a sort of triumphal progress, the people everywhere eager to testify their affection and esteem, and on the 29th of April landed at New York, having crossed over from New Jersey in a barge fitted up for the occasion, and rowed by thirteen pilots in white uniforms.

But even now the new Federal Hall was not ready, and Washington took the oath of office, after Divine service had been performed in all the churches, in a balcony fronting the street where the assembled populace could witness the ceremony. The oath was administered by Livingston, Chancellor of New York, who, on its conclusion, exclaimed aloud, “Long live George Washington, President of the United States!” and the multitude answered with enthusiastic shouts.

The inaugural address of Washington was short, and remarkable for its deep tone of gratitude to the Divine Ruler, who had permitted the affairs of America to take a favourable issue; for its pure and elevated sentiment of political wisdom, and of devotion to that beloved country in whose service he had already laboured so faithfully. “The foundation of the national policy,” he remarked, “should be laid in the pure principles of private morality; no truth being more thoroughly established than that there exists an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy and the solid rewards of public prosperity and happiness.” He considered “the success of the republican form of government as an experiment entrusted to the American people,” and assured them, “that the propitious smiles of Heaven could never be looked for if the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself had ordained, were disregarded.”

His disinterested patriotism was proved by the fact that now, as on the former occasion when he held the office of commander-in-chief, he desired no other compensation for his services than the reimbursement of his expenses.

It was early attempted in the senate to introduce styles and titles of office, and to address the president as “His Highness,” but this was resolutely opposed; nevertheless a committee was appointed to consider the subject, and in the meantime the question was decided by the house of representatives, the supporters of republican simplicity. They addressed Washington, in their reply to his opening address, merely as “the President of the United States.”

Washington on his part, though a strenuous advocate of republican simplicity, found it necessary to sustain the dignity of his office by a form of etiquette which was considerably censured at the time, but which has ever since continued to regulate the presidential household. He laid it down as a rule to return no visits. Certain days were appointed for levees; nor were any invitations to dinner given, excepting to foreign ministers, officers of the government, and strangers of distinction. The arrangement of the ceremonial at levees and other public occasions was entrusted to Humphries, who had formerly been aide-de-camp to Washington, and later, secretary of legation at Paris, and who was supposed to know a good deal on the punctilios of court life. Trifling matters of ceremonial introduced by Humphries, as the placing the president and his wife on elevated seats at public balls, and requiring the dancers to acknowledge their presence by bows and curtseys, led to trouble in after years, as marks of the monarchical tendencies of the federal party.[^[64]] For the rest the greatest simplicity prevailed; there was neither ostentation nor reserve, and the guests of the first man in the Union were entertained with as much ease, and received as kind a welcome, as though he had still been only “Farmer Washington.” On the Sundays, however, no visits were received. He regularly attended church in the morning, and in the afternoon retired to his private apartment. The evening was spent with his family, when sometimes an intimate friend might call, but promiscuous company was not permitted.[^[65]]

The first objects of congress were to establish a revenue for the support of government, and the supply of the exhausted treasury; to organise the executive departments; to establish a judiciary; and to amend the constitution. In order to provide a revenue, duties were imposed on the tonnage of vessels, and on foreign goods imported into the states, among which were ardent spirits. As regarded spirituous liquors, the attention of the public was just turned to this subject by a tract on the great evils attending their use, lately published by Dr. Rush. It was the commencement of the temperance movement, and at the great Federal Festival, held at Philadelphia to celebrate the adoption of the new Constitution, ardent spirits had been excluded, American beer and cider being the only liquors used.

Three executive departments were established to aid the president in the affairs of government—the departments of Foreign Affairs, of the Treasury, and of War. Thomas Jefferson was appointed to the first, Alexander Hamilton to the second, and General Knox to the third, which he had long held, the small navy being also placed under his care. These offices were under the control of the president, and the power of removing them was, after much discussion, placed also in his hands.

The national judiciary now established consisted of a Supreme Court, having one chief-justice and several associate judges, as well as circuit and district courts possessing jurisdiction as specified in the Constitution. Washington declared that “the due administration of justice was the firmest pillar of good government, and that the selection of the fittest characters to expound the laws and dispense justice was an invariable object of his anxious concern.” He selected, therefore, the fittest men he knew for those important appointments; and John Jay became chief-justice, and Edmund Randolph attorney-general. Several amendments to the Constitution were proposed, ten of which, as given in the preceding chapter, were afterwards adopted.

The salary of the president was fixed at 25,000 dollars a year, that of the vice-president at 5,000, those of the heads of departments at 3,500. Six dollars a day, with six dollars for every twenty miles of travelling, were allowed to the representatives, and seven dollars, with the same sum for travelling expenses, in the same ratio, to the members of the Senate. The chief-justice of the Supreme Court was to receive 4,000 dollars, and the associate judges 500 dollars less, per annum.

On the 29th of September, the first session of congress closed. In November, North Carolina ratified the Constitution.

During the recess of congress, the president made a tour through the New England states, omitting, however, Rhode Island, which had not yet given in its adhesion to the Constitution. Everywhere he was received with demonstrations of love and respect. “Men, women and children,” says Jared Sparkes, “people of all ranks, ages, and occupations, assembling from far and near, at the crossings of the roads and other public places where it was known he would pass. Military escorts attended him on the way, and at the principal towns, he was received and entertained by the civil authorities.

“This journey,” continues the same writer, “not only furnished proofs of the attachment of the people, but convinced him of the growing prosperity of the country, and of the favour which the Constitution and the administration of government were gaining in the public mind. He saw with pleasure that the effects of the war had almost disappeared; that agriculture was pursued with activity; that the harvests were abundant, manufactures increasing, the towns flourishing, and commerce becoming daily more extended and profitable. The condition of society, the progress of improvements, the success of industrial enterprise, all gave tokens of order, peace and contentment, and a most cheering promise for the future.”

Journeys of this kind, the great object of which was the becoming better acquainted with the capabilities, as well as the condition of the country, were not uncommon with Washington. Already, in 1784, at the close of the war, he had made a journey of 600 miles, to visit his lands on the Ohio, when the practicability of a great scheme suggested itself to him, viz. that of uniting the East and West, by means of intercommunication between the head waters of the Atlantic streams and the western rivers. He pressed the subject upon the notice of the government of Virginia, the result of which was the formation of two companies, “the Potomac Company,” and “the Kenhawa and James River Company.” Washington thus became the first mover in the great series of internal improvements which took place.

The second session of congress opened on the 6th of January, 1790. Hamilton, the secretary of the treasury, brought forward early his report upon the public debt contracted during the war, and which had hung like a mill-stone so long round the neck of government. Taking an able and enlarged view of the advantages of public credit, he recommended that not only the debts of the continental congress, but those of the individual states contracted on behalf of the common cause, should be funded or assumed by the general government, and that provision should be made for paying the interest by taxes imposed on certain articles of luxury, and on spirits distilled in the country. This report led to long discussion; but in conclusion, congress passed an act for the assumption of the states’ debts, and for funding the national debt. Provision for the payment of the foreign debt was made without any difficulty. The debt funded amounted to about 75,000,000 dollars; and it was especially enacted that no certificate should be obtained from a state-creditor, which it could not be ascertained had been issued for the express purposes of compensation, services, or supplies, during the late war. The proceeds of the western lands and the surplus revenue, with the addition of 2,000,000 dollars which the president was authorised to borrow at 5 per cent, constituted a sinking fund to be applied to the reduction of the debt. The effect of these measures upon the country in general was of the most satisfactory kind. The sudden increase of monied capital gave a fresh impulse to commerce and consequently to agriculture.

Shortly after the discussion on the debt commenced in Congress, it was interrupted by petitions from the yearly meeting of the Quakers of Pennsylvania, Delaware and New York, advocating the abolition of slavery, and which were followed up by a memorial from the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, signed by Benjamin Franklin as president, one of the last public acts of this remarkable man’s life; he died a few weeks afterwards. This subject led to two months’ controversy on the subject of slavery and the slave-trade, the end of which was a report, entered on the journal of the debates, that any state thinking proper to import slaves, could not be prohibited by congress prior to the year 1808, although it had power to prevent their supplying foreigners with slaves, and that they had no authority to interfere in the emancipation of slaves, or in the treatment of them in any of the states.

In May of this year, Rhode Island acceded to the New Constitution, and thus completed the union of the Thirteen States. About the same time an act was passed for accepting a cession of land from North Carolina, and erecting it into a territorial government, under the title of “the Territory South of the Ohio,” and which was in every respect to stand upon the same basis as the “Territory North West of the Ohio,” with this exception, that slavery was not excluded. This new territory, which forms the present Tennessee, included the late aspiring state of Frankland, and another tract of about 2,000 square miles, which had been settled in 1780 by James Robertson, who, with about forty families, had advanced 300 miles into the wilderness, and there established the town of Nashville on the banks of the Cumberland River; whither, also, he had been followed by many of the officers and soldiers of the revolutionary war, to whom land-bounties had been assigned on the same river. The new territory, for which a governor was presently appointed, was for the greater part in the possession of the Indians at that very time.

Indian wars were the certain result of the advance of the white man into the wilderness, and the frontiers of the more southern states still continued to be the scenes of bloodshed. A war had been carried on for some time between the Creek Indians and Georgia, on the subject of lands said to have been ceded by the Indians to that state, but which they denied. The Creek warriors were well supplied with fire-arms and ammunition, and had the advantage of an able and accomplished chief, a half-breed Indian called, after his father, M‘Gillivray, and who had received an excellent education in Charleston. Under this chief the Creeks carried on a fierce and terrible war, which spread alarm even as far as Savannah. Washington, anxious to bring about a negotiation with these formidable warriors, invited M‘Gillivray to New York; and accompanied by twenty-eight chiefs and warriors, he arrived there, congress being still in session, and was received with every mark of respect and attention. A treaty of peace was entered into; wampum given and tobacco smoked; after which M‘Gillivray having made a speech, and “a shake of peace” between Washington and the chiefs being given, “a song of peace” was raised by the Indians, and the ceremony ended. Peace was established on the frontiers of Georgia, and the lands which the Creeks claimed solemnly guaranteed to them, not much to the satisfaction of the whites.

Thus successful with the Creeks, they were much less so with the western Indians, who encouraged, it was said, by the British in Canada, insisted on making the Ohio their boundary, and infested the banks of the river, attacking the emigrant boats, which descended it, and carrying their ravages far into Kentucky. Pacific overtures having been made in vain by the president to these hostile Indians, General Harmar was sent from Fort Washington, now Cincinnati, with a force of 1,400, to reduce them to terms. He succeeded in destroying the Indian villages and their harvests, but in two engagements near the confluence of the St. Mary’s and St. Joseph’s in Indiana, successive detachments of the army were defeated with considerable loss.

Congress during this present session passed an act “for the encouragement of learning,” which secured a copyright to authors for fourteen years, and if living at the end of that term, for fourteen years longer.

During the session of 1791, a National Bank was proposed by Hamilton, which met with the most vigorous opposition from the republican party, who considered that congress had no constitutional power for such a measure. The supporters of the bill maintained it to be constitutional and necessary for the operations of government. The president required the opinions of the cabinet in writing, and after mature deliberation, gave the bill his signature, and the bank was established at Philadelphia, with a capital of 10,000,000 dollars.

The dissentions on the subjects of the funding system and the bank, originating in the heart of the republic, extended themselves to the extremities, and were a signal for the people to range themselves under two parties. Hamilton and Jefferson were the leaders of these factions, and Washington in vain endeavoured, by his practical wisdom and affectionate remonstrances, to reconcile the two parties. But we have not space to enter at large into the struggles and bitternesses of this party strife. We pass, therefore, on to events.

New York having relinquished her claim to Vermont, though not without the purchase of a release for 30,000 dollars, and the Green Mountain Boys, having adopted the Constitution, were in February admitted into the Union.

The Indian war still continuing, and even with increased violence, additional troops were raised and command given to General St. Clair, governor of the North West Territory, to march to the relief of the suffering settlers; and in October he encamped with 1,400 men near the Miami villages. The chief of the Miamis, at this time, was the powerful Michikiniqua, or the Little Turtle, who by the force of native talent, had raised himself to the military leadership of the confederated western tribes. In his forces, which numbered about 1,500, were included many half-breeds and refugees, among whom was the notorious Simon Girty. St. Clair and his officers were asleep in the midst of their camp, when in the early dawn they were roused by a sudden attack. The carnage which followed was terrible; more than one-fourth of the Americans, and the artillery and baggage, fell into the hands of the enemy.[^[66]] This second repulse spread the greatest terror throughout the north-west frontier even into Pennsylvania. On the news of this disaster, congress resolved to prosecute the war with increased vigour, and provision was made for augmenting the army, by enlistment, to the number of 5,000 men. The defeat of Harmar and St. Clair had, however, created such a dread of the Indians, that a sufficient number of recruits could not be obtained. A clamour was raised against the war; Willett and Daniel Morgan, old revolutionary officers, declined to act as brigadier-generals, Willett openly declaring his doubt of the justice of the war. “The intercourse,” said he, “which I have had with these people, and the treatment which I and others have received from them, makes me their advocate. The honour of fighting and beating the Indians is not what I aspire after.” Colonel Harden and Major Trueman were then sent with a flag of truce, to attempt a negotiation, but they were both murdered. The Six Nations now, at the request of Washington, interfered to persuade the tribes on the Wabash to withdraw from the confederacy, and make peace with the United States. This was in part effected, and the Miamis agreed to a conference the following spring.

The first census of the inhabitants of the United States was taken this year, when the population was found to be 3,921,326, of whom 695,655 were slaves. By this census the representatives were apportioned, allowing one representative for each 33,000 inhabitants, and thus giving the house 105 members. The revenue, according to the report of the secretary, amounted to 4,771,000 dollars.

In this session, the long-agitated question regarding the locality of the permanent seat of government was decided. A district, ten miles square, comprehending lands on both sides the river Potomac, was selected and the city of Washington laid out, the sales which took place producing the necessary funds for its erection.

Kentucky had the satisfaction, after her long efforts at independence, to be admitted into the Union, in June of 1792. The same year the post-office was organised and a mint was established and located in Philadelphia. The coinage, to be called Federal money, were the eagle, half-eagle and quarter-eagle in gold; the dollar, half-dollar, quarter-dollar, dime and half-dime in silver; the cent and half-cent in copper. The device for the coinage led to considerable agitation; the head of Washington, in the first instance, and other presidents for the time being, with the name and order of succession, being considered an alarming step towards monarchy, like the former proposition of the title of Highness and the present levees of the president, and was therefore rejected. An emblematic figure of liberty was finally adopted.

The first Congress had now closed its sessions. Washington was again elected president, and was inaugurated in March of 1793, John Adams also being re-elected to the office of vice-president.

CHAPTER XVII.
WASHINGTON’S ADMINISTRATION (continued).

The two parties of Federalists and Anti-Federalists enlisted under their banners the friends and enemies of the new National Constitution, the former asserting the necessity of a strong central government, and the latter opposing, with jealous anxiety, any measure which should lessen the popular power by decreasing that of the individual States. The admirable working, however, of the Constitution under Washington and his able ministry; the increase of commerce; the extension of territory, and the general prosperity, would no doubt within a few years have allayed party animosities, had not an element at that moment come into operation which, if no other causes had existed, would have divided the country into two equally violent parties. This was the French Revolution.

Thomas Jefferson had been recalled from France, where he acted as ambassador of the United States, to take part in the administration under the new Constitution, and brought with him a strong prepossession in favour of the French revolutionists. Nothing could be more natural than that the citizens of the United States, who had so lately and so gloriously achieved their own independence, should sympathise warmly in the struggle of that very nation which had aided them in the time of their difficulty to throw off the despotism under which they was suffering, and the early and better impulse to which had been a spark caught from the American flame of liberty. While the anti-federalists, resisting, as they believed, all dangerous aggressions on their own dearly-bought independence, cordially espoused the French cause; the federalists saw in the outrage and ferocity of the French republicans indications which filled them with the utmost jealousy and alarm, lest the same spirit should break forth upon their shores, and sweep away those wise foundations of order which had been so carefully laid.

With these opposite sentiments towards France were united, as a matter of course, equally opposed feelings towards England. The federalists regarding their country as allied to Great Britain by similarity of language, religion, and literature, were ready even to doubt, with the example of France before them, whether a republican form of government could be relied upon, and to draw still more closely the bonds of union between themselves and the mother-country. They charged the anti-federalists with blind devotion to the French cause, and their leaders, with Jefferson at the head, with being deeply tinctured with the sentiments of the French school of philosophy, and with the design of introducing the same infidel and jacobinical notions into America, as had led to the sanguinary and revolting scenes in France.[^[67]]

The revolutionary party in France regarded the Americans as brethren, and expected from them only applause and sympathy. The French minister who had been sent over by the king was recalled, and citizen Genet, as representative of the new republic, arrived in April, 1793, about a month after Washington’s second entrance into office, at Charleston, South Carolina, where he was received with distinguished respect and honour, intended to express the approbation with which America regarded the change in the institutions of France. While the minister of the French republic was thus received with peculiar marks of honour by the anti-federal party, they insisted upon the president resuming office with the most republican simplicity. Jefferson was at the head of this movement, and lest he might appear as the only thorough republican in the cabinet, now that republicanism was the fashion, Hamilton, the opponent of Jefferson, fell into the same idea. Knox and Randolph dissented; and Washington took the oath of office in the Senate-chamber in the presence of the members of the cabinet, various public officers and foreign ministers. The Vice-President Adams, too, assumed a republican simplicity of living; gave up his house in Philadelphia and went into lodgings, leaving his wife at home to manage the farm, to whom writing, he said that his style of living made him very popular, and that he himself was well satisfied with his present simplicity. This republican rage was consequently shocked severely on the occasion of Washington’s next birth-day, when visits of congratulation, balls, parties, and other festivities, took place, not in Philadelphia only, where congress was now sitting, but in many other cities and towns; all which were regarded by the democrats as alarming steps towards monarchy, and the press teemed with bitter effusions on the subject.[^[68]]

Genet, the new French minister, flattered by the reception given to him, and supposing that the American nation, whatever its government might be, were ready to embark in the cause of France, proceeded to authorise the fitting out and arming privateers in the port of Charleston, and the enlisting men and giving commissions to cruise and commit hostilities on nations with whom the United States were at peace. He assumed also to authorise the French consuls throughout the Union to erect Courts of Admiralty, for trying and condemning such prizes as might be brought into the American ports; and acting on this assumed authority, proceeded accordingly against several prizes which were very soon brought to Charleston.

Five days before the arrival of Genet at Charleston, the news had reached New York of the French declaration of war against England and Holland. Washington, who was then at Mount Vernon, hastened to Philadelphia, summoned his cabinet, and took into serious consideration the important question, as to what part the United States must take in the present crisis of European affairs. Not wishing to involve his country in the contests of Europe, he himself advocated neutrality, and the cabinet finally came to the same opinion. This step, however, was by no means a popular one. Genet, who was an old and able diplomatist, arrived at Philadelphia immediately after the American government had published their decision. His journey, like his reception, called forth the most extravagant enthusiasm. The very men, says Hildreth, who had reprobated any demonstration of respect to Washington, as savouring too much of the old spirit of monarchical adulation, now seemed almost insane in the fervour of their desire to do honour to the Republic of France, in the person of her minister.

Republican feasts were held in sober Philadelphia; the public press took up the cry; democratic societies were formed; the red cap of Liberty was hoisted; the Marseilles hymn was sung, with two additional verses written by Genet, with reference to the navy; and a large faction, more French than American, seemed all going mad together.

Genet was a firebrand in the country. Not alone did he attempt to exercise sovereignty on the coast, but to organise in Georgia and South Carolina a hostile expedition against Florida, and another in Kentucky against New Orleans. The leadership in this latter undertaking was given to George Rogers Clarke, who formerly distinguished himself in the revolutionary war by the conquest of the Illinois country, but who now had sunk very low by a long course of intemperance. America could not rule her own country as long as Genet remained within it. Nothing could be more opposed than the restless, scheming, hot-headed and unprincipled Genet, and the calm, religious, and sagacious Washington. The excesses into which Genet and his party ran, caused complaints from the British minister. The cabinet resolved to enforce the laws; and Genet, believing that the whole management of American affairs was in his hands, threatened to appeal to the people against their government.

A reaction had already begun, and this very attempt to shake the government served but to strengthen it. Washington requested the recall of Genet, and in the following year his place was supplied by Fauchet, who was instructed to inform the American government that France disapproved of the conduct of her late minister. The Reign of Terror had now commenced in that devoted country, and Genet, who had in the meantime married the daughter of Governor Clinton, of New York, not choosing to return to France settled down in America, dropping at once his character of democratic agitator and sinking into the obscure citizen.

We must now take a rapid glance at the state of affairs in the West. After the defeat of St. Clair in 1791, General Wayne, to whom the Indians gave the name of the Black Snake, was appointed to the command of the American forces. Taking post near the country of the enemy, he made assiduous but vain attempts at negotiating peace, while his troops suffered greatly from a kind of epidemic influenza. The winter of 1793 he passed on the ground where the disastrous battles of 1791 had been fought, and here erected Fort Recovery. The Little Turtle would willingly have made peace, for, said he, addressing the confederated tribes, “we shall not now surprise them, for they have a chief who never sleeps;” but the Indian council insisted on war.

Early in the summer of 1794 operations commenced; Fort Recovery was attacked, and the Indians repulsed, although at the loss of 300 pack-mules and fifty men. In August, a reinforcement of 1,100 men having joined him, Wayne reached the confluence of the Au Glaize and the Maumee rivers, about thirty miles from a British post, where the whole force of the enemy, about 2,000 strong, was collected. Here, taken by surprise, they fled precipitately, and were pursued for two hours at the point of the bayonet. The country was finely cultivated and full of abundant crops. The American commander declared that he had never seen anything equal to it. The banks of those beautiful rivers appeared for many miles one complete village. At this point the conqueror built a strong fort called Fort Defiance, and a second called Fort Adams, to connect it with Fort Recovery.

Wayne offered to treat with the Indians, but they asked ten days for deliberation. This he would not grant, and followed them down the Maumee for two days; on the third he found them strongly encamped by the river, and a battle took place in which they were completely routed. The English lost 107 men; the loss of the Indians was never ascertained. The Indian corn-fields were ravaged up to the very walls of the British fort. Two British companies, it was asserted, with their faces painted to represent Indians, were in the fight; nevertheless, when the routed Indians fled to the fort for refuge, they were refused admittance, which treatment they never forgave; and Buckongahelas, the principal chief of the Delawares, immediately afterwards made peace with the Americans. The British influence over the savages was broken, and their confederacy dissolved. This victory insured peace and security to the whole settlements north-west of the Ohio, and even extended to Georgia.

On the 3rd of August, 1795, Wayne concluded a treaty of peace on behalf of the “Thirteen Fires,” as the federal states were called, with the Indians at Greenville. The principal chiefs, Tarhe, Buckongahelas, Black Hoof, Blue Jacket, and the Little Turtle, attended by 1,100 warriors, were parties to it. This treaty stipulated that the Ohio, with a few reservations, should thence become the boundary of the Indian territory. Besides the extent of country thus ceded, were several detached portions of territory, including the present or former sites of forts in the possession of the British, and about to be surrendered under a treaty with Great Britain, of which we shall speak anon, having, as regards these Indian affairs, somewhat advanced beyond the regular course of events. Among these cessions was a tract opposite Louisville, granted by Virginia to George Rogers Clarke and his soldiers for their services in the Illinois country; the ancient post of Vincennes and other French settlements; Fort Massac on the Ohio; and several other forts on different rivers with adjacent territory, Detroit, Mackinaw, and tracts at Sandusky, Chicago, and at the mouth and head of the Illinois river. The Indians received for these cessions 20,000 dollars worth of goods, with an annual allowance of about 10,000 dollars more.

At the exchange of prisoners which took place on this occasion, many affecting incidents occurred. The war, as against Kentucky, had lasted for about twenty years, during which time a great number of white people had been carried into captivity. Wives and husbands, parents and children, who had been separated for years, were now reunited. Many of the younger captives had quite forgotten their native language, and some of them absolutely refused to leave the savage connexions, into whose families they had been received by adoption.[^[69]]

We now return to Congress and the affairs of the administration. On the 1st of January, 1794, Jefferson resigned his office as secretary of state, and was succeeded by Randolph; William Bradford, of Pennsylvania, supplying his place as attorney-general.

This year was rendered remarkable by an insurrection in Pennsylvania. In 1791, congress had enacted laws laying duties upon spirits distilled within the United States, and upon stills. The operation of these laws had from the first created dissatisfaction, and an organised system of resistance was formed in the four western counties, and especially among the anti-federal or democratic party, to resist and defeat them. Indictments were found against such as had neglected to enter their stills, and the marshal of the district, about to serve the thirtieth warrant near Pittsburg, was met by an armed force which put him and his men to flight. This was the signal for further and more determined violence. The next morning, the house of General Neville, the inspector of the revenue, who had been wounded the day before, was attacked by an armed force, under a man called Tom the Tinker, and entered. Several persons were wounded, and Neville compelled to enter into stipulations to desist from the execution of his office. The following day the attack was renewed by a still more formidable party, but Neville had then fled, and the buildings were burned to the ground by the infuriated mob, the garrison which was stationed there being compelled to surrender. The marshal and the inspector fled to Ohio, and embarking, descended to Marietta, and thence by land to Philadelphia. This was a great triumph to the malcontents; a meeting was held at Pittsburg, and corresponding societies established. The mail from Philadelphia was intercepted, and the letters examined to ascertain beforehand how their affairs had been taken up at head-quarters. These multiplied outrages appeared to the president as very alarming signs of the times, especially as the democratic societies of the West were beginning to affiliate with their ferocious brethren of Paris. Several of the cabinet agreed with Washington in the necessity of using very decided and summary measures, and it was proposed to call out the militia. Again the governor of Pennsylvania, this time Mifflin, doubted his authority to call them out, or their obedience if he did so, and Washington immediately issued a proclamation commanding the insurgents to disperse, and warning all persons against aiding, abetting, or comforting the perpetrators of these treasonable acts, and requiring all officers and other citizens, according to their respective duties and the laws of the land, to use their utmost endeavours to suppress these dangerous proceedings.

The insurgents were no way deterred by this proclamation, and meetings of delegates from all the disaffected districts took place under liberty-trees with liberty-banners floating around them. The president’s call for the militia was responded to; and quotas were sent in from Virginia under the old revolutionary officer Morgan, as well as from Maryland, while Mifflin, thinking better of his hesitation, made a tour through the lower counties, and using his extraordinary popular eloquence for the occasion, soon filled up the ranks. Again, on the 25th of September, the president issued a second proclamation, admonishing the insurgents, and forcibly stating his determination, after the spirit of defiance with which the former lenient treatment of the government had been received, to obey the duty assigned to him by the Constitution, and “take care that the laws be faithfully executed,” and that he would proceed forthwith to reduce the refractory to obedience.

It was time that summary measures were taken, for disaffection and sedition were spreading in all directions; armed mobs were marching everywhere, erecting liberty-poles and committing deeds of violence. Fifteen thousand men were sent into the disaffected districts, under General Lee of Virginia. No sooner was the news abroad that this formidable army was advancing against them, than the tide of democratic violence began to ebb; liberty-poles were pulled down, and the armed insurgents dispersed. Several of the most active leaders were handed over to the civil authorities for trial, but were afterwards pardoned, as were also two others who were found guilty of treason. Morgan, however, remained in the disaffected counties through the winter, with a body of 2,500 men. The government was strengthened even by this outbreak; the decision and promptitude of the president won the respect, and his lenity the hearts of the country.

During this session an act was passed to raise a naval force consisting of six frigates, as a defence for American commerce against the Algerine pirates; no less than eleven merchant vessels and upwards of 100 citizens having been captured by those pests of the ocean. An act also was passed about the same time for fortifying the principal harbours, the more immediate cause for which was the apprehension of war with Great Britain, which at that time prevailed.

Ever since the treaty of peace in 1783, Great Britain and the United States had been mutually reproaching each other for having violated its conditions. The former complained that the royalists were prevented from recovering possession of their estates, and British subjects from recovering their debts. The Americans, on the other hand, complained that the British had carried away negroes at the close of the war, and that they still obstinately retained those military posts in the north-west, of which such frequent mention has been made. The excitement against Great Britain received, however, at this moment a great accession by two orders in council just issued, and by which all British cruisers were directed to stop and seize all ships laden with provisions bound for any French port, and to bring them for adjudication into the British courts of admiralty. These orders, which in fact went to destroy all neutral trade with the French colonies, produced the utmost excitement in Philadelphia, and for the moment nothing but war with Great Britain was talked of. Congress assembled, and a bill was passed laying an embargo for thirty days, which was again extended to a second thirty; and it was further debated whether all commercial intercourse with Great Britain and her subjects, as far as regarded all articles of British growth or manufacture, should not be discontinued, until she had acceded to their reasonable demands.

Washington foresaw in these violent measures no other issue than war with the mother-country, which he desired under every circumstance to avoid; and believing that the existing differences between the two countries might be brought to an amicable adjustment, resolved to make the experiment. Accordingly, Chief-Justice Jay being appointed to this important mission, embarked on May 13th, being attended to the shore by a great concourse of people, whom at parting he assured of his determination to leave no means untried for the security of the blessings of peace.

This measure being taken for pacific arrangements, congress passed acts for putting the country in a state of defence. The principal harbours were to be fortified, as we have before said, and 80,000 militia to be held in readiness for immediate service; the importation of arms was permitted free of duty, and additional taxes were levied.

About this time, the afterwards celebrated John Quincy Adams, son to the vice-president, received his first public appointment as minister at the Hague, he having already distinguished himself by certain articles in a Boston paper on Genet’s proceedings, which attracted Washington’s attention.

Hamilton, at the commencement of this year, resigned his office of Secretary of the Treasury, and was succeeded by Oliver Wolcot; and at the close of this session, General Knox having resigned, Timothy Pickering of Massachusetts was appointed Secretary of War.

Jay was successful in his mission, and early in the following year a treaty was laid before the Senate for ratification. This treaty provided that the posts which the British had retained should be given up to the Americans, and compensation made for illegal captures of American property; and the United States were to secure to the British creditor the proper means of collecting debts which had been contracted before the peace of 1783. It did not, however, prohibit the right of searching merchant vessels, and thus violated the favourite maxim of the Americans, that “free ships make free goods.” The treaty was not all that Washington himself desired; but as no better terms were to be had, he wisely resolved that, if the Senate approved of it, he would not withhold his signature.

The country was in a state of angry excitement, and ready to reject rather than accept it, even before they knew the exact terms of the treaty, while the Senate, with closed doors, were discussing it and coming gradually to the decision that it should be ratified. At this moment an imperfect copy appeared in a newspaper, and Washington then ordered it to be published.

This was like throwing a lighted brand among combustibles. The partisans of France assailed it with the utmost violence; an outcry was raised against it from one end of the Union to the other, as “a pusillanimous surrender of American rights, and a shameful breach of obligations to France.” City after city protested against it, and the popular feeling was expressing itself in acts of outrage and violence, when Washington, with the prompt decision of a wise governor, after protesting and remonstrating against such clauses of the treaty as he considered injurious to the American interests, settled the question by attaching his signature to the treaty. “As regards this treaty,” says Jared Sparkes in his Life of Washington, “time disappointed its enemies and more than satisfied its friends. It saved the country from a war, improved its commerce, and served in no small degree to lay the foundation of its durable prosperity. The great points which were said to be sacrificed or neglected—the impressment of seamen, neutral rights and colonial trade—have never yet been settled, and are never likely to be settled while England maintains the ascendancy she now holds on the ocean.”

Two other treaties were negotiated about the same time; one with Algiers, by which the commerce of the Mediterranean was opened, and the prisoners who had been in bondage for many years released; but for this was paid the large sum of 763,000 dollars, with an annual tribute in stores of 24,000 dollars, a black-mail which was paid likewise by various European nations, to secure them from the piracies of the Dey. The other treaty was with Spain. Spain had long acted towards the United States in an unfriendly manner. She was fearful lest the principles of liberty and independence which they had so successfully asserted should find their way into her contiguous provinces. She had always endeavoured that the western boundary of this so dangerous neighbour should be fixed at 300 miles east of the Mississippi, and she denied to the inhabitants west of the Alleganies access to the ocean by that great river, the mouth of which was in her province of Louisiana. At length, however, when at home she became involved in a war with France, and in America alarmed by the unauthorised preparations making in Kentucky, under the influence of Genet, to invade Louisiana, she intimated her willingness to adjust her differences with the United States by treaty. An envoy extraordinary was therefore immediately despatched to Madrid, and in October a treaty was signed, by which the western boundary of the American republic was fixed according to their own claims, the navigation of the Mississippi made free to both nations, and the American citizens allowed the privilege of landing and depositing cargoes at New Orleans.

During the recess of congress, and while the president was busied with filling up vacancies in his cabinet, the treaty with Great Britain was agitating the country, and petitions got up against it and numerously signed were presented to the House of Representatives when the fourth sitting of congress commenced. By this time, however, the offensive treaty had been ratified by his Britannic Majesty, and no other means of opposition now remained to the democratic or French party in the House of Representatives but to demand from the president the instructions by which Jay had entered into this negotiation. Washington refused to comply with this demand, asserting that the power to make treaties was vested by the Constitution solely in the president, with the advice and consent of the Senate, and that the House of Representatives had hitherto acquiesced in this mode of procedure. The malcontents were not prepared for this refusal, and the debate which it led to was carried on for many days with great eloquence as well as warmth. But even though Washington hazarded much in opposing the popular branch of the legislature, his was not a mind to be swayed by any lesser consideration from that which he knew to be the true line of duty. He believed that to yield in this instance would be to introduce a dangerous principle into the diplomatic transactions of the nation, and he was firm in his refusal.

The resolution moved in the house, to make the necessary appropriations to carry the treaty into effect, again called forth violent opposition. The people themselves now took up the subject also; meetings were held, and the strength of the two parties fully tried, until at length it was evident that the majority were in favour of the treaty. Petitions in its favour were presented to congress; and lastly, Fisher Ames, of Massachusetts, at that time just risen from his sick-bed, appeared in the house, pale, feeble, and scarcely able to stand, and spoke with such irresistible power on behalf of the treaty, that further opposition was vain. The eloquence of the sick man conquered; and the necessary laws were passed for the fulfilment of this agitated treaty.

The number of 60,000 inhabitants being required to constitute a state government, and Tennessee having attained to a still higher population, was admitted into the Union this year; and Sevier, who had distinguished himself in the extinct state of Frankland, was elected governor. This new State was peopled principally from North Carolina. The first newspaper established at Knoxville was in 1793.

The troubles regarding Jay’s treaty with Great Britain were not yet at an end. The French government and its partisans in America, who had, spite of the neutral position assumed by the United States, always calculated upon substantial aid and service being rendered to France, were consequently greatly disappointed and annoyed by the line of conduct which Washington had adopted, and which had tended to knit up, rather than to dissever, the old relationships between the two kindred countries. Washington and the federalists were pronounced to be hostile to the cause of France; to be traitors to their own principles, enemies to the rights of man, and meanly subservient to Great Britain.

Morris, the successor of Jefferson as American representative in France, a man of great sagacity and cool judgment, who having taken an active part in the revolution of his own country, could not yet regard with satisfaction the means adopted to establish a republic in France, was looked upon with suspicion by whatever party for the time being held the reins of government. Accordingly, when the Committee of Public Safety, under Robespierre and his associates, sent letters of recall to Genet, they requested also that another ambassador might be sent to supply the place of Morris. Mr. Monroe, an ardent friend of republican liberty and the rights of man, was sent over. The fall of Robespierre had taken place when Monroe arrived in Paris, and the Thermodorians, who were then in power, received him with considerable coolness, as questioning the loyalty of the nation which he represented to their great goddess of liberty.

The new ambassador by his instructions was empowered to contradict the report circulated in France of the unfriendly feelings of the president and his party towards the cause of that country. Monroe made the most of this permission; and Merlin de Douay and he embraced in public, that the French people might be edified by the spectacle which was to “complete the annihilation of an impious coalition of tyrants;” and the convention passed a decree that the “flags of the two republics should be entertwined and suspended in their hall, in testimony of eternal union and friendship.” In return, the French colours were sent to America for the same purpose, by M. Adet, who superseded Fauchet, he being removed at the fall of the Robespierre faction. These colours were duly presented on New-year’s-day, 1796, with an address, and the president replying, the colours were ordered to be deposited with the archives of the nation.

These theatrical flatteries were, however, but tricks and cajoleries to induce America to take part in the wars of France; and Monroe, caught in the snare that was laid, was not long before he wrote to urge the policy of a loan to France, adding “that the Americans in that case might at once seize the western posts, and the territory on the Lower Mississippi, occupied by the Spaniards, and trust to French aid to see them out of the war—if war should follow, which he did not conceive likely, either on the part of Britain or Spain, considering the success of the French arms.”

The schemes of the infatuated Monroe did not meet with that encouragement in America which he had led the French government to expect; and Jay’s treaty being about this time ratified, the French cruisers were ordered to capture, in certain cases, the vessels of the United States, and several hundred vessels laden with valuable cargoes were in consequence seized and confiscated.

Monroe, highly unfit for his office, not only displeased the government at home by his attempt to compromise them, but fell into disgrace at Paris, because he had failed to bring about that close alliance between the United States and France which he had promised. He was recalled; and Charles C. Pinckney, of South Carolina, appointed in his stead, he being furnished with instructions to use every effort, compatible with national honour, to restore the amicable relations which had formerly existed between the two countries.

But events were tending more and more to separate them. The British, at this time, were endeavouring to complete the conquest of the French portion of St. Domingo, the defence of which, for the republic, was left almost entirely in the hands of the black general, Touissaint. Provisions and horses, purchased in America, had been forwarded in American vessels chartered for that purpose, for the supply of the British troops. Adet complained of this, and very soon after had to communicate the decree of July 14, which empowered the seizure of American vessels in the West India seas. In November a proclamation was issued by Adet, commanding, in the name of the French Directory, all Frenchmen in America to assume the tri-coloured cockade. And this cockade was at once mounted, not only by Frenchmen, but by the American partisans of the French Republic. Adet was commencing the career of Genet.

With the close of 1796, which was now at hand, the time for the election of a new president was come. Washington, weary of the anxieties and contentions of public life, had already, in September, published a farewell address to his countrymen, which bore strongly upon the present state of public feeling; he emphatically urged the maintenance of Union, as the palladium of political prosperity and safety; of the Federal constitution, and of the public credit; he solemnly adjured them to avoid sectional jealousies and heartburnings, the baleful effect of party-spirit, and of permanent inveterate antipathies against particular nations or passionate attachments for others. He dwelt at length on the policy of an impartial neutrality and of a disconnexion with the nations of Europe, so far as existing treaties would permit, together with the dangers of foreign influence.

The address bore directly upon the present position of America with regard to France, and was, in fact, so important in this respect, that Adet followed it up with a manifesto which, like the address, was circulated through the newspapers and intended to counteract its effect.

Washington, as president, met the national legislature for the last time in December, and his last words in that character were a fervent desire “that the virtue and happiness of the people might be preserved, and that the government which they had instituted for the protection of their liberties might be perpetual.”

CHAPTER XVIII.
THE ADMINISTRATION OF ADAMS AND JEFFERSON.

Had Washington been willing to accept the presidentship yet a third time, the wishes of the nation would gladly have retained him in that office; but this not being the case, the two great political parties were each anxious to see its leader at the head of the administration. The federalists claiming to be the sole adherents of the measures adopted by Washington, and dreading the influence of French sentiments and principles, made the most active efforts to elect John Adams; while the republicans, declaring themselves to be the only true friends of liberty, and accusing their opponents of a dangerous tendency to Great Britain and her institutions, were no less strenuous to elect Thomas Jefferson. The result of the election was that Adams was president, and Jefferson vice-president.

The new president was inaugurated on the 4th of March, Washington being present as a spectator, and well pleased to see his place filled by one whom he considered worthy of so high a trust.

Scarcely had the president assumed his authority, when intelligence reached him that the Directory of Paris had refused to receive Pinckney, announcing to him “their determination not to receive another minister-plenipotentiary from the United States, until after the redress of grievances demanded of the American government, and which the French Republic had a right to expect from it;” and immediately afterwards he was compelled, by a written mandate, to quit the territories of the French Republic.

Congress was immediately called, and met on the 15th of June, when this extraordinary aspect of affairs was submitted by the president to their consideration. Wishing still to preserve peace and friendship with all nations, so far as was compatible with the honour and interests of the United States, the president proposed to institute a fresh attempt at negotiation; but earnestly recommended it to congress to provide in the meantime effectual measures of defence.

As a last effort, therefore, to effect a negotiation, three envoys-extraordinary were appointed, at the head of whom was Pinckney, then at Amsterdam. Their instructions were to establish peace and reconciliation by all means compatible with the honour and the faith of the United States; but to impair no national engagements; nor to permit any innovations upon those internal regulations for the preservation of peace which had been deliberately and uprightly established; nor yet to surrender any rights of the government. These ambassadors, also, the Directory refused to receive. Proposals however were made to them, which proceeded verbally from Talleyrand, the French minister for foreign affairs, through inofficial persons. A large sum of money was in the first place demanded, preparatory to any negotiation being entered into. To this insulting proposal no other reply than an indignant negative could be returned; and when the demand was persistently urged, the envoys broke off any further communication; on which two of them, who were federalists, were ordered to leave France, while the third, who was an acknowledged republican, was permitted to remain.

When these events were known in the United States, they excited universal indignation. For the moment party animosity seemed to be at an end, and one universal sentiment prevailed, “millions for defence, not a cent for tribute.” The treaty with France was declared by congress to be void, and authority was given for seizing French armed vessels. Provision was made for raising a small standing army, the command of which was offered to General Washington, who accepted it with reluctance, though entirely approving of these measures. General Hamilton was appointed second in command, and a naval armament decided upon.

TOMB OF WASHINGTON.

The French had already commenced depredations on the American commerce, and reprisals soon followed. In February, 1798, the French frigate L’Insurgent, of forty guns, which had captured the American schooner Retaliation and carried her into Guadaloupe, was compelled to strike her colours to the American frigate Constellation, after a close engagement of an hour and a half, her loss being much the greater. This victory on the side of the United States soon produced overtures from the Directory at Paris, on which Adams immediately appointed Oliver Ellsworth, chief-justice of the United States, Patrick Henry, late governor of Virginia, and William Van Murray, minister at the Hague, to conclude an honourable peace. On their arrival in Paris, they found the Directory overthrown, and Napoleon Bonaparte at the head of the government, with whom a treaty of peace was satisfactorily concluded on September the 30th, 1800; after which the provisional army was disbanded by order of Congress.

Washington, though he took the supreme command of the army, never believed that the French would actually invade the United States. He was not, however, permitted to witness the re-establishment of peace. On the 14th of December, 1799, he calmly and peacefully expired, after an illness of twenty-four hours, at Mount Vernon, his beloved residence, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. The whole nation mourned his loss.

Congress was in session at Philadelphia when the news of this melancholy event reached that city, and both houses immediately adjourned for the remainder of the day. On assembling the next morning, the House of Representatives resolved that the chair of the speaker should be shrouded in black; that the members should wear mourning during the remainder of the session; and that a committee of both houses should be appointed “to consider on the most suitable manner of paying honour to the memory of the man, first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his fellow-citizens.”

The Senate testified their respect in a similar manner, and the joint committee of the two houses appointed—that a marble monument should be erected to commemorate the great events in the military and political life of Washington; that an oration suitable to the occasion should be pronounced in presence of both houses of congress; and that the people of the United States should wear crape on their left arms for thirty days.

“No formal act of the national legislature was, however, required,” says Jared Sparkes, “to stir up the hearts of the people or to remind them of the loss which they had sustained in the death of a man whom they had so long been accustomed to love and revere, and the remembrance of whose deeds and virtues was so closely connected with that of their former perils, and of the causes of their present prosperity and happiness. The mourning was universal. It was manifested by every token which could indicate the public sentiment and feeling. Orators, divines, journalists, and writers of every class, responded to the general voice in all parts of the country, and employed their talents to solemnise the event, and to honour the memory of him who, more than any other man, of ancient or modern renown, may claim to be called THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY.”

Both in France and England also was a tribute of respect paid to the memory of this truly great man. On the 9th of February, soon after the news of Washington’s death reached France, Napoleon Bonaparte, then first consul, issued the following order of the day to his army: “Washington is dead! This great man fought against tyranny; he established the liberty of his country. His memory will always be dear to the French people, as it will be so to all freemen of the two worlds; and especially to French soldiers, who, like him and the American soldiers, have combated for liberty and equality.” It was likewise ordered that for ten days black crape should be suspended from all the flags and standards throughout the Republic. A funeral oration in honour of Washington was also pronounced in the Hôtel des Invalides, then called the temple of Mars, the first consul and all the civil and military authorities being present. The news of Washington’s death arrived in England at the time when the British fleet, which had chased the French fleet into the harbour of Brest, was lying at Torbay, and consisted of nearly sixty ships of the line. Lord Bridport, who had the command, on hearing the intelligence, ordered his flag half-mast high, which example was followed by the whole fleet.

During the summer of 1800 the seat of government was removed to the city of Washington, in the District of Columbia, of which we have already spoken. During the same year the territory between the western boundary of Georgia and the Mississippi river, and a portion of the north-west territory called Indiana, were erected into a distinct government, called the Mississippi Territory.

As the time approached for the election of a new president, the two parties made again the most strenuous efforts each to acquire the direction of government. Adams had been elected by the predominance of federal principles, but several things had occurred in his administration which had not only weakened his personal influence, but rendered the party to which he was attached unpopular with the majority. The acts by which the army and navy had been strengthened, and which had placed 80,000 militia at his command, were regarded by the democratic as indications of a wish to subvert the spirit of republican government; while the Alien and Sedition Laws, to which he had given his sanction, completed his unpopularity, and fomented party animosity to an extent which had never been equalled, and tended greatly to the overthrow of the federal party.

The federalists supported for the approaching election Adams and General Pinckney, the democratic party Thomas Jefferson and Colonel Aaron Burr. The two latter were found to have a small majority, the whole of the republican party having voted for them, with the intention of Jefferson being president and Burr vice-president. On counting the votes, however, it was discovered that both were equal; the selection, therefore, of the president devolved upon the house of representatives, who, voting by states, according to the constitution, should decide between the two. Again and again and yet again the balloting was repeated in the house, and the result always the same; nor was it until the thirty-sixth balloting that one altered vote turned the scale in Jefferson’s favour. He became president, and Aaron Burr vice-president. To guard against the recurrence of such a difficulty, Article XII. was added to the Constitution.

Tucker, in his life of Jefferson, thus describes the scene which the house of representatives presented on this extraordinary occasion: “The business of the house being confined to balloting, and the result always showing an adherence by every member to his first purpose, some of the members conducted themselves in one way and some in another, according to their various characters and tempers; a portion of the republican party, gloomy, suspicious, and resentful, auguring the worst consequences and preparing their minds for the most desperate results; others, more sanguine, looking forward to a happy termination of the conquest, which they laboured to bring about by the arts of blandishment and conciliation. A few, quietly and steadily doing their duty, determined neither to frustrate the wishes of the people, by changing their votes, nor to submit to any unconstitutional expedient which a majority of both houses might venture to resort to. The federal party, conscious of not having the approbation of the people, exhibited less variety of emotion; they justified themselves by the exercise of a constitutional right, and thought it prudent and decent to conceal their secret satisfaction of vexing and embarrassing their adversaries.”

On the election of Jefferson, all the principal offices of the government were transferred to the republican party; Madison was appointed to the department of state; the system of internal duties was abolished, together with several unpopular laws which were enacted during the last administration.

A second census of the United States was taken in 1801, giving a population of 5,319,762, presenting an increase of 1,400,000 in ten years. During the same time the exports had increased from nineteen to ninety-four millions of dollars, and the revenue from 4,771,000 to 12,945,000. A wonderful increase, which has scarcely a parallel in the history of the progress of nations, excepting it may be in some extraordinary cases, like those of California and Australia under the gold impulse, but which as regards the United States must be attributed only to sound laws and political institutions, as well as to the enterprising and industrious habits of the people.

In 1802 the State of Ohio was admitted into the Union, and the following year the first states convention met. Within thirty years from the time when its first settlement of forty-seven individuals was made at Marietta the number of its inhabitants exceeded half a million, and from this extensive and important tract slavery was entirely excluded.

The right of depositing merchandise at New Orleans, which had been granted to the citizens of the United States by the Spanish governor of Louisiana, in a late treaty, and which was absolutely necessary to the people of the western states, was withdrawn this year, and caused a general agitation. A proposal was made in congress to take forcible possession of the whole province of Louisiana; but milder measures were adopted, and the right of deposit was restored. In the year 1800, Louisiana had been secretly ceded to France, and Jefferson, in 1802, opened a private correspondence with Livingston, in Paris, on the subject of this cession. The United States had hitherto, he said, considered France as their natural friend, but the moment she became possessed of New Orleans, through which three-eighths of the produce of the Americans must pass, she would become their natural enemy. The case was different with a feeble and pacific power like Spain; but it would be impossible that France and the United States could continue friends when they met in so irritating a position. That the moment France took possession of New Orleans, the United States must ally themselves with Great Britain; and, he asked, was it worth while for such a short-lived possession of New Orleans for France to transfer such a weight into the scale of her enemy? He then artfully suggested the cession of New Orleans and the Floridas; but adds, and even that they would consider as no equivalent while she possessed Louisiana.

In January, 1803, agents were sent over to negotiate the purchase of Florida; but instead of the purchase merely of New Orleans and the Floridas, as had been planned, they were able to effect that of all Louisiana, equal in extent to the whole previous territory of the United States. They owed their good fortune to the war which was so suddenly renewed between France and England, when the government of France, convinced that the possession of Louisiana would soon be wrested from her by the superior naval power of England, readily consented to make sale of it to a third power, and the rather, as the money was very acceptable at that time.[^[70]]

For the trifling sum of 15,000,000 dollars the United States became possessed of that vast extent of country embracing the present State of Louisiana, which was called “the Territory of Orleans,” as well as of “the District of Louisiana,” embracing a large tract of country extending westward to Mexico and the Pacific Ocean. The treaty was concluded at Paris in 1803. The area of the country thus ceded was upwards of 1,000,000 square miles, but all, excepting a small proportion, occupied by the Indians, its natural proprietors. Its inhabitants, chiefly French, or the descendants of the French, with a few Spanish creoles, Americans, English and Germans, amounted to between 80,000 and 90,000, including about 40,000 slaves.

About the same time the United States acquired another considerable extent of territory. The Kaskaskia Indians, occupying the country which extended along the Mississippi, from the mouth of the Illinois to the Ohio, and which is considered the most fertile in the Union, finding themselves so reduced by wars and other causes as to be unable to defend themselves from the neighbouring tribes, transferred their country to the United States, reserving only for agricultural purposes sufficient to sustain the remnant of the nation. For this valuable acquisition the United States engaged to extend to them protection, and give them annual aid in money, implements of agriculture, and other articles of their choice.

In 1803 an appropriation was made by congress for defraying the expenses of an exploring party across the continent to the Pacific. This was a scheme which the president had much at heart, and under his auspices it was carried out; Captain Meriwether Lewis being at the head of the expedition, while second in command was Captain Jonathan Clarke, brother of George Rogers Clarke, and under them twenty-eight well-selected individuals, with an escort of Mandan Indians. The expedition set out on May 14th, 1804.

Since 1801 war had existed between the United States and Tripoli. Without going into minute details of this war, we will follow the abstract given of it by Willson. “In 1803 Commodore Preble was sent into the Mediterranean, and after humbling the emperor of Morocco, he appeared before Tripoli with most of his squadron. The frigate Philadelphia, under Captain Bainbridge, being sent into the harbour to reconnoitre, struck upon a rock, and was obliged to surrender to the Tripolitans. The officers were considered prisoners of war, but the crew were treated as slaves. This capture caused great exultation to the enemy; but the daring exploit of Lieutenant, afterwards Commodore Decatur, humbled the pride which they felt in this accession to their navy.

Early in February of the following year, Lieutenant Decatur, under the cover of evening, entered the harbour of Tripoli, in a small schooner, having on board but seventy-six men, with the design of destroying the Philadelphia, which was then moored near the castle, with a strong Tripolitan crew. By the aid of his pilot, who understood the Tripolitan language, Decatur succeeded in bringing his vessel in contact with the Philadelphia, when he and his followers leapt on board, and in a few minutes killed twenty of the Tripolitans and drove the rest into the sea.

“Under a heavy cannonade from the surrounding vessels and batteries, the Philadelphia was set on fire, and not abandoned until thoroughly wrapt in flames; when Decatur and his gallant crew succeeded in getting out of the harbour without the loss of a single man. During the month of August, Tripoli was repeatedly bombarded by the American squadron, under Commodore Preble, and a severe action occurred with the Tripolitan gunboats, which resulted in the capture of several, with little loss to the Americans.

“At the time of Commodore Preble’s expedition to the Mediterranean, Hamet, the legitimate sovereign of Tripoli, was an exile, having been deprived of his government by the usurpation of a younger brother. Mr. Eaton, the American consul at Tunis, concocted with Hamet an expedition against the reigning sovereign, and obtained from the government of the United States permission to undertake it.

“With about seventy men from the American squadron, together with the followers of Hamet and some Egyptian troops, Eaton and Hamet set out from Alexandria towards Tripoli, a distance of 1,000 miles across a desert country. After great fatigue and suffering they reached Derne, a Tripolitan city on the Mediterranean, which was taken by assault. After two successful engagements had occurred with the Tripolitan army, the reigning bashaw offered terms of peace, which being considered much more favourable than had before been offered, were accepted by Mr. Lear, the authorised agent of government.”

Sixty thousand dollars were given as a ransom for the unfortunate American prisoners, together with an agreement to withdraw all support from Hamet.

In July, 1804, General Hamilton, the present head of the federalist party, fell in a duel fought with the vice-president, Aaron Burr, who having lost the confidence of the republicans, and despairing of re-election either as president or vice-president, had offered himself as candidate for the office of governor of New York. He was not elected, and attributing his unsuccess to the influence of Hamilton with his party, sent him a challenge, and Hamilton’s death was the result.

This autumn closed Jefferson’s first presidential term, and the general prosperity which prevailed gained for him the national favour. Summing up in short the events of his administration, we find that, by a steady course of economy, although he had considerably reduced the taxes, the public debt was lessened 12,000,000 of dollars; the area of the United States about doubled, and the danger of war with both France and Spain averted; the Tripolitans chastised, and a large and valuable tract of Indian land acquired.[^[71]]

Jefferson was re-elected president, and George Clinton, late governor of New York, vice-president.

The wars which raged in Europe in consequence of the French revolution began now to be seriously felt even in America. Napoleon was emperor of France, triumphant and powerful, with most of the European nations under his feet, while England, alone remaining untouched and undaunted, carried on the war against him with more determined resolution than ever. America, profiting by the destruction of the commerce of other nations, entered with her neutral ships into every port, thus maintaining her commercial relations with every country, however hostile to each other. English and American ships were at this time almost the only ones on the ocean.

Already, early in the war, American ships conveying the produce of the French colonies to Europe, were seized and condemned by British cruisers; and now still greater difficulties and impediments were thrown in the way of the neutral trader. In May, 1806, England declared every European port under the control of France, from Brest to the Elbe, in a state of blockade, and every American vessel attempting to enter any of them was captured and condemned. In return, Napoleon declared the British Islands in a state of blockade, by which means the neutral American vessels, trading to any of the British ports, were liable to be seized and condemned by the French. These measures so detrimental to the commerce of the United States, caused loud complaints from the merchants, who demanded from the government redress and protection.

But this was only a portion of the grievance to which this great European war gave birth in America. England assumed “the right of search,” which had long been offensive to the Americans, and by this means citizens of the United States, on the plea of their being British subjects, that is, born Britons though naturalised Americans, were seized under the barbarous law of impressment, dragged from their friends, and compelled to serve as British marines, and fight against nations at peace with their own. The three presidents had, each in his turn, remonstrated against this iniquitous law, but in vain; every year added to its enormity; and at length, in June 1807, an event occurred which brimmed the cup of popular indignation against Great Britain. The frigate Chesapeake being ordered on a cruise to the Mediterranean, when at only a few leagues’ distance from the Virginia coast, was come up with by the Leopard, a British ship of war, commanded by Vice-Admiral Berkeley; and an officer came on board with an order to search her for four deserters from the Melampus, and supposed to be serving among her crew. Commodore Barron, who commanded the Chesapeake, politely replied that he was not aware of such persons being in his crew; that he wished to preserve harmony with the British commander, but that he never allowed the crew of any ship under his command to be mustered by any officers but his own.

The Leopard, on this manly reply, ranged alongside of the Chesapeake, and commenced firing upon her. The Chesapeake was unprepared for action, and lost three of her men, and eighteen more being wounded, Commodore Barron ordered his colours to be struck. The commander of the Leopard sent an officer on board, mustered the crew, found the men whom he wanted, and then abandoned the ship.

The Chesapeake returned immediately to Hampton Roads, whence she had sailed, and carried with her intelligence which set the whole United States in a flame, more especially as it was proved that three of the men thus seized were American citizens, who had been impressed for the British service and afterwards escaped. The president, on this information, interdicted by proclamation the entrance of any armed British vessel within the harbours or waters of the United States; and an envoy was sent to London to demand satisfaction for this outrage, and security against any further aggression. Vice-Admiral Berkeley was in consequence recalled; two of the men who had been taken as deserters were sent back to America, and a proclamation issued forbidding any further search in national ships of neutral nations for deserters. But this did little, as the celebrated orders in council were published by the British government in November, which prohibited neutrals, except on humiliating terms, from trading with France or her allies; which, in fact, was equivalent to excluding them from almost every port in Europe. Napoleon retaliated, of course, by his Milan decree, which rendered every vessel trading with Britain, or submitting to search by her, liable to confiscation if found near his ports or by his cruisers. Thus were the neutral ships of America still endangered by both belligerent powers.

In return for these vexatious measures, congress, in December, passed a bill laying an embargo; “so that all American vessels were prohibited from sailing to foreign ports, all foreign vessels from taking out cargoes, and all coasting vessels were required to give bond to land their cargoes in the United States. This embargo was strongly opposed by the federalist party, and great were the complaints of a total stop being thus put to foreign commerce. All, however, hoped for a favourable result from a measure which, if it were seriously felt by the United States, would, it was believed, be still more seriously felt by their enemies.”[^[72]]

This embargo failed to obtain any concession from France and England, and being in itself so injurious to the commercial interests of the United States, was repealed in 1809, at which time, however, congress interdicted all commercial intercourse with France and England.

Such was the situation of the country when Jefferson, having been eight years in office, and following the example of Washington, refused to accept of re-election, prepared to retire from the administration. But before we speak of this event, we must briefly return to a cause of anxiety and agitation, originating in the designs of the late vice-president, Aaron Burr.

Burr, while in office, offended both prevailing parties. The federalists by his fatal encounter with Hamilton, who was the idol of that party; and the republicans by his supposed intrigues against Jefferson. Under these circumstances, finding himself everywhere unpopular, he retired as a private citizen to the newer western states. Here, restless, scheming and ambitious, he engaged in an enterprise the full scope and intention of which seems never to have been completely fathomed. With the ostensible design of forming a large agricultural settlement on the banks of the Washita in Louisiana, he put himself at the head of a great number of people, who were armed and organised, and for whose use boats were purchased and built on the Ohio. The nature of his preparations, which had a warlike rather than a peaceful character, and the disclosures of some of his associates, led to the supposition that his real object was of a very different character—was, in fact, no less than to separate the western states from the Union, to add Mexico to them, and place himself at their head. “Nothing,” says the President Jefferson, writing on this subject to La Fayette, “has more strongly proved the innate force of our form of government than this conspiracy. Burr had probably engaged 1,000 men to follow his fortunes, without letting them know his projects, otherwise than by assuring them that the government approved of them. The moment a proclamation was issued, undeceiving them, he found himself left with about thirty desperadoes only. The people rose in a mass wherever he went, and by their own energy the thing was crushed in an instant, without its having been necessary to employ the military excepting to take care of their respective stations. His first enterprise would have been to seize New Orleans, which he supposed would powerfully bridle the upper country, and place him at the door of Mexico.”

“Burr was arrested in the Mississippi territory, in January 1807, and brought before the highest court in the territory. Here making a favourable impression on the grand jury, he moved to be discharged, but this being refused, he made his escape with a single companion, and was again taken on his way to Florida. Carried now to Richmond, in Virginia, for trial, the whole United States waited with intense interest for the result. The former character and station of the accused, the novelty and boldness of his enterprise, the air of mystery in which it was involved, all contributed to the excitement. Nor was party-spirit inactive, the federalists, spite of his offences against them, wishing to prove him innocent, for the sake of thwarting the executive and proving the president vindictive and tyrannical.”[^[73]]

The trial commenced in May, and on the 23rd of June the grand jury found him and several of his associates guilty of treason. He was then committed to prison, but on the plea of such close confinement being likely to affect his health, he was removed to a publichouse with a guard over him. On the 3rd of August, the court having adjourned so long, he was put on his trial, and on the last day of that month was discharged, on the plea that there was not sufficient evidence to prove his guilt. The republican party attributed this result to the interest of the faction which chose to support him for political purposes, and the case probably might not have ended here, had not the public mind been at that very time diverted by subjects of yet greater interest. These were the British interference with American commerce and shipping, and the affair of the Chesapeake, which electrified the nation to its remotest extremities, and fused all party animosities for the moment into one general indignation; and Burr, taking advantage of this removal of public attention from himself, sailed for England, where he was afterwards suspected of being an agent of mischief to the United States.[^[74]]

CHAPTER XIX.
ADMINISTRATION OF JAMES MADISON—WAR WITH GREAT BRITAIN.

On March 4th, 1809, James Madison was elected president, and George Clinton re-elected vice-president. The embargo, as we have said, was repealed, though commercial intercourse with France and England was still prohibited. It was, however, provided that if either nation revoked her hostile edicts, the prohibition should cease by proclamation from the president to that effect. Soon after the accession of the new president, therefore, Mr. Erskine, the British minister plenipotentiary to the United States, having informed him that the British orders in council should be repealed by the 10th of June, the renewal of commercial intercourse with Britain was proclaimed for the same day. But the British government disavowed the acts of its representative; the orders in council remained unrepealed, and non-intercourse was again proclaimed.

In March, 1810, Napoleon retaliated the act of congress forbidding the vessels of the United States to enter the ports either of France or her allies, by the decree of Berlin, which ordered all American vessels and cargoes arriving in any of the ports of France, or the countries occupied by French troops, to be seized and condemned. In November, however, of the same year, these hostile decrees were revoked by France, and commercial intercourse was renewed with that country.

But England would revoke nothing, and the feeling between the two countries grew daily more and more hostile, although the ultra-Whigs in England, as the federalists in America, used their utmost to bring about amicable relationships between the two countries. In March, 1811, Pinckney, the American minister, was suddenly recalled from London; and British ships being stationed before the principal harbours of the United States for the purpose of enforcing the British authority, open acts of hostility took place in May of the same year. The British frigate Guerrière, exercising the assumed right of search, carried off three or four natives of the States from some American vessels, whereupon orders came down from Washington to Commodore Rodgers to pursue the British ship and demand their own men. Rodgers sailed from the Chesapeake on the 12th of May, in the President frigate, and not meeting with the offending Guerrière, fell in with a smaller vessel, the Little Belt, towards evening of the 16th of May. The President was a large ship, the Little Belt a small one; the President hailed, and in return, the Americans declared, a shot was fired. The British, on the other hand, declared that the President fired first; however that might be, a severe engagement took place, the guns of the little Belt were silenced, and thirty-two of her men killed and wounded. Through the night the two ships lay at a little distance from each other to repair their damages, the British ship being almost disabled.

This was the muttering of the thunder before the storm; an earnest of that which was approaching. But before we proceed to the actual breaking out of the war, we must turn for a moment to the West, where a hostile confederacy and formidable preparations were discovered among the Indians, fomented by the British in Canada. At the head of this alarming confederacy was the great Shawanese chief, Tecumseh, and his twin brother, Laulewasikaw, who, in order to give to their undertaking a solemn and mysterious character, had assumed the name of the Prophet, and who, pretending to direct communication with the Great Spirit, acquired a powerful influence over the awestruck Indians, who implicitly obeyed his commands.

Tecumseh, who had been always hostile to the whites, and active in the later efforts against them, was a man of powerful mind, and possessed of all those stoic qualities which give a grandeur even to the most savage nature. He was in the battles of the confederated tribes in the late war, and one of those who, in opposition to the advice of the Little Turtle, rejected peace; and when finally peace was made at Greenville, he retired with the Prophet to the Pottawattamies, Wyandots, and other tribes, over whom the two, and especially the latter, gained a powerful ascendency, even to the extent of causing to be put to death some of the oldest and most powerful chiefs of various tribes. Tecumseh and his brother, as we have said, were enemies of the white intruders, and the object of all their endeavours was to be rid of these troublesome guests. For several years, therefore, the frontier inhabitants in the vicinity of the sources of the Mississippi had suffered grievously. At length, in the autumn of 1811, Indian hostilities having assumed an alarming and frightful character, Governor Harrison, of the Indiana territory, was directed by congress to march towards the residence of the prophet on the Wabash, and put a stop to their barbarities. On the 7th of November, having reached the vicinity of the prophet’s town, he was met by a deputation of chiefs, who, in the name of the prophet, offered peace and submission, requesting him to encamp for the night. Suspecting treachery, General Harrison ordered his men to sleep on their arms, and long before dawn the faithless Indians made their attack. A bloody battle ensued, but the Indians were routed; and after totally destroying the prophet’s town, and establishing a strong fort, the American general retired to Vincennes. Tecumseh was not in this fight, but at that time engaged in inciting the more distant tribes. This victory produced peace for a season.

Erskine, the British minister, was replaced by Mr. Foster, who was empowered to make restoration for the damage done to the Chesapeake, to restore the men forcibly taken from her, and offer pecuniary compensation to the families of those seamen who had fallen in the action. Admiral Berkeley had been deprived of command in consequence of his majesty’s displeasure; and, in fact, every possible concession was made, excepting that which America required, viz. to give up the impressment, and to revoke the orders in council. America had just reason to complain; for these orders, now that a free commerce was restored with France, were enforced with greater rigour than ever, and a great number of richly-laden American ships destined for the ports of France had fallen into the hands of British cruisers.

In November, the president recommended that the United States should be put in an attitude of defence, and congress agreeing thereto, provision was made for the increase of the regular army to 35,000, and also for the enlargement of the navy. The president was empowered to borrow eleven millions of dollars; the duties on imported goods were doubled, and taxes laid on domestic manufactures and nearly all descriptions of property. Early in April, 1812, congress passed an act laying an embargo of ninety days on all ships and vessels of the United States. This was intended to lessen the number of trading vessels that would otherwise be at the mercy of England when war was declared, and which, in fact, were comparatively useless in any case, for commercial intercourse had now been so long suspended or intercepted that grass grew on the deserted wharfs of New York and Philadelphia. By the end of May, most of the fast-sailing ships, brigs, and schooners of their merchant service, were fitted out as privateers or men of war. On the 4th of June a bill passed the house of representatives declaring war against Great Britain, and on the 17th the senate, and two days afterwards the president, issued a proclamation of war. This decisive act did not, however, meet with universal approbation. The federalist party, occupying generally the northern and eastern states, and strongly attached to Britain, put forth their solemn protest against the war; and when the news reached Boston, many citizens appeared in mourning, and the church bells were tolled.

Exertions were immediately made to enlist 25,000 men; to raise 50,000 volunteers, and to call out 100,000 militia for the defence of the sea-coast and frontiers. Henry Dearborn, one of the few surviving officers of the revolutionary war, was appointed major-general and commander-in-chief, and his head-quarters were at Greenbush, near Albany, on the Hudson.

At the time of the declaration of war, General Hull, governor of Michigan, was at the head of 2,500 men, well supplied with artillery and ready to march, but waiting then at Detroit, the capital of Michigan, for orders; the intention being to invade Canada. The English were, however, on the alert; and Major-General Brocke, knowing of the gathering of Hull’s forces at Detroit, and believing that war was inevitable, sent discretionary orders to the British officer in charge of Fort St. Joseph to act against the enemy as should appear advisable. Hull, also, had received discretionary orders to invade Canada, “if consistent with the Safety of his own posts.” On the 12th of July, therefore, he crossed the river Detroit and encamped at Sandwich, intending to march upon the British post at Maldon, or Amherstburgh, a stronghold of the British and their Indian allies. From Sandwich, Hull issued a bold proclamation inviting the oppressed citizens of Canada to throw off their allegiance to the British and become citizens of the Republic. Brocke also began to move, and on the 27th of July surprised the American post at Mackinaw, which Hull had left singularly unaware of present circumstances, and the commandant of which received the first knowledge of the declaration of war by being summoned to surrender to a combined British and Indian force, and who not being prepared to defend the place, having but fifty-seven men, surrendered, thinking himself fortunate to obtain for his little band the honours of war. Thus was one of the strongest positions in the United States placed at once in the hands of the British. Nor was this all; Major van Horne, who had been sent by Hull to convey a party bringing up provisions to his camp, was attacked by a united force of British and Indians, headed by Tecumseh, and defeated.

Hull lay inactive for a month in Canada, Amherstburgh in the meantime being reinforced, and then suddenly re-crossed the Detroit on the night of the 7th of August, to the bitter vexation and disappointment of his troops, and encamped under the walls of Detroit. Colonel Procter was despatched after him by Major-General Brocke, and advanced to Sandwich, where batteries were raised, and where he was presently joined by Brocke with reinforcements. On the very day after Hull reached Detroit, having sent 600 of his best troops again to convey provisions, they were attacked in the woods by a British and Indian force, again under the terrible Tecumseh, and a severe fight took place upon the very ground where Van Horne had before been defeated.

On the 16th of August, Major-General Brocke crossed the river a few miles above Detroit without interruption, and immediately marched against the American works with about 700 British troops and 600 Indians. The American troops, advantageously posted and outnumbering the enemy, anxiously awaited the order to fire, when, to their unspeakable astonishment and indignation, they were suddenly ordered to retire within the fort, on the walls of which they beheld a white flag in token of submission. The indignation of the army was so great, that, crowding into the fort without any orders, many it is said wept; others, in stacking their arms, dashed them violently on the ground.

Not only the army at Detroit, but the whole territory, with all its forts and garrisons, were surrendered to the British. The British were as much astonished at this surrender as the Americans themselves. General Hull, being exchanged for thirty British prisoners, was arraigned before a court-martial. He was acquitted of treason, but convicted of cowardice and unsoldierlike conduct, and sentenced to death, but was afterwards pardoned by the president in consideration of his revolutionary services. His name, however, was struck from the rolls of the army.

Leaving Colonel Proctor to hold possession of the Detroit frontier, Brocke moved off rapidly along the Niagara frontier, from which quarter, also, arrangements had been made, during the summer, for the invasion of Canada, and where a body of troops was collected, under command of Stephen van Rensselaer. Early in the morning of Oct. 13th, a detachment, under Colonel Solomon van Rensselaer, crossed the river and gained possession of the heights of Queenstown, on which was a small battery. At the moment of success the enemy received a reinforcement, under General Brocke, and a long and obstinate engagement ensued, in which the gallant Brocke was killed; and spite of all the exertions General van Rensselaer could make the republicans retired with great loss. A singular circumstance occurred on this disastrous day. General van Rensselaer commanded the militia of New York, in the ranks of which federalist principles were very prevalent; when, therefore, they were needed to support their failing brethren on the other side of the river, they refused to embark, on the plea that they had scruples of conscience against carrying offensive war into the British territories.

Soon after the battle of Queenstown, General van Rensselaer retired from the service, and General Alexander Smyth, of Virginia, assumed the command; and issuing an address, announcing that he would retrieve the honour of his country by another attack on Canada, he invited the young men of the country to share in the glory of the enterprise. Between 4,000 and 5,000 responded to his call; but after storming a battery on Black Rock and thus opening a way for the much-vaunted undertaking, it was suddenly abandoned; the troops, to their great astonishment, were recalled, and sent into winter-quarters.

In the meantime, Ohio and Kentucky had collected forces for the support of Hull, which were on their march to Detroit when the news of the surrender of that post met them. Harrison, governor of the Indiana territory, who possessed the entire confidence of the West, and brigadier-general in the army, was appointed by congress to the command of these forces, amounting to nearly 10,000. With these he marched to the north-western parts of Ohio, to protect the country against the incursions of the Indians, which were becoming more and more terrible every day.

On the 2nd October, 2,000 mounted volunteers from the territories of Indiana and Illinois assembled at Vincennes, under the command of General Hopkins, and on the 10th, set out on an expedition against the Kickapoo and Peoria towns. On the fourth day, alarming masses of smoke and flame, advancing with the wind, were seen in the distance, by which they perceived that the Indians had set fire to the long thick grass of the prairie over which they had to pass. The troops became mutinous, and demanded to return. Hopkins called a council of his officers, and agreed to take the sense of the army. The majority were for returning. The general, mortified at this result, commanded the army to follow him onward; but they turned their horses’ heads and rode off almost to a man. Hopkins could do no less than follow. With better success, the same officer, in the month of November, marched from Fort Harrison against the Prophet’s town and a Kickapoo village, which were both destroyed.

Nor were the achievements of the republican forces under Dearborn calculated to retrieve the honour of the American arms. A detachment marched from Plattsburgh, on Lake Champlain, a short distance into Canada, where they surprised a small body of combined British and Indians, and destroyed a considerable quantity of stores. That was the extent of their operations. After the misfortunes of Detroit and Niagara, the army in all its branches seemed paralysed.

While defeat and disgrace, however, attended the arms of the republic by land, the most brilliant success crowned their efforts on sea.

On August 19th, Captain Isaac Hull, commanding the Constitution of forty-four guns, engaged the British frigate Guerrière of thirty-eight guns, that very frigate which had been the great cause of quarrel about the English deserters, and after an action of half an hour, nearly every mast and spar being shot away, Captain Dacres, who commanded the Guerrière, struck his flag. One-third of the crew were either killed or wounded, while the American vessel lost only seven, and eight men wounded. The Guerrière was so shattered that it was impossible to get her into port, and she was burned. Again, on the 18th of October, the American sloop Wasp, of eighteen guns, commanded by Captain Jacob Jones, had an encounter with the British frigate Frolic, of twenty-two guns, which after a bloody fight of three-quarters of an hour, was boarded by the Americans, when only three officers and one seaman were found on the forecastle, while the decks, slippery with blood, were covered with the dead and dying. The Frolic lost eighty men, the Wasp only ten. The Wasp, with her prize, was captured the same day by a British seventy-four. A few days after, the frigate United States, commanded by Captain Decatur, engaged the British frigate Macedonian. The action lasted nearly two hours, when the Macedonian struck her colours, being nearly disabled, and her loss amounting to upwards of 100 men, while the Americans lost but five, and eight wounded. This engagement took place near the Canary Islands, and the prize was brought safely into New York harbour. Finally, in December, the Constitution, now commanded by Commodore Bainbridge, achieved a second victory, after a most desperate encounter with the Java, of forty-nine guns and four hundred men. The combat took place off the coast of Brazil; nor did the Java strike her flag until she was a mere wreck, with 161 killed and wounded. Like the Guerrière, she was burned. These naval victories were peculiarly gratifying to the Americans, especially as being gained on an element where the American citizens had suffered so much. Many British merchantmen were also captured by American privateers, which now issued from every port. Above 300 prizes was taken in the first seven months of the war.

As regards this extraordinary series of naval successes, the English naval historian records, that “the Java, for instance, was perhaps the worst-manned ship that we ever had afloat. Our Admiralty, obliged to keep at sea in all parts of the world such an immense number of men of war, straitened in their finances, and finding it difficult to obtain at short notice crews for all their ships, had certainly sent to sea a great many vessels exceedingly ill-manned. The Java had been patched up and commissioned only on the 17th of August of the present year. The greatest difficulty was to provide her with any crew; sixty-nine Irishmen were on board who had never been to sea before. She appears to have had but eight tried and excellent seamen; and including officers, not fifty on board had ever been in action before. The Constitution, on the other hand, had a crew consisting entirely of able-bodied and practised sailors, there being the usual proportion of deserters from English ships, and of other subjects of Great Britain, whose treason and dread of the gallows disposed them to fight desperately.” Such was the consolation which England took to herself in this hour of mortification.

Very soon after declaration of war, the United States communicated to Great Britain her willingness to pacificate on condition that the orders in council should be repealed, the impressment of American seamen discontinued, and those already impressed restored. These conditions, however, were rejected by Lord Castlereagh, then Secretary of Foreign Affairs, although negotiation was entered upon and an armistice proposed. The arbitrary conduct of the British government towards America met with strong opposition even in England. On June 16th, Mr. (now Lord) Brougham, who had always strenuously advocated the revocation of these orders in council, moved an address to the Prince Regent, beseeching him to recall or suspend the orders, and to adopt such other measures as might tend to conciliate neutral powers. Lord Castlereagh opposed the motion, but stated that government intended to make a conciliatory proposition to the United States; and accordingly on the 23rd of June the orders in council were revoked as far as regarded America. Great Britain still, however, reserved to herself the right of impressment, and the United States, rejecting negotiation on these terms, prepared to prosecute the war.

As regarded pacification with Great Britain, the Emperor Alexander of Russia offered himself as mediator between the two countries; and the United States sent over three commissioners, one of whom was John Quincy Adams, empowered to negotiate with deputies clothed with similar authority on the part of Great Britain; they were also authorised to conclude a treaty of commerce with Russia, and to strengthen the amicable relationships between the two countries.

On the 4th of March, 1813, James Madison was re-elected president, and Elbridge Gerry was elected vice-president.

In June, bills passed congress authorising the construction of four ships, carrying each seventy-four guns, and six frigates each of forty-four guns. The military service was also to be increased; a loan of 16,000,000 of dollars for the present was also authorised, with the issue of treasury notes to the amount of 5,000,000 more.

The scene of military operations in 1813 comprehended the extensive northern frontier. At the opening of the campaign, the army of the west, under General Harrison, lay near the head of Lake Erie; the army of the centre, under General Dearborn, between lakes Erie and Ontario; and that of the north, under General Hampton, occupied the shores of Lake Champlain. The invasion of Canada was still the object of the American armies.

Sir George Prevost, governor of Canada, and commander-in-chief, could not bring any great force into the field, but his numbers were formidably increased by a vast number of Indian auxiliaries. The defence of Upper Canada was committed to Colonels Proctor and Vincent, and that of Lower Canada to General Sheafe.

The head-quarters of Harrison were Franklinton, in Ohio, and thence Brigadier-General Winchester, an old revolutionary officer, marched in advance to attack a party of the British stationed at Frenchtown, twenty-six miles from Detroit. The British were routed, and Winchester encamped in the open field outside the town; and here on the morning of the 22nd of January, they were suddenly attacked by Colonel Proctor, who, with about 500 British and an equal number of Indians, had marched from Amherstburgh. The surprise was complete; and though the Americans rallied and made a desperate defence, their generals, Lewis and old Winchester, were taken prisoners; the latter by Round-head, a famous Indian chief, who, before surrendering his prisoner to the British colonel, stripped him of his hat and uniform, which he himself assumed. A more disastrous fight, or one characterised by more horrible detail, never occurred. It is said that Proctor assured his prisoner Winchester that if his men would surrender they should be preserved from the savage barbarities of the Indians, on which he ordered his men to give up their arms. Proctor, however, did not keep faith, and the promised protection was not afforded. The town was burned, and the savages held a carnival of blood and horror. Five hundred were killed, and the same number made prisoners. The victory and the account of spoils obtained at Frenchtown brought down the warlike tribes from the Wabash, and even the Mississippi, to join the British arms, whose honour was tarnished by suffering these savage barbarities to be enacted under their banner. In July the Six Nations declared war against the Canadas, and the United States, following the example of the British, accepted the services of the Indians. General Harrison was so dismayed at the fate of Winchester, that leaving Franklinton he erected Fort Meigs, near the rapids of the Miama River, which falls into Lake Erie; and here, on the 1st of May, he was besieged by Colonel Proctor, with a force of 1,000 British and 1,200 Indians. On the 5th of May, General Clay advanced with 1,200 Kentuckians to his relief, and although with considerable loss, attacked and dispersed the besiegers, on which a great number of the British Indian allies, notwithstanding the entreaties of Tecumseh, who was faithful to the cause he espoused, deserted; and the Canadian militia-men, greatly to the disgust of Colonel Proctor, retired to their farms, after which he returned with but few followers to Amherstburgh.

Pursuant to the law passed by congress, efforts were made to build and equip fleets upon the lakes. The preceding year the Americans possessed but one brig of sixteen guns on Lake Ontario; but by April of the present year, Commodore Channing, the naval commander on that station, had built and equipped a squadron sufficiently powerful to contend with that of the British. On the 25th of April, 17,000 troops were conveyed in the new flotilla across the lake, from Sackett’s Harbour, for the attack on York, the capital of Upper Canada, the depository of British military stores. On the 27th the troops landed, headed by General Pike, and, though opposed by a strong force of British and Indians, who were soon driven back to the garrison, a mile and a half, carried one battery by assault, and were still advancing, when the powder-magazine blew up, hurling immense quantities of stone and timber upon the advancing troops, and killed many. Pike received a mortal wound; but his troops, after a moment’s halt, pressed forward, and soon gained possession of the town. Sir George Prevost, who seems to have been a man of great indecision, if not of cowardice, is blamed severely by the British historians for having ordered a retreat before their own case was hopeless. York being gained, the squadron and troops returned to Sackett’s Harbour, after which they attacked Fort George, situated at the head of the lake, which, after a warm engagement, was abandoned by the British, who, headed by General Vincent, retreated to a good position on Burlington Bay.

While the American army was thus employed, Sir George Prevost having learned that General Dearborn had left Sackett’s Harbour with but a small garrison, despatched Commodore Yeo, commander of the British fleet on Lake Ontario, to gain possession. On the morning of the 29th, about 1000 British troops landed, but were repulsed by General Brown, and re-embarked so hastily, as to leave their wounded behind.

In the latter part of July, about 4,000 British and Indians, the former under General Proctor, the latter under Tecumseh, again appeared before Fort Meigs, now commanded by General Clay. After waiting a few days, and not succeeding in drawing out the garrison as he hoped, Proctor withdrew his forces and proceeded to Fort Stephenson, at Sandusky, which was garrison by 120 men, under Major Coghan, a young man of one-and-twenty. The defence of this place was one of the bravest on record. The British were repulsed with great loss, and fled so precipitately that they left behind them a quantity of clothes and military stores.

While all this was going forward on land and on the inland seas, the coast was harassed by predatory warfare carried on by large detachments from the British navy. One squadron stationed in Delaware Bay captured and burned every merchant ship they could seize, while another burned the farms and houses along the Chesapeake Bay; several towns also were burned. Various naval actions took place. On the 23rd of February, Captain Lawrence, in the Hornet sloop-of-war, encountered the Peacock sloop-of-war, which was, after an engagement of fifteen minutes, so much damaged that she sank, and spite of every effort of the captors to save the lives of those whom they had just attacked, she went down with thirteen men on board. On his return to shore, Captain Lawrence was appointed to the command of the Chesapeake frigate, then in harbour at Boston. For several weeks the British frigate Shannon, of equal force, commanded by Captain Broke, had been cruising before the port, challenging to combat any American frigate. It had already been triumphantly sung in England,

And as the war they did provoke,

We’ll pay them with our cannon

The first to do it will be Broke,

In the gallant ship, the Shannon.

This challenge was accepted by Captain Lawrence, and on the 1st of June, the Chesapeake sailed to meet her rival. Towards evening of the same day they met, and instantly engaged with unexampled fury. In a very few minutes the challenge was decided against the Chesapeake; every officer capable of taking command was killed or wounded; Captain Lawrence received a mortal wound, and the rigging was so cut to pieces, that she fell on board the Shannon. Lawrence received a second wound and was carried below. At the moment when Broke boarded her, Lawrence was asked if her colours should be struck. “No,” replied he, “they shall wave while I live!” But her colours were struck already, and the gallant and brave young man, delirious with suffering, cried continually for four days while life lasted, “Don’t give up the ship!” an expression which became consecrated to his countrymen. The Shannon carried her prize into Halifax, and there poor Lawrence died, and was buried, his pall being borne by the oldest captains in the British navy, who mourned for him with generous sympathy. War makes such men enemies, and their duty it is to kill each other!

The next encounter at sea was disastrous likewise to the Americans, the sloop Argus being taken in St. George’s Channel by the British sloop Pelican. The commander of the Argus was mortally wounded, and was buried with honour in England; and soon after the brig Enterprise, commanded by Lieutenant Burrows, captured the British brig Boxer, commanded by Captain Blyth. Both commanders were killed in the action, which took place off the coast of Maine, and were interred side by side with military honours at Portland, their bodies being rowed to land by masters of vessels, with the funeral stroke of the oar, while minute-guns were fired by the vessels in harbour.

From sea-fights we now pass on to an encounter between the British and American squadrons on Lake Erie. The American squadron was commanded by Commodore Perry, a young inexperienced man, that of the British by Captain Barclay, a veteran who had lost, like Nelson, one arm while serving under that commander. On the 10th of September, the British commander not having a single barrel of flour left, and no alternative but attempting to clear the lake or starvation, accepted the offer of battle. The wind changed immediately after he had sailed, giving the Americans the advantage. Perry, forming his line of battle, hoisted his flag, and the words of the dying Lawrence, “Don’t give up the ship,” met the eyes of all and were hailed with universal acclamations. Since that day they have become the motto of the American navy. The firing commenced about noon, and being directed principally against the Lawrence, the flag-ship, she soon became unmanageable, having all her crew, with the exception of four or five, killed or wounded. Commodore Perry then left her in an open boat, and transferred his flag to the Niagara, which, passing through the British, poured broadsides into five of the vessels at half pistol-shot. Towards four o’clock every vessel had surrendered. The day, however, was not lost to the British until the first or second in every vessel had been killed or dangerously wounded. Poor Barclay’s one arm was shattered before he left the deck. Commodore Perry gave intelligence of the victory to General Harrison thus laconically: “We have met the enemy, and they are ours. Two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop.”

This defeat rendered the rapid retreat of General Proctor and the Indian chiefs who were with him inevitable. They therefore began to dismantle the forts, and to abandon all the positions on the Detroit, thus leaving the Michigan territory again in the possession of the Americans. But they could no longer retreat without fighting. General Harrison passed over between 5,000 and 6,000 men, and interposed between Proctor and the country to which he was directing his steps. On the 5th of October, a severe battle was fought at the river Thames, when the British army was taken by the Americans. On this day the famous Tecumseh was slain, bravely fighting in the thick of the battle. Six hundred of the British were made prisoners. Proctor escaped with 200 cavalry. Among the trophies of the victory were six brass field-pieces, which had been given up by Hull, on two of which were inscribed the words, “Surrendered by Burgoyne at Saratoga.”

By this victory was broken up the great Indian confederacy, in which, though 3,000 warriors still remained, the bond of union was gone with Tecumseh. The Ottawas, Chippewas, Miamis, and Pottawattamies, now sent deputies to General Harrison and made treaties of alliance with the Americans.

But before this confederacy was broken, in the month of August, the Creeks and Seminoles, who had been visited by Tecumseh, and into whom he had breathed his hatred of the whites, had commenced a cruel war against the frontier inhabitants of Georgia, in which nearly 300 white inhabitants had been fearfully massacred. On this, General Jackson, at the head of 2,500 volunteers of Tennessee, marched into the Creek country, while Georgia and Mississippi sent upwards of 1,000 more. Battles were fought at divers places with their wild sonorous Indian names—Tallushatchea, Talladega, Autosse, Emuefau, and others—in all of which the Indians were defeated. The last stand of the Creeks was at the great bend of the Tallapoosa, called by the Indians Tohopeka, and by the whites Horse-shoe-bend. Here about 1,000 of their warriors had assembled in a strong fort, which was soon compassed by a detachment under General Coffee to prevent escape. The main body advanced under General Jackson; the outworks were carried, and the Indians seeing no chance of escape, and scorning to surrender, fought till nearly all were slain. Only two or three Indian warriors were taken. This was the last effort of the Creeks; their power was broken, and the few remaining chiefs gave in their submission.[^[75]]

CHAPTER XX.
EVENTS OF 1814, AND CONCLUSION OF THE WAR.

During the year 1814 the Americans again prepared for the invasion of Canada, but no ground was gained. Without going into minute details, we will content ourselves with giving the principal warlike events of the year, whether in the North or the South.

Early in the season, General Brown was detached from the army of General Wilkinson at Sackett’s Harbour, where he had been assiduously disciplining his army, to the Niagara frontier. At the beginning of July he crossed the Niagara, took Fort Erie, and advanced into Canada. When he reached the British lines of Chippawa, he found General Riall strongly entrenched there. A sanguinary conflict took place, the advantage remaining on the side of the Americans. Riall retreated to a better position at Fort Niagara, where he was reinforced by General Drummond, with part of Wellington’s veterans; for the pressure of the war having abated in Europe, the British army in America was reinforced by these able soldiers.

The Americans encamped near the Falls of Niagara, on the morning of the 25th of July, and towards four o’clock in the afternoon the British army appeared in sight. The two armies engaged in what was called Lundy’s Lane, at a short distance from the Falls, and here was fought one of the most obstinate battles that took place during the war. They fought till midnight, close to the great cataract, the roar and din of which was silenced by the firing of twenty-four pieces of ordnance and 8,000 muskets, and which was heard distinctly lifting up its eternal voice amid the momentary pauses of the battle. Wonderful bravery was displayed on both sides, and the loss of life was about equal. The Indians fled early in the battle. General Drummond was wounded on the British side; Generals Brown and Scott on the American, the command devolving now on General Ripley, who remained in quiet possession of the field, and who, after collecting his wounded, retired to Fort Erie, whither he was pursued by Drummond, at the head of 5,000 men, and who, having made an assault upon the fort, was repulsed with the loss of 1,000. Two days later, Brown having again resumed command, a successful sortie was made from the fort, and the besiegers were driven back with great loss. There was great loss of life on both sides, and though reinforced from Plattsburgh, Fort Erie was abandoned and destroyed; and the American army, recrossing the Niagara, went into winter-quarters.

No sooner had the detachment left Plattsburgh, than Sir George Prevost, now so well supplied with Wellington’s veterans, thought it a good opportunity to destroy the American flotilla on Lake Champlain and advance into New York. On the 6th of September he reached Plattsburgh, which is situated on Lake Champlain, on the northern bank of the little river Saranac. No movement of the British during the war had roused in an equal degree the American patriotism, and volunteers poured in from the northern parts of New York and the Green Mountains of Vermont. For four days the American troops opposed every attempt of the British to force the passage of the stream. About eight o’clock on the morning of the 11th, the British fleet, under Captain Downie, bore down and engaged that of Commodore Mac Donough, which lay at anchor prepared for battle, and the most desperate encounter ensued which had taken place on any of the lakes. During the conflict on water, the British on land began a heavy cannonade upon the American lines, and attempted again and again to cross the Saranac, but only to be driven back by the American militia. The utmost blame attaches to Sir George Prevost for his inefficient command and his many blunders on this occasion; nevertheless, great valour was shown by the British, but to little effect; and in the afternoon the British fleet was captured, Captain Downie having been killed soon after the contest began; and towards evening the British commenced a precipitate retreat, leaving behind them immense quantities of stores, ammunition, and provisions; about 200 were slain, and strange to say, 800 deserted to the American side.

On the 15th of August, the very day on which the British general, Drummond, was repulsed from Fort Erie, ruin was approaching the city of Washington, the federal capital of the United States. The British, on the return of spring, had renewed their predatory inroads on the banks of the Chesapeake, in pursuance of governmental orders to destroy and lay waste such towns and districts of the coast as might be found assailable; and now, about the middle of August, Admiral Sir Alexander Cockburn, having on board the land troops of Major-General Ross, another Peninsula hero, entered the Potomac, on which river Washington stands, and which empties itself into the Chesapeake. The British general landed his forces, 5,000 in number, and commenced his march to Washington, distant twenty-seven miles; Admiral Cockburn proceeding at the same time up the river in a flotilla of launches and armed boats. Washington was not defenceless, although her defenders, neither by land nor water, appear to have been very efficient. On the 22nd, the expedition reached Pig Point, and descried the flag of the American flotilla. It was naturally supposed that it was the intention of Barney, the American commodore, to dispute the passage of the river; but, to the surprise of the British, the shipping was found to be on fire. Sixteen out of seventeen vessels were blown up to prevent their falling into the hands of the British. On the 20th, General Winder, who commanded the land forces, being joined by the marines of Commodore Barney, marched out to meet the advancing enemy, and encamped at Marlborough, where they were inspected by the president, by General Armstrong, secretary of war, and by various heads of other departments, who, appearing to despair at the first glance, at once dispersed. On the 24th, General Ross and his troops reached Bladensberg, a village five miles from the capital, where a stand was made, principally by seamen and marines, the commodore being wounded and taken prisoner. The example of President Madison had been followed; the American army retreated across the Potomac. Nothing was easier than the task which Ross had undertaken. At the head of 1,600 men, after a skirmish which did not last half an hour, he took possession of Washington. The work of destruction began immediately. The capitol, or senate-house, the president’s house and public offices, the arsenal, the navy yard, and the bridge over the Potomac, all were destroyed. On the following night a leisurely retreat was commenced, and the British troops, meeting with no resistence on their return, re-embarked on the 30th.

Little as had been the spirit shown in the defence of Washington, the ruthless destruction of its public buildings and records aroused a spirit of indignation which more than anything else during the war united the Republic in one general sentiment of hostility against the invaders.

In the meantime, another portion of the British fleet had ascended the Potomac, and on the 29th appeared before the town of Alexandria, which fearing pillage and destruction, surrendered all its merchandise and shipping. Elated with this success, the British admiral, on the 11th of September, made his appearance at the mouth of the Patapsco, fourteen miles from Baltimore, which was strongly fortified. On the 12th the British landed at North Point, and commenced their march towards the city, when they were met by a large force, who resisted them bravely. Although the Americans were obliged to retreat, this enterprise cost the life of General Ross and a great number of others. The day following, the British abandoned the attempt and retired to their shipping.

On the ocean the fortune of the combatants was about equal. The Essex, commanded by Captain Porter, struck to a British frigate and sloop-of-war. The American sloop Peacock captured the Epervier. The sloop Wasp, commanded by Captain Blakeley, captured the English brig Reindeer in St. George’s Channel, and afterwards, in the same cruise, sank the Avon. She made several other prizes, but never returned into port, and was supposed to have foundered at sea.

The last great land action of the American war was at the city of New Orleans. Not contented with ruining the trade of all the towns on the Mississippi, by blockading that river, the British commanders resolved upon attacking New Orleans. The operations of the British in Louisiana commenced by a small expedition, which, being aided by the Spaniards, took possession of Pensacola, in the middle of August. The British commander, Colonel Nicholls, brought with him a great quantity of arms, which were intended for the Indians, who were invited to flock to the British banner. But they refused the invitation, as did also Lafitte, the chief of the pirates of Barataria, though he received liberal offers to enlist in their cause. Lafitte and his followers had been outlawed by the American government; but such was the patriotism of these otherwise lawless men, that while they deluded the British commander with the hope of joining him, it was merely to gain a knowledge of his intended movements, which were communicated to Claiborne, governor of Louisiana, who in return pardoned the whole band, and invited them to come forward in defence of their country. They did so, and rendered essential service.

General Jackson, who after the peace with the Creeks had taken up his quarters at Mobile, the capital of the Alabama territory, as commander in the South, remonstrated with the Spanish governor of Pensacola on affording shelter to the enemies of the United States. But no regard being paid to his remonstrances, he marched against the place, stormed the town, and compelled the British to evacuate Florida. Returning to Mobile, he learnt that preparations were making for the invasion of Louisiana, and accordingly hastened to New Orleans, which he found in great alarm and confusion. By his exertions order and confidence were restored, the militia organised, and fortifications erected. His command was supreme, and his energy unabating. Every man who could carry a musket or wield a spade was set to work on the fortifications or drilled as a soldier.

New Orleans stands upon the eastern bank of the Mississippi, at about 110 miles from the sea. It is built upon a narrow tract of land, confined on one side by the river, and on the other by almost impassable morasses. Even though unfortified, it presented the greatest obstacles to an invader. Below the town, however, were some strong forts which commanded the navigation of the river, so that the approach to the town either by land or water was equally difficult.

The British expedition ascended the river as high as possible, and then landed about eight miles below the city. This was on the 23rd of December, and on the following evening General Jackson made a sudden and furious attack on their camp; but though the loss of life was considerable, this was merely a check. On Christmas-day, Sir Edward Pakenham, the chief in command, took up a strong position about six miles from the city, between which and himself the American army was drawn up. Fighting went on day after day, the utmost bravery being shown by both parties, and the English advanced still nearer to the city, finding it necessary with every advance to assault and take the formidable field-works which the indefatigable republicans had thrown up, as though they had been regular fortifications. “At length,” says the writer of “Knight’s Pictorial History of England,” “on the night of the 31st of December, having procured the material, one-half of the English army was ordered out to throw up a chain of works; the men halted at about 300 yards from the enemy’s line, and here, the greater part of them laying down their muskets, applied themselves vigorously to their task, while the rest stood armed in case of an attack. The night was dark; the English maintained a profound silence, and the Americans kept a bad watch, for it was the last night of the year, and conviviality abounded in the republican camp. In this manner six batteries were completed before the dawn of New-year’s-day, and thirty pieces of heavy cannon mounted. There had not been much digging and trenching, for every storehouse and barn in the country was filled with hogsheads of sugar and molasses, and these being rolled to the front were placed upright to serve as parapets to the batteries. The morning of New-year’s-day, 1815, was very dark and foggy amid those swamps and bogs of New Orleans, and the day was considerably advanced before the Americans discovered how near the British had approached to them, or the novel use they had made of their molasses and sugar-hogsheads.”

The Americans made several vigorous but unsuccessful attacks, seeming to produce no other effect than to knock in pieces the hogsheads and scatter their contents. Several days went on, and both parties received strong reinforcements. Sir Edward Pakenham resolved now on a combined attack on both sides of the river, for which purpose he caused a canal to be dug across the entire neck of land, so as to convey his troops to the other side. It was a most arduous undertaking, and for two nights consecutively not a man in the British army closed an eye. On the 8th of January the great attack was to take place. The British forces amounted to upwards of 10,000, the attacking columns being provided with ladders and facines.

Behind their breastworks of cotton-bales, which no balls could penetrate, 6,000 Americans, mostly militia, all good marksmen, and principally from Tennessee and Kentucky, silently waited the attack. As the advancing columns came within reach of the batteries, they were met by an incessant and destructive cannonade; but closing their ranks as fast as they were opened, they continued steadily to advance, until within reach of the American musketry and rifles. The extended American line now presented one vivid stream of fire, throwing the enemy into confusion and covering the plain with the wounded and the dead. In an attempt to rally his troops, Sir Edward Pakenham was killed; General Gibbs, the second in command, was mortally wounded, and General Keane severely so. The British now fled in dismay from the certain death which seemed to await them; General Lambert, on whom the command had devolved, being unable to check their flight. Seven hundred dead were left on the field, and upwards of 1,000 wounded.[^[76]] The loss of the Americans was seven killed and six wounded.

The Americans on the west side of the river did not, however, behave with much bravery; they fled on the first onset, and were closely pursued by the British, until the latter, receiving intelligence of the total discomfiture of the main army, re-crossed the river and returned to their intrenchments.

No further attempt was made; and on the 18th, Lambert, with his wounded and stores, was on his way to the fleet. Nothing was abandoned but ten pieces of artillery. The success of General Jackson, afterwards president of the United States, caused him to be regarded with great honour by his countrymen, and won for him the appellation of “the conqueror of the conquerors of Napoleon;” whence probably comes the Yankee boast, “the Britishers licked all the world, and we licked the Britishers.”

From New Orleans General Lambert sailed to Mobile, and on the 7th of February invested that place, which surrendered to him on the 11th.

On the 17th of February, whilst New Orleans was yet rejoicing over her victory, a special messenger arrived from Europe, bringing a treaty of peace, which had been signed at Ghent, in the month of December, before the terrible battle was fought at New Orleans. This treaty, which was immediately ratified by the president and the Senate, stipulated for the restoration of all places taken during the war, and for the revision of the boundary of the American and British dominions; it engaged that each nation should put an end to all subsisting hostilities between them and the Indian tribes, and both parties likewise covenanted to continue their efforts for the total abolition of the slave-trade. The whole northern and eastern states, to whom the war had been very unsatisfactory, and who were continually and violently opposed to all measures of the administration regarding it, rejoiced extremely in this peace. The Englishman who took out the ratification of the treaty was carried by the citizens and people through the streets of New York in triumph and jubilee.[^[77]]

America, however, had not even yet quite done with war. From the treaty of 1795 peace had been preserved with Algiers by the annual payment of a tribute. In July of 1812, the Dey, believing America, then engaged in war with England, would not be able to defend her shipping, extorted a large sum of money from the American consul at Algiers, to purchase the freedom of himself and other citizens of the United States, and commenced a piratical warfare against every American vessel that came in the way of his cruisers, and many American citizens were in this manner condemned to slavery.

Two squadrons were therefore fitted out, under Commodores Decatur and Bainbridge. The former sailed from New York in May, 1815, and proceeding up the Mediterranean, captured, in June, two Algerine brigs; after which, sailing to Algiers, the Dey was so much alarmed, that he cheerfully signed a treaty very advantageous to the Americans. Proceeding then to Tunis and Tripoli, Decatur also obtained satisfaction for various aggressions, after which he joined Bainbridge at Gibraltar, and resigning to him the command, the latter visited the three piratical cities, whose submission was complete.

In order to secure the tranquillity of the western and north-western frontiers, measures were taken to form treaties of peace with all the various tribes which had lately been in hostility with the United States. A congress of chiefs met for this purpose at Detroit, in the month of September, when alliances of friendship were made, by means of which extensive portions of territory were ceded, and the tribes acknowledged to be under the protection of the republic.

The charter of the former National Bank having expired since 1811, a second National Bank, called the Bank of the United States, was incorporated by charter for twenty-four years, with a capital of 35,000,000 dollars.

In December, the territory of Indiana was admitted into the Union as a state, and the territory of Mississippi divided, and the western portion admitted into the Union as the State of Mississippi, while the eastern portion became the territory of Alabama. During the same month two piratical establishments—the refuge also of runaway negroes, the one on Amelia Island, on the coast of Florida, the other at Galveston, on the coast of Texas—were broken up.

The time for the election of president being now come, James Monroe was chosen, and Daniel D. Tomkins vice-president.

About the year 1790, establishments for the home manufacture of coarse cotton fabrics were commenced in the state of Rhode Island. The embarrassments to which commerce was subjected increased the demand for these goods, and large capitals were invested in manufacturing establishments. At the close of the war, however, when British goods were again imported, it was found that, owing to the great improvements in machinery, merchants were able to afford their goods at a much lower price than the American manufacturer. In order, therefore, to enable the manufacturer to withstand this formidable competition, a new tariff was formed in 1816, by which the double imposts which had been laid during the war were removed, and an increased duty imposed on various manufactured goods. The return of peace, however, though it embarrassed the mercantile interests, gave a stimulus to agriculture, and thousands of citizens who found themselves impoverished, removed westward, where lands were cheaper and more fertile than in the eastern states. Emigration from England also set in like a spring-tide, and so great was the increase of an active and valuable population, that within two years of the establishment of peace, six new states had sprung up in the recent wilderness.[^[78]]

The African Colonisation Society for Free Blacks originated in this year, not under the auspices of government, but that of private individuals. It is questionable, however, whether this scheme is one of pure benevolence, although much is said of Africa being civilised and christianised by this means; and the slave born in America, perhaps of the second or third generation, is expatriated when shipped over to Africa. Is not the true benevolence and the true Christianity rather to gradually, wisely and justly abolish slavery—to prepare the black man to be a good and useful citizen of a great and free country, and more productive to his master as a servant than as a slave?

Madison’s second term of office expiring, he declined, as his predecessors had done, a third re-election; and on March 4th, 1817, James Monroe was elected president, and Daniel D. Tomkins re-elected vice-president.

Peace and prosperity go hand-in-hand, and with prosperity a wise nation seeks to promote by every possible means the improvement and comfort of the people. Hence great public works were now undertaken by the American States governments; roads and canals were constructed in every part of the Union, the wealthy and enterprising state of New York, at the head of which was De Witt Clinton, taking the lead. The great western canal, connecting Lake Erie with the Hudson, and the northern canal, connecting that river with the waters of Lake Champlain, were completed. A great road was also constructed by order of congress, which, passing through the seat of government, connected the eastern with the western states. Military posts were established for the security of the frontiers at the mouth of St. Peter’s on the Mississippi, and at the mouth of the Yellow Stone River on the Missouri, above 1,800 miles above its junction with the Mississippi. Thus was the influence of civilisation radiating like light into the far wilderness.

Towards the close of 1817, the Seminole Indians and the remnant of the Creeks commenced depredations on the frontiers of Georgia and Alabama. The hostile spirit of the Indians was further incited by another Indian prophet and two English traders, Arbuthnot and Ambrister, who had taken up their residence among the Indians. General Gaines was sent against them, but his force being insufficient for the purpose, General Jackson was ordered to take the field and to demand aid from the governors of the adjacent states. Jackson knew where he was most likely to find the aid he needed; and inviting volunteers from Western Tennessee, soon saw himself at the head of 1,000 men. With these he marched into the Indian territory, which he presently overran, meeting with no opposition from the Seminoles, who had fled into Florida. Once in Florida, Jackson seemed to think it as well, in the words of a homely proverb, to kill two birds with one stone; accordingly he attacked and took possession of St. Mark’s, a feeble Spanish post, and removed, in a very summary manner, the Spanish authorities to Pensacola; where meeting with Arbuthnot and Ambrister, had them tried by court-martial and executed, after which he took possession of Pensacola and shipped off the authorities to Havanna.

There was a bold energy in this unprincipled proceeding which won for it public approbation, although it called down much animadversion, and congress discussed it for two years, endeavouring to pass a vote of censure, which the majority would not allow. In February, 1819, however, a treaty was negotiated at Washington, by which Spain ceded to the United States Florida and the adjacent islands. The king of Spain was dissatisfied with the treaty, and endeavoured to set it aside, but the United States, like General Jackson, had their way, and in 1820 the treaty was ratified.

In 1819 the southern portion of Missouri territory was formed into a territorial government, under the name of Arkansas, and in December of the same year, Alabama was admitted as a state into the Union. Early in 1820 also the province of Maine, which since 1652 had been attached to Massachusetts, was separated from it and became an independent state.

A violent controversy arose in congress on the subject of slavery, when Missouri first applied for authority to form a State government, which arrayed the South against the North, the slaveholding against the non-slaveholding states. Missouri, having been considered a portion of Louisiana, had derived from her connexion with the French and the Spaniards the custom of holding slaves, which she considered as her right. It was proposed, however, that in “admitting the territory to the privileges of a state, slavery, or involuntary servitude, should be prohibited, except for the punishment of crimes of which the party should have been duly convicted; and that all children born within the said state after its admission into the Union should be free at the age of twenty-five.” This clause divided congress into two parties: the non-slaveholding states demanded the restriction; the southern and slave states rejected it. The contest of opinion was violent in the extreme. Two principles seemed involved in this question; not only resistance to slavery, but resistance to the interference of congress in the internal government of individual states; and hence many advocates of sound liberty and friends to the emancipation and elevation of the slave opposed the restrictive clause.

After much violent discussion, the Missouri question was settled by a compromise, which, while it allowed slavery in Missouri, prohibited it in all the territory of the United States north and west of the northern limits of Arkansas; and in August, 1821, Missouri became the twenty-fourth state in the Union.

In 1821 Monroe entered upon his second presidential term, having been re-elected, as was also Daniel Tomkins as vice-president.

The fourth census, taken in the year 1820, showed the population of the United States to be 9,625,734; about a million and a half of whom were slaves.

On the 7th of March in this year, General Jackson was appointed governor of Florida and Elijeus Fromentin chief-justice. The Spanish officers, very unwilling to give up their posts, threw many impediments in the way of the new government, and refused to give up the archives which had been stipulated for; and even when they were obtained, certain documents were kept back by Don Cavalla, the Spanish governor. But Jackson, who very well understood how to exercise authority, sent an armed force to bring Cavalla before him; and as he still refused, had him carried from his bed to prison, when he took possession of the papers, after which he was discharged. Again these summary measures were severely commented upon; but they were only according to Jackson’s mode of action—prompt, overbearing, and successful. Florida was divided into two counties, St. John’s, on the east of the Suwaney river, and Escambia on the west. Jackson’s term of office expired with the rising of congress, and he declined a re-appointment.

In 1822 a convention of navigation and commerce was concluded on terms of reciprocal and equal advantage between France and the United States. In the same year the ports of the West India Islands were opened to the American Republic by act of the British parliament.

The American commerce having for many years suffered greatly from the depredations of pirates in the West Indies, a small naval force was sent against them, which recaptured five American vessels in the vicinity of Matanzas in Cuba, and destroyed upwards of twenty piratical vessels. But depredations still continuing, a larger force was sent out the following year, under Commodore Porter, which broke up their retreats in these seas, and sent them to other hiding-places, whence they reappeared after a time.

In 1823 congress recognised the independence of the South American republics, and ministers were sent to Mexico, Buenos Ayres, and Chili. The same year, articles of convention for the suppression of the African slave-trade were signed in London by agents sent for that purpose from the United States, and officers were commissioned by each nation to capture and condemn such ships as should be concerned in this illicit traffic.

During the summer of 1824 the venerable La Fayette, now seventy years of age, visited America, by express invitation from congress, after the lapse of nearly half a century. He was received at New York with every demonstration of respect, and made a tour through all the states of the Union, upwards of 5,000 miles, which was in fact a triumphal progress, state vying with state as to which should show him most affection and honour. Finally he sailed from Washington, in September, in an American frigate prepared for his accommodation, and called the Brandywine, from the battle in which he was wounded.

In the year 1825, John Quincy Adams was inaugurated as president, and J. C. Calhoun, of South Carolina, vice-president. The administration of the ex-president had been marked by singular prosperity. Sixty millions of dollars of the national debt had been paid off, and party-feeling had so much abated that this period is signalised as “the era of good-feeling.” The new president, taking a review of the past in his inaugural speech, remarked: “The year of jubilee since the first formation of our Union is past, that of our Declaration of Independence is at hand. Since that period a population of 4,000,000 has multiplied to 12,000,000. A territory bounded by the Mississippi had been extended from sea to sea. New states have been admitted to the Union in numbers almost equal to those of the first confederation. Treaties of peace, amity, and commerce have been concluded with the principal dominions of the earth. The people of other nations, inhabitants of regions acquired not by conquest but by compact, have been united to us in the participation of our rights and duties, our burdens and our blessings.”

On the 4th of July, 1825—that jubilee of the Declaration of Independence of which the president had just spoken, and which was celebrated throughout the Union as a great national festival—died two venerable ex-presidents, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, both members of the early colonial congresses; the former of whom nominated Washington as commander-in-chief of the army, the latter drew up the celebrated Declaration of Independence.

CHAPTER XXI.
EVENTS OF TWENTY YEARS.

We must now rapidly pass over the remaining quarter of a century, and in so doing merely pause upon such events as give a marked character to the progress of the years.

The first which we shall notice is of a moral rather than a political character; one calculated to produce infinite results for the happiness of humanity. It was in the year 1826 when temperance societies took their first organised form. At that time one of the besetting sins of the Americans was the use of ardent spirits; and so widely-spread was this pernicious habit of dram-drinking, that the statistics of that period present a calculation that, out of a white population of 10,000,000, between 3,000,000 and 4,000,000 were habitual spirit-drinkers, of whom 375,000 drank daily on an average three gills of ardent spirits, while an equal number consumed more than twice the quantity, and of course were drunkards—a disgrace to themselves and their country, and a perpetual source of discomfort to their relatives and friends. In this situation of things, continues Hinton, in his History, from which we have taken the above calculations, a few individuals in the state of Massachusetts undertook the gigantic and seemingly impracticable task of bringing about a reformation. The means which they proposed was the establishment of temperance societies, the members of which bound themselves to total abstinence from spirituous liquors. The scheme was considered as ridiculous; and even many who beheld drunkenness with disgust smiled at the inadequate weapon with which it seemed to them this monster vice was about to be attacked. But God crowned their grain-of-mustard-seed-effort with gigantic success. Societies on the plan of the parent-institution, and zealously co-operating with it, sprang up in all parts of the Union. In September, 1832, there were in the state of New York alone, about 4,000 temperance societies, of which one-thirtieth of the whole population were members. And since that time the cause has progressed immensely. In 1841 there were 2,000,000 pledged teetotallers, 15,000 whom were reformed drunkards; and in 1846 about 5,000,000. In Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Vermont, Maryland, Wisconsin and Michigan, legislative enactments have first restrained, then prohibited, under pains and penalties, the traffic in intoxicating liquors.

One other event, which occurred during the presidentship of John Quincy Adams, and in which he took a very lively interest, must be mentioned—the formation of the anti-masonic societies. The cause was this: One William Morgan, a quiet, inoffensive man, a citizen of Batavia, in Genesee County, New York, was about to publish a book, disclosing, as was said, the secrets of Freemasonry. On the 11th of September, 1826, it being then Sunday, this man was taken from his home, his wife, and children, under colour of a criminal process, into Ontario County, examined and discharged. The very same day, however, instead of being allowed to return home, he was again arrested and thrown into jail by the persons who brought the first charge against him. Again these same people paid his debt, and immediately upon his issuing from prison, which was then in the darkness of night, he was again seized, gagged, and forced into a carriage, which was rapidly driven 150 miles, relays of horses and carriages being prepared along the whole line of road, and in this manner conveyed, as after inquiry showed, to the Canadian frontier, lodged in solitary confinement within the walls of an old fortress, and after five days was supposed to be transported, at the dead of night, “to the wide channel of the Niagara river, by four royal archcompanions and sunk to the bottom. Nine days were occupied in the execution of this masonic sentence; and at least 300 worthy brethren and companions of the order were engaged as principals or accessories in the guilt of this cluster of crimes.”[^[79]]

It was in vain that the legislature of New York passed an act ordering a strict investigation of the subject. Although numerous persons were proved to be implicated in the abduction, it was impossible to procure any evidence of the manner in which the unfortunate man had been destroyed. All that could be learnt was, that a body, said to be that of Morgan, was found below Fort Niagara. It being impossible, therefore, to bring forward testimony which would warrant a charge of murder, it was resolved to prosecute on that of abduction. But here again insuperable difficulties were thrown in the way by the masonic fraternity. Many witnesses were removed out of reach, grand juries were packed, intimidation exercised, and every art put in practice to insure impunity to the criminals. And although in some instances convictions were obtained, and the conspirators punished, all the chief actors managed to set the law at defiance.

Morgan’s abduction, and the formidable influence which the masonic fraternity was found to possess, in the attempt to convict for that crime, excited extreme indignation and disgust against these secret and powerful societies in the minds of the citizens of New York, who argued that secret societies were not only dangerous, but incompatible with the institutions of a republican government, that their oaths and mysteries were illegal and immoral, and that the use of them must disqualify for offices of public trust. A political party, called Anti-Masonic, soon rose in the western part of the state, which acquired such great influence that its leaders became members of the legislative body. The example of New York was followed by the states of Vermont, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, Ohio, and the territory of Michigan. But freemasonry existed through it all.

About the time that the anti-masonic party began to decline, the anti-slavery party arose. It still has its work to do; to battle with oppression and crime a thousand times greater than that of freemasonry. May God help the right!

The presidential election of 1828 was decided in favour of General Jackson of Tennessee, with whose arbitrary and decisive military movements we are already acquainted; and John Calhoun, of South Carolina, was chosen vice-president. When, on the 4th of March, 1829, Jackson assumed the reins of government, he found the country rich and prosperous, at perfect peace with all nations, and having in the national treasury a surplus of more than 5,000,000 dollars.

During the year 1828, congress enacted a tariff law, laying protective duties on such imported articles as competed with certain manufactured goods and agricultural products of the United States, by means of which additional duties were laid on wool and woollen goods, iron, hemp and its fabrics, distilled spirits, silk-stuffs, window-glass and cottons. The manufacturing states were well pleased with this law, which, however, was highly unsatisfactory to cotton-planters of the southern states. This tariff law was the fertile source of agitation, and almost revolution, during the presidentship of General Jackson.

In April of 1832, the Winnebagoes, Sacs, and Foxes, Indian tribes inhabiting the upper Mississippi, commenced hostilities under their celebrated chief, Black Hawk, re-entering the lands which had been sold to the United States, and which were now occupied by the citizens of Illinois. The so-called sale of Indian lands was frequently anything but with the free-will of the red man, and, as in this very instance, the Sac Indians were extremely unwilling to vacate their lands; but American generals, of the same character as the president, unscrupulous and resolute, not troubled either with too much conscience or too much sensibility, were ever at hand ready to pledge themselves “within fifteen days to remove the Indians, dead or alive, over to the west side of the Mississippi.” The conduct of Black Hawk on this occasion is worthy to be related. Gaines, the American general, rose in the council of the chiefs, and said that the president was displeased with the refusal of the Sacs to go to the west of the great river. Black Hawk replied that the Sacs, of which he was the chief, had never sold their lands, and were determined to hold them.

“Who is this Black Hawk? Is he a chief?” inquired the general. “What right has he in the council?”

Black Hawk rose, and gathering his blanket round him, walked out of the assembly. The next morning he was again in the council, and rising slowly, said, addressing the American general: “My father, you inquired yesterday, ‘Who is this Black Hawk? Why does he sit among the chiefs?’ I will tell you who I am. I am a Sac; my father was a Sac; I am a warrior, and so was my father. Ask those young men who have followed me to battle, and they will tell you who Black Hawk is; provoke our people to war, and you will learn who Black Hawk is.”

The people were provoked to war, and the Americans learned to know Black Hawk. He and his warriors came mounted and armed into the country which they still claimed as their own, and broke up the settlements of the white intruders, killing whole families and destroying their dwellings. Generals Scott and Atkinson were sent out against them. But an enemy more formidable than the red man went with them, and thinned their ranks more remorselessly than the hatchet of the savage. This was the cholera. The troops embarked in steamboats at Buffalo, and the disease made its first appearance on board. Great numbers died; great numbers also deserted on landing, and fled to the woods, where they perished either from the disease or starvation. Scott was not able to reach the scene of action. Atkinson, by forced marches, came up with Black Hawk’s party on the 2nd of August, near the mouth of the Upper Iowa. The Indians were routed and dispersed, and Black Hawk and his two sons and several great warriors made prisoners. Nothing in the history of humanity is much sadder than the putting down and destroying the last remnants of these once powerful tribes. Driven out from their fertile lands, thousands literally died of starvation; and if, as in the case of the Sacs, they were headed by a chief of superior intellect, who could not patiently submit to be uprooted like a weed from the soil of his fathers, and who clung to it with a love as intense as that of the Swiss for his mountains, then fire and sword swept him and his followers from the land, and they were killed as traitors. God sees these things, and permits them; nevertheless they are great iniquities. Black Hawk and his sons were sent to Fort Jefferson, and put in irons; they were taken to Washington, and had an interview with President Jackson, when a treaty was concluded, and the captives relinquished all claim to their territory, and consented to remove west of the Mississippi. After this they were taken through several of the eastern cities, that they might see the power and greatness of the whites, and how hopeless it was to contend against them. Black Hawk ended his days on the Des Moines river, where his people had settled. He had a bark cabin, which he furnished, in imitation of the whites, with chairs, a table, a mirror, and mattresses. He was no longer the great warrior; in the summer he is said to have cultivated a few acres of land, on which he grew corn, melons, and other vegetables. His last speech was at Fort Madison, on the 4th of July, a festival to which he had been invited, and thus he spoke: “It has pleased the Great Spirit that I am here to-day. I have eaten with my white friends. The earth is our mother; we are now on it, with the Great Spirit above us. It is good. I hope we are all friends here. A few winters ago I was fighting against you. Perhaps I did wrong—but that is past; it is buried—let it be forgotten. Rock River was a beautiful country; I loved my towns, my corn-fields, and the home of my people. I fought for it. It is now yours; keep it as we did; it will produce you beautiful crops.”

Such was the spirit of the old, exiled Indian chief; he was a Christian in practice, though not in name.

As the last chief of a once great and powerful people, we must be allowed to say a few more words respecting Black Hawk, which we give from the pen of one who knew him personally. “A deep-seated melancholy,” says he, “was apparent in his countenance and conversation, and he spoke occasionally of his former greatness with an inexpressible sadness, representing himself as at one time master of the country north-east and south of us. In the autumn of 1838 he set out for the frontier, where payment was to be made to the tribe of a portion of their annuity. The weather was both hot and wet, and he appears to have imbibed on his journey the seeds of the disease which terminated his life. In October the commission was to meet the tribes at Rock Island, but Black Hawk was then too ill to accompany them. On the 3rd of October he died, after an illness of seven days. His only medical attendant was one of the tribe who knew something of vegetable antidotes. His wife, who was devotedly attached to him, mourned deeply for him during his illness. She seemed to have a presentiment of his approaching death, and said, ‘He is getting old—he must die; Monotah is calling him home!’

“After his death, he was dressed in the uniform presented to him at Washington, and placed upon a rude bier with bark laid across, on which he was carried by four of his braves to the place of interment, followed by his family and about fifty of the tribe, the chiefs being all absent. They seemed deeply affected and mourned in their usual way, shaking hands and muttering in gutteral tones prayers to Monotah for his safe passage to the land prepared for the reception of all Indians. The grave was six feet deep and of the usual length, situated upon a little eminence about fifty yards from his wigwam. The body was placed in the middle of the grave in a sitting posture, upon a seat constructed for that purpose. On his left, the cane given him by Henry Clay was placed upright, with his right hand resting upon it. Many of his old trophies, his favourite weapons and some Indian garments were placed in the grave. The whole was then covered with plank, and a mound of several feet in height thrown over, and the whole enclosed with pickets twelve feet in height. At the head of the grave was placed the American flag, and a post was raised at the foot, on which, in Indian characters was inscribed his age, which was about seventy-two.”

As an instance of the rapid growth of civilization in the wilderness of the West, we will give a few sentences from the graphic pen of Judge Hall, when speaking of this very region in the year of Black Hawk’s death. “The country,” says he, “over which Black Hawk, with a handful of followers, badly mounted and destitute of stores or munitions of war, roamed for hundreds of miles, driving off the scattered inhabitants, is now covered with flourishing settlements, with substantial houses and large farms—not with the cabins and clearings of border-men, but with the comfortable dwellings and the well-tilled fields of independent farmers. Organised counties and all the subordination of social life are there; and there are the noisy school-house, the decent church, the mill, the country store, the fat ox and the sleek plough-horse. The Yankee is there with his notions and his patent-rights, and the travelling agent with his subscription book; there are merchandise from India and from England, and in short all the luxuries of life. And all this within six years. Six years ago the Indian warrior ranged over that fertile region which is now covered with an industrious population, while the territories of Wisconsin and Iowa and vast settlements in Missouri have since grown up, beyond the regions which was then the frontier and the seat of war.”

Such was the state of the West in 1832. Now in twenty years from that time the white population has advanced still farther and farther westward, removing at every step the Indian frontier. Iowa, Missouri and Wisconsin have now taken their position as states of the Union, and religion and education are establishing true civilization in the former wilderness, and may atone to heaven for the wrongs done to the Indian on this very soil.

But we must now return to the events of our general history.

The tariff bill, which passed into operation at the close of the session of 1832, caused, as we have said, great excitement in the southern states. South Carolina was the head-quarters of the opposition; and the party adverse to the bill called themselves the State-rights party, afterwards “nullifiers,” because having in November held a convention at Columbia, they issued an ordinance in the name of the people, declaring that congress had exceeded its powers in laying on protective duties, and that all such acts should from that time be utterly null and void. And finally they declared, that should congress attempt by force to bring their act into operation, the people would not submit; and that any act of congress authorising the employment of a naval or military force against the state, should be null and void; and that in such case the people would hold themselves absolved from any political connexion with the other states, and would forthwith proceed to organise a separate government, and do all other acts and deeds which a sovereign and independent state has a right to do.

Further still; the legislature of South Carolina met on the 27th of November, when Governor Hamilton gave in his concurrence to the ordinance, and recommended that the authorities of the state and of the city of Charleston should request the withdrawal of the United States troops, which had been stationed there to guard against a slave insurrection; that the militia should be called out, and provision made for obtaining heavy ordnance and other munitions of war.

This novel doctrine, says Willson, of the right of a state to declare a law of congress unconstitutional and void, and to withdraw from the Union, was promptly met by a proclamation of the president, in which he seriously warned the ultra-advocates of “States-rights” of the consequences that must ensue if they persisted in their course of treason to the government. He declared that, as chief-magistrate of the Union, he could not, if he would, avoid the performance of his duty; that the laws must be executed, and that any opposition to their execution must be repelled if necessary by force.

This proclamation was extremely popular, and was supported even in South Carolina, where there existed a strong party called “Friends of the Union.” Party animosities were for the moment forgotten throughout the States, and all united in agreeing to support the president in asserting the supremacy of the laws. Nor did the president talk only; with his usual prompt decision he caused Castle Pinckney, a fortress which commands the inner harbour of Charleston, as well as the town, to be put in complete order of defence; strongly garrisoned Fort Moultrie, and ordered several ships of war to be stationed in the bay. Every one saw that he was in earnest, and even the most violent nullifiers shrunk back from a contest against the whole nation with a man like General Jackson at its head.

Fortunately for the peace of the nation, the cause of discord and discontent was in great measure removed by a compromise bill, introduced into congress by Henry Clay. This bill was for modifying the tariff, and ultimately reducing the duties to a proper standard. It was strongly opposed by the supporters of the manufacturing interests, but nevertheless, having passed both the House of Representatives and the Senate, received the president’s signature early in March, 1833. It was, however, accompanied by an act which provided for the collection of duties on imports, and was called the Enforcing Bill, which was strongly objected to as giving the president an almost unlimited power over commerce. On the 4th of March, 1833, General Jackson entered his second presidential term, Martin Van Buren, of New York, being elected vice-president. Very soon after the re-election of President Jackson, a great excitement was occasioned on account of the removal from the Bank of the United States of the government funds deposited there, and their transfer to certain state banks. The opponents of the administration censured this measure as an unauthorised and dangerous assumption of power by the executive; and the public confidence in the moneyed institutions of the country being shaken, the pecuniary distresses of 1836 and 1837 were charged upon the hostility of the president to the Bank of the United States; while, on the other hand, these very distresses were ascribed to the management of the bank, which the president declared to have become “the scourge of the country.”[^[80]]

Again the pent-up and out-driven Indian tribes making, as it were, a dying effort to save themselves, rose into rebellion, and the story again is very sad. The Chickasaws and the Choctaws had, during the last few years, quietly emigrated west of the Mississippi, into the territory bordering on Arkansas, which had been allotted to them instead of their own lands, and as an inducement to remove voluntarily, the United States had paid the expenses of their journey, and supplied them with a year’s provisions. Other tribes there were, however, who were not so easily managed, and it is of their struggles to maintain a footing on their own lands that we have now to speak. The Cherokees were the most civilised of the Indian tribes; they had an established government, a national legislature, and written laws. Their rights had been protected during the administration of John Quincy Adams, against the claims of Georgia. Under the administration, however, of the unscrupulous and aggressive General Jackson, the legislature of Georgia, which acted very much in the spirit of the president, extended its laws over the Indian territory comprised within their boundaries, and among other severe enactments it was declared, that “no Indian nor the descendants of an Indian, residing within the Creek or Cherokee nation of Indians, should be deemed a competent witness or party to any suit, in any court where a white man is a defendant.” It was in vain that the Supreme Court of the United States protested against these acts as unconstitutional. Georgia persisted in its hard enactments, and President Jackson informed the alarmed and anxious Cherokees that “he had no power to oppose the sovereignty of any state over all who may be within its limits.” Their case was precisely as if a fly, caught in a spider’s web, had appealed for deliverance to another spider, when the advice would have been that of President Jackson to the Cherokees—“they must abide the issue, without any hope that he would interfere.”

They did abide the issue, until, worn out by oppressions and vexations, some of their chiefs were induced to sign a treaty of evacuation. In vain the Cherokees as a nation protested against it; lived quietly and inoffensively; availed themselves of the civilisation of the whites, and wished to profit by it; they were still the red men, the aborigines of the forest, and they must become once more dwellers in the wilderness. There was no help for them. Their general emigration was decided upon in 1835, but it was not effected until three years later.

The same year in which the removal of the Cherokees was decided, the Seminole Indians of Florida began to resist the settlement of the whites in their vicinity, the immediate cause of their hostility being again an attempt to remove them west of the Mississippi. In September, 1823, soon after the purchase of Florida by the United States, a treaty had been made with the Seminoles, by which they relinquished their claims to large tracts, reserving certain portions to themselves for residence. The terms of this treaty being disputed, a second was made at Payne’s Landing, in Florida, in 1832, when it was stipulated that the Seminoles should relinquish their reservation, and remove west of the Mississippi, a delegation of their chiefs being sent out at the expense of the United States to examine the country assigned to them, whither the Creeks were already gone; and, according to the treaty, if it were found that they, the Creeks, would live amicably with them, and that the country was agreeable to them, then the treaty should be binding. The report of the delegates was not satisfactory. The country which was assigned to them was of a stern character, unlike that of their native Florida; it produced no light-wood for fuel, which was easy to fell, and to which the Seminoles were accustomed. The savage wilderness of Nebraska did not allure them; and the Indians, they reported, were bad; they preferred to remain in Florida, and they accordingly maintained that the treaty was not binding. Macanopy, their king, opposed their removal, and Osceola, their most celebrated chief, said that he “wished to rest in the land of his fathers, and for his children to sleep by his side.”

But the wishes of Macanopy and Osceola were as nothing beside the will of President Jackson; and General Wiley Thompson was sent as the government agent to Florida, to arrange the removal of the Seminoles. Thompson reported that the Seminoles were unwilling to emigrate, and received for reply that they must go; that his military force should be increased, and that the annuities which the Seminoles received under the treaty of 1823 should not be paid until they consented to leave the country. The Seminoles took council together and promised to go the following spring; and Thomson, writing to the president, said, “I believe that the whole nation will come into this measure, but it is impossible not to feel a deep interest and much sympathy for this people.”

But when the spring came, and government measures began to be put in operation for their removal, the heart of the whole people was roused as one man, and they declared that they “could not leave their homes and the graves of their fathers.” This persistance in opposition was attributed to Osceola, whose bearing was proud and gloomy, and by order of General Thompson he was put in irons. Dissembling his wrath, Osceola obtained his liberty, and not only gave his consent to the removal of the whole nation, but so completely won the confidence of the government agent as to be entrusted with various commissions in different parts of the country, which he executed faithfully. In the meantime, however, he was concerting with the Indians a plan of deep revenge, which in the month of December began to take effect.

The remainder of this mournful history we will briefly relate from Marcius Willson. “At this time General Clinch was stationed at Fort Orange in Florida. Being supposed to be in danger from the Indians, and also in want of supplies, Major Dade was despatched from Fort Brooke, at the head of Tampa Bay, with upwards of 100 men, to his assistance. He had proceeded about half that distance, when he was suddenly attacked by the enemy, and he and all but four of his men were killed; and those four, horribly mangled, afterwards died of their wounds. At the time of Dade’s massacre, Osceola with a small band of warriors was prowling in the vicinity of Fort King. While General Thompson and a few friends were dining at a store only 250 yards from the fort, they were surprised by a sudden discharge of musketry, and five out of nine were killed. The body of General Thompson was found pierced with fifteen bullets. Osceola and his party rushed in, scalped the dead, and retreated before they could be fired upon by the garrison.

“Two days later, General Clinch engaged the Indians on the banks of the Withlacoochee, and in February of the following year, General Gaines, the commander of the north-western division, was attacked near the same place. In May, several of the Creek towns and tribes joined the Seminoles in the war. Murders and devastations were frequent; the Indians obtained possession of many of the southern mail-routes in Georgia and Alabama, attacked steamboats, destroyed stages, burned several towns, and compelled thousands of the whites, who had settled in their territory, to flee for their lives. A strong force, however, joined by many friendly Indians, being sent against them, and several of the hostile chiefs having being taken, the Creeks submitted; though such was their desperation, that many Indian mothers killed their children rather than that they should become prisoners to the pale-faces. During this summer great numbers were transported west of the Mississippi.

“In October, Governor Call took command of the forces in Florida, and with nearly 2,000 men marched into the interior, when several engagements took place.”

The time for the election of president being now come, Martin Van Buren was chosen, and Richard M. Johnson, of Kentucky, vice-president. The war in Florida, though it still raged, was for the time disregarded, owing to the monetary and mercantile distresses of the country, which reached their crises almost immediately after the accession of Van Buren. And yet so prosperous had the country been, only in the preceding June, that a large amount of surplus revenue had accumulated, which was given up to the people, and distributed in three instalments among the several states in proportion to their respective representations in congress. While this extraordinary prosperity lasted, there was a perfect frenzy of speculation; hundreds made immense fortunes, and tens of thousands were reduced to want. During the months of March and April of 1837, the failures in the city of New York alone amounted to nearly 100,000,000 dollars. The great extent of the business operations of the country, and their intimate connexion with each other, caused the evil to extend into all channels of trade. It was felt from the highest to the lowest. The third instalment of the surplus revenue, which we have already mentioned, having not yet been paid to the different states, was now applied to the necessities of government; but no means of relief were attempted for the people, it being contended that the case did not call for governmental interference, but a reformation in individual extravagance and a return to the old neglected ways of industry. A destructive fire in New York, which occurred at the close of 1835, and the loss by which was estimated at 17,000,000 dollars, added to the present distress.

Nevertheless growth, which is the principle of American life, went on. In September, 1835, Wisconsin was erected into a territory, and Arkansas into a state; and now, in the midst of the general distress, Michigan was admitted into the Union, making the twenty-sixth state; the original number of thirteen being doubled.

We must now resume and conclude our account of the Seminole war, which at this critical moment added to the expenses of the nation; while the climate of a country abounding in swamps and marshes, amid which the war was carried on, proved more fatal to the whites than even the Indians themselves. After several encounters early in the season, a number of chiefs came to the camp of General Jessup, and signed a treaty, by which hostilities were to cease, and the Seminoles engaged to remove beyond the Mississippi. But again the war broke out, and Osceola being suspected as the cause, was seized in the month of October, when, with several other chiefs and about seventy warriors, he arrived under the protection of a flag of truce at the American camp. This was the finishing stroke to the misfortunes of the Seminoles. It was a base action; but the treachery of Osceola was pleaded in its palliation. The Indian chief was now in the safe custody of the pale-faces, but the strength of the Seminoles was not yet broken. He was confined in Fort Moultrie, on Sullivan’s Island, opposite Charleston. Though a captive, he was not treated with unkindness. He was visited by the principal people of Charleston, and all was done for him which could render him comfortable, but his spirit was broken. It is related by one gentleman who visited him frequently, that the expression of his countenance was the most melancholy that could be conceived. He, however, is said never to have uttered any lamentation, although he often spoke with bitterness of the manner in which he had been taken prisoner, and of the injustice which had been done to his people. His person was handsome, his voice melodious, and his eyes filled with a gloomy fire.

Although his bearing and his fate awoke, as we have said, a universal interest for him, and Mr. Edin in particular, who felt an enthusiasm for the handsome and unhappy Seminole chief, brought him presents, he was indifferent to all; he grew more and more silent, and from the moment when he was put in prison his health declined, though he did not appear to be ill. He ate very little and refused all medicine. The captive eagle could not live when deprived of the free life and air of his forest.[^[81]]

Osceola was a captive, but his people were not quelled. They, however, after they lost his leadership, strove not so much to maintain a hold on their country as to fight out the quarrel with their enemies. Accordingly, for three years more the war went on. In 1839, General Macomb, who had assumed the chief command of the army, induced a number of chiefs in the southern part of the peninsula again to sign a treaty of peace. By this treaty they were permitted to remain in the country until they could be assured of the prosperity of their friends, who had already emigrated. Again the treaty was broken, and in June of that year the territorial government offered 200 dollars for every Indian, dead or alive; and thus a war of extermination having begun, was continued till the year 1842.

In 1837, a patent was granted to S. F. B. Morse, for the Electric Telegraph.

The census of 1840 gave the population of the United States as 17,068,666.

The Democratic or Whig party succeeded, in the following election, in returning William Henry Harrison, “the hero of the Thames and the Tippacanoe,” as president, in opposition to Van Buren, and John Tyler, of Virginia, as vice-president. On March 4th, 1841, Harrison was inaugurated, and exactly one month afterwards, his health being feeble, he expired; when the vice-president, according to the Constitution, became president.

Monetary affairs were at this time engrossing public attention, and so great were the present pecuniary difficulties, involving many mercantile houses in ruin, that congress adopted the extraordinary expedient of passing a bankrupt law, which operated throughout all the states. And not only did this law become available for individuals, but was taken advantage of by various states themselves, and a great obloquy for the time was cast on the nation—this was called repudiation. With returning prosperity, however, most of the states resumed payment, and little, if any state repudiation of debt has remained.

In 1842, a long existing dispute between the United States and England, regarding the north-eastern boundary, was adjusted. Lord Ashburton was sent from England as a special envoy, and Daniel Webster and he arranged the terms of a treaty by which this important question of north-eastern boundary, which had even threatened war, was amicably and finally settled.

In 1844, serious disturbances occurred in the state of New York, called the Anti-Rent Disturbances, of which a few words must be permitted us, and which we will give principally from Mrs. Willard.

“In the early history of the state, we have seen, that under the Dutch government certain settlers received patents of considerable portions of land, that of Van Renssalaer being the most extensive, comprehending the greater part of Albany and Renssalaer counties. These lands were divided into farms, containing from one hundred to one hundred and sixty acres, and leased in perpetuity on the following conditions. The tenant must each year pay to the landlord or ‘patron,’ a quantity of wheat, from twenty-two-and-a-half bushels to ten, with four fat fowls, and a day’s service with wagon and horses. If the tenant sold his lease, the landlord was entitled to one-quarter of the purchase money. The landlord was also entitled to certain privileges on all water power, and a right to all mines. In process of time the tenants began to consider these legal conditions as anti-republican, as a relic of feudal tyranny. Stephen Van Renssalaer, who came into possession of his patent in 1780, had in the kindness of his nature omitted to exact his legal right until 200,000 dollars of back rent was owing, which, on his death in 1840, was found appropriated by will. The enforcement of these long-neglected demands gave rise to much dissatisfaction, and finally they were forcibly resisted, when the States’ government called out the military, but still to no purpose.

“In the summer of 1844, the anti-rent disturbances broke out with great violence in the eastern towns of Renssalaer, and in the Livingston Manor in Columbia County. The anti-renters formed themselves into associations to resist the law, and armed and trained bands, disguised as Indians, scoured the country, compelling every person whom they met to give in their allegiance to this revolt, by saying ‘Down with the Rent!’ Not contented with this, they proceeded to violence, and tarring and feathering, and other outrages of the most fearful kind took place. Sometimes a thousand of these pretended Indians, more fearful even than the real ones, assembled in a body. Similar disturbances occurred at the same time in Delaware, where Steele, the deputy sheriff, was murdered in the execution of his official duties.

“In 1846, Silas Wright was chosen governor of the state, and by his wisdom and firmness the public order was restored. On the 27th of August, he proclaimed the county of Delaware in a state of insurrection; resolute men were made sheriffs, military aid was given, and the leading anti-renters taken and brought to trial. The murderers of Steele were condemned to death, but their punishment commuted to perpetual imprisonment.”

March 3rd, 1845, the two former territories of Iowa and Florida were admitted as states into the Union.

CHAPTER XXII.
WAR WITH MEXICO.—ANNEXATION OF TEXAS.—VAST INCREASE OF TERRITORY.—THE MORMONS.

We have already related how the adventurous La Salle, when endeavouring to establish a colony at the mouth of the Mississippi, mistook his reckoning, and entered the bay of Matagorda instead. This gave the French nation a claim to Texas. The fort built by the unfortunate La Salle was soon demolished by the Indians, and the Spaniards from their neighbouring Mexico disputed also the French right of possession, they claiming the whole of this coast as a portion of their own territory.

The first permanent settlement of the whites in Texas was by the Spaniards, in 1684, when, under San Antonio de Bexar, the fort of that name was established. In 1719 also a colony settled there from the Canary Isles. Various missionary stations and military posts were also established at different places, so that the Spaniards became the assured possessors of the country, with an increasing population. The missionary stations, unlike the simple log-huts and chapels of the early French jesuits, were massive fortresses of stone, the churches decorated with images of saints and paintings, and surmounted by enormous towers. The ruins of several of these vast erections still remain in various parts of Texas, and produce a very striking effect, especially in a country where the traces of civilised life are so scanty. The Spanish population of Texas was, however, inconsiderable at the time of the Mexican revolution in 1810, owing to the incursions of the savage Comanches and other Indian tribes, and to the police regulations of the Spanish government. As regards the relative positions and feelings of the Mexican government and that of the United States, we will give a few remarks from an American writer.[^[82]] “The Mexican authorities were not so desirous of occupying Texas as of keeping her a desolate waste; that she might present an impassable barrier between themselves and their Anglo-American neighbours. The cause of this is not of difficult solution, and is derived from the old mother-country. At the time when Mexico was first colonised, Spain was at the head of the Roman Catholic countries, and all heretics were held in abhorrence by her, and exterminated by the inquisition and the sword. The changes which knowledge and general enlightenment have produced in the Protestant world universally, and even in the Catholic when it has been forced into closer contact with progressive opinion, have not reached Mexico, which has been shut up as it were, and which has jealously retained all her native aversions, prejudices and jealousies. Besides which, Mexico as a colony belonged less to the Spanish nation than to the Spanish kings, and was governed by their viceroys, regardless of the well-being of the people, merely as an estate to produce a revenue. No possible rivalry with the mother-country was permitted; meanwhile the mines were industriously worked, no commerce was permitted to the Mexicans, nor might they rear the silkworm or plant the olive or the vine.

“When, however, the English colonies asserted and established their own independence, Spain, fearing a similar revolt in her own colony, somewhat relaxed her laws regarding their trade with foreign nations, but only under severe restrictions and enormous duties, so that the freedom on the one hand might be nullified by the restrictions on the other. Very little change took place in Mexico.

“At length, in 1810, when the Spanish nation fell under the arm of Napoleon, the Mexicans revolted. But the people were not united, and after a war of eight years the Royalist party prevailed. A second revolution took place in 1821, under Iturbide, when the Mexicans succeeded in throwing off the Spanish yoke. Iturbide proclaimed himself king, and the people, wishing for a republic, deposed him; he was banished, and returning was executed. A new leader arose in the person of Santa Anna, under whose auspices Mexico was divided into States, with each a legislature, and over the whole a general government with a federal constitution similar to that of the United States. But Santa Anna was not a second Washington; the constitution became subverted, and he the military tyrant of the country.”

Having given this brief sketch of the condition and government of Mexico, we now return to Texas. When, in 1803, the United States purchased Louisiana from France, the disputed claim to Texas became transferred to them, and in 1819, when Florida was granted to them by Spain, they ceded to that country their claims to Texas as a portion of Mexico. But although they had resigned their claim to Texas, the United States could not resist their natural impulse at extension and colonisation, and, in 1821, favoured by the Mexican authorities, who hoped that the bold and determined Anglo-American settler would be a good defence against the hostile Comanches, the first attempt at the colonisation of Texas was successfully made. The intended leader of this movement was Moses Austen, of Durham, in Connecticut, who obtained a grant of land from the Mexican authorities for the settlement of a colony between the rivers Brazas and Colorado. Death prevented Moses Austen from carrying out his plans, which, however, were fully and most successfully executed by his son, Steven F. Austen. The success of Austen’s colony soon alarmed the Mexican authorities; and well it might, for these sturdy republicans once planted there would soon take such firm root as to displace any other possessor. Nor was it long before evidences of their intentions were apparent. In 1827, a movement was attempted by the settlers of Nacogdoches to throw off the Mexican yoke and to establish a republic under the name of Fredonia. The attempt was unsuccessful, but the Mexican authorities were alarmed, more especially as soon after some overtures were made on the part of the United States government to purchase Texas.

In 1833, there were about 10,000 American settlers in Texas; and at that time dissatisfaction and discontent were prevailing largely among them. The Spanish Mexicans of the province carried against them every measure in the government, and when Steven Austen was sent to the city of Mexico to petition for redress, he was first neglected, and then thrown into a dungeon. In 1835 Austen was once more in Texas. The usurpations of Santa Anna had in the meantime increased the public discontent, and the Texians generally prepared to throw off the yoke of his despotism. Adventurers from the American states hastened to take part in the approaching contest, which sooner or later was sure to be advantageous to their nation. A provisional government was appointed, and Samuel Houston placed at the head of the army in Texas.

In December the Texian forces, under General Burleton, besieged the strong fortress of Alamo and the city of Bexar, which was garrisoned by General Cos and 1,300 Spaniards and Mexicans. In a few days the fortress was taken, and the Mexicans obtained permission to retire; so that within a very short time not a single Mexican soldier remained east of the Rio Grande.

Santa Anna, who understood too well the spirit of the people, no sooner saw the stronghold of Bezar taken by a party whose purposes were so adverse to his own, than he entered Texas in person, and with 4,000 men invested Goliad and Bezar, which had unfortunately been left in the hands of a very inadequate force. The attack commenced and continued for several days, the fortress of the Alamo in Bezar being defended by its little band with a courage, says Samuel Goodrich, worthy of Leonidas and his Spartans. After having held out for a considerable time they sustained a general assault on the night of the 6th of May. They fought until Travis, their commander, fell, and seven only of the garrison were left when the place was taken, and the little remnant was torn to pieces. Two human beings only were left, a woman and a negro servant. Among those who fell on this terrible occasion was the celebrated David Crockett of Tennessee, a man well known from the eccentricity of his mind and the independence of his character; he was found surrounded by a heap of dead whom he had slain.

Colonel Fanning, who commanded at Goliad, by direction of the Texian authorities evacuated this place on the 17th of March, but had scarcely reached the open country when they were surrounded by the Mexicans with a troop of Indian allies. They defended themselves all day, and killed a great number of the enemy; during the night, however, the Mexicans being reinforced, they were obliged to surrender, on condition of being treated as prisoners of war: good faith, however, was unknown to Santa Anna, and no sooner were they in his power than he ordered them to be drawn out and shot. Four hundred men were thus murdered in cold blood; one of the soldiers saying to his fellows, when the inhuman order was given, “They are going to shoot us; let us face about and not be shot in the back.” This bloody tragedy, which stamped the name of Santa Anna with infamy, took place on the 27th of March, 1836.

These direful tidings aroused, at the same time, the American hatred and sympathy. After this they would not permit Texas to remain in the hands of so cruel and false an enemy.

Santa Anna, encouraged by his victory and confident of success, pursued the Texian army, now under the command of General Houston, as far as San Jacinto, where Houston resolved to risk a battle, although his force was less than 1,000 and the enemy double his number. This was on the 21st of April. The Texians commenced the attack, rushing furiously forward to within half-rifle distance, with the ominous battle-cry of “Remember the Alamo!” The fury with which they assailed the enemy was irresistible, and in less than half an hour they were masters of the camp, the whole Mexican army being killed, wounded, or prisoners. The following day Santa Anna himself was taken, without arms and in disguise.

The plausibility of this artful leader induced his captors to believe him favourable to the independence of Texas. At his request he was sent to the United States, and had an interview with President Jackson, whom he succeeded also in winning, and by whom he was permitted to return to Mexico. No sooner in Mexico than he disclaimed his late proceedings and again commenced war on Texas. In the meantime the United States, England and France recognised the independence of that country. But her struggle was not at an end; and gaining strength by the contest, the Texians, in 1841, assisted by a body of American adventurers, proceeded to take possession of Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico, lying on the eastern side of the Rio Grande. This attempt was unsuccessful, but it opened, as it were, a door into New Mexico, and the American foot being once planted there, as elsewhere, was but the forerunner of possession.

In 1844 Texas made application to be received into the American Union. Great discussion followed; both President Jackson and his successor, Van Buren, opposed it, on the ground of the existing peaceful relations with Mexico, but the great body of the American people were favourable to it. The question of annexation was made the great test question of the following election, and James Polk and George M. Dallas owed their elections to its support. Accordingly, on the 4th of March, 1844, they were inaugurated, and Texas already in February had been admitted into the Union. The annexation of Texas was of course resented by Mexico, her minister at Washington declaring it to be “the most unfair act ever recorded in history.”

The conditions of annexation required from the authorities and people of Texas were as follows: 1st. That all questions of boundary should be settled by the United States; 2nd. That Texas should give up her harbours, magazines, etc., but retain her funds and her debts, and, until their discharge, her unappropriated lands; 3rd. That additional new states, not exceeding four, might be formed with slavery if south of lat. 36½°, but if north, without.

The annexation of Texas led to war with Mexico. In July an armed force under Colonel Zachery Taylor, was sent out to protect the new territory against the threatened invasion of Mexico, besides which negotiations were opened for the adjustment of the quarrel, the United States being desirous of purchasing a peaceful boundary on the Rio Grande and the cession of California.

Whilst these negotiations were pending with but little hope of a successful termination, a difficulty arose between the United States and England respecting the northern boundary of Oregon. The brief history of this north-western state is as follows. In the spring of 1792, Captain Robert Gray, of Boston, discovered a river to which he gave the name of his vessel, the Columbia. This was the first knowledge which the Americans had of this river. In 1804–5, Messrs. Lewis and Clarke, under the commission of the American government, explored this river from its mouth to its source. After the year 1808, the country was occupied by various fur companies. These are the circumstances upon which the United States based her claims to the territory as far as 54° 40′. But English merchants being settled in the country, England also asserted her claim, and a discussion of rights and claims ensued, which became so hot on both sides as even to threaten war between the two countries. Fortunately, however, the question was amicably adjusted by the treaty of 1846, by which the 49th degree became the frontier of the United States to the north, Vancouver’s Island was wholly relinquished to the British, to whom also the right of navigation in the Columbia was conceded.

War with Mexico continued through the whole of 1846–47, and in May of the following year, left the Americans in quiet possession of the northern provinces of Mexico proper, a vast and important territory including New Mexico, Utah, and California. The incidents of the war were of an adventurous and romantic character. The wonderfully varied and tropical character of the country, and the wild and guerilla kind of warfare amid scenes rendered memorable in the old chivalrous days of Spanish glory and enterprise, gave an extraordinary charm to a war which perhaps cannot be justified on strict principles of Christian morality. Young adventurers flocked to the armies of Generals Wool, Kearney, and Taylor, impatient to take part in a enterprise which was dangerous and exciting in the highest degree. It is said that when the news of the imminent danger of the army on the Rio Grande reached the United States, that everywhere young men hastened westward to defend their brethren, fight the Mexicans, and push forward for the Halls of the Montezumas; and that Prescott’s work, the “History of the Conquest of Mexico,” being just then published and universally read, greatly increased the enthusiasm.

In April, 1847, Peubla, the second city in Mexico, was taken by the Americans under General Scott, and in the following September, the grand city of Mexico itself. “Three hours before noon,” says Mrs. Willard, who seems to have the strongest sympathy with this war, “General Scott made his entrance, with escort of cavalry and flourish of trumpets, into the conquered city of the Aztecs. The troops for four-and-twenty hours now suffered from the anarchy of Mexico more than her prowess had been able to inflict. Two thousand convicts let loose from the prisons attacked them from the house-tops, at the same time entering houses and committing robberies. The Mexicans assisting, these fellows were quelled by the morning of the 15th.

“General Scott gave to his army, on the day of their entrance into Mexico, memorable orders concerning their discipline and behaviour. After directing that companies and regiments be kept together, he says, ‘Let there be no disorders, no straggling, no drunkenness. Marauders shall be punished by court-martial. All the rules so honourably observed by the glorious army in Peubla must be observed here. The honour of our country, the honour of our army, call for the best behaviour from all. The valiant must, to win the approbation of God and their country, be sober, orderly, and merciful. His noble brethren in arms will not be deaf to this hasty appeal from their commander and friend.’

“On the 16th, he called the army to return public and private thanks to God for victory; and on the 19th, for the better preservation of order and suppression of crime, he proclaimed martial law. Thus protected by the American army, the citizens of Mexico were more secure from violence, and from the fear of robbery and murder, than they had ever been under their own flag.”

Nor does this statement appear to be overdrawn. An English writer[^[83]] on Mexico, who was in the country the two years following the war, dates the commencement of an improvement in this degraded people from the American invasion. “Nothing,” says he, “could exceed the jealous suspicions with which the Mexicans formerly regarded other nations, more particularly perhaps the people of the United States. The hatred and rancour with which the very name of American was mentioned while hostilities were in progress, were immeasurable. But at the present time kindly feelings are being fostered with a large proportion which will lead to happy results for both countries.

“In respect of the broad principles of commerce, productions and restrictions, the intercourse of Mexico with other nations has at present led to but few salutary results. Exclusiveness and shortsighted suspicion still remain the governing features of their commercial policy; liberality, innovation, and improvement, being carefully guarded against. Foreign productions of importance are excluded as ruinous, and the country is effectually protected against honourable traffic, though left open to the lawless proceedings of swindlers and smugglers of every grade.

“When the Americans marched upon the interior of the country,” after gaining every battle on the outskirts, said an intelligent Mexican, who had been seized upon by the American army and compelled to serve as a guide, “the most horrible ideas of their cruelty and rapacity were set afloat. As they drew near the capital, we were given to understand that there was no torture nor disgrace to which they would not subject the inhabitants, if they conquered us. The priests made themselves particularly busy in influencing the minds of the people in every part of the city against them, and members of the secular clergy went from house to house of the wealthier classes, to arouse their zeal against the invaders, and to procure sums of money for the benefit of the cause. It was generally believed that our enemies were neither more nor less than a kind of monsters, permitted by heaven to visit us as a judgment upon our crimes and neglect of the holy church.

“‘For my own part such a dreadful idea of our enemies had taken possession of me, that I could neither eat nor sleep; I was like one bereft of his senses; every avenue of my mind seemed closed but that of fear. Sleeping or waking, I was haunted by the image of our invaders, and I was in the act of making a precipitate retreat at the moment I was surrounded by several hostile soldiers. But, above all, was a popular horror associated with the American generals. The people were taught to believe them the most atrocious impersonations of cruelty and rapacity which it was possible to imagine. It was reported that they had sworn to hang every Mexican who should fall into their hands, and that they had approached the capital with the most malicious determination to wreak their vengeance upon it.’ The Mexican prisoner related, therefore, that when he found himself in the hands of such dreaded foes he was in momentary expectation of being shot or hanged, and could not at first understand why his execution was delayed. Still more was he astonished when he beheld the American generals themselves. Instead of fierce tyrants with bloodthirsty visages, as he had been taught to regard them, he beheld, he said, two agreeable-looking, fair men, with paternal countenances and amiable manners. General Scott made a good impression; but General Taylor attracted by his unassuming dignity and awed by his firmness.

“‘I am sure,’ continued this narrator, ‘that many of my countrymen have a great respect for the people of the United States; they have reason for it. Their officers were kind instead of cruel to us; they spared our houses and our property; they were just to our storekeepers. Indeed, in many respects, our city has had cause to regret the period when they went away.’ The cruelties of the Mexicans in this struggle were of the most unsparing character; every American or Texian who was captured was killed in some ruthless manner, their dead and mangled bodies being left to be recognised by their friends. It was their practice,” says Mr. Mason, “to extort by the most brutal threats and unlicensed conduct, the money and property of individuals unfortunate enough to be in their vicinity, or failing this to outrage their families, or sacrifice them to their mean revenge. They exhibited the utmost baseness and duplicity in all attempts at compromise and interchange of prisoners; and they stripped and plundered the bodies of the American dead left on the field of battle, burning and disfiguring them in the most brutal manner.

“The generosity of the American general shines in happy contrast with these deeds of their enemies. A large party of wounded Mexicans were left in the hospital totally unprovided for on the retreat of Santa Anna’s army from Buena Vista, where the Americans gained a signal victory in February, 1847, and which in fact made them masters of the northern provinces of Mexico Proper. In the disastrous flight which followed this defeat, hundreds of the wounded were left by the wayside to be drowned by the waters, even before death, and numbers who had escaped unscathed in the battle, perished on the march in the agonies of thirst and hunger. On General Taylor becoming acquainted with the fact, he despatched such medical assistance as he could spare, together with between thirty and forty mules laden with provisions, to their assistance. This, it is said, being only one instance out of many that might be recorded to the credit of the Americans.” And no more than what is right; for the Americans, though chargeable with an aggressive spirit in many cases, with a greed of territory and a lust of colonisation, like their old Anglo-Norman ancestors, were yet Christians, and it is by this Christianity alone, which the conqueror must never forego, that the citizens of the United States will in process of time extend themselves over the whole of the western hemisphere.

We have heard above the testimony of a Mexican to the character of the American invaders. And as regards the moral state of Mexico, we will give an average statement of the amount of crime for one year in the city of Mexico, the population of which is but little above 130,000:

	MALES.	FEMALES.	TOTAL.
Robbery	1,800	590	2,390
Quarrelling and Wounding	2,937	1,805	4,742
Bigamy, etc.	421	203	624
Homicide	180	42	222
Incontinence, etc.	75	37	112
Forgery	11	3	14
Throwing Vitriol	41	17	58
Lesser Crimes	734	341	1,075
			9,237

Besides which, about 900 dead bodies are found in the streets and suburbs annually, the cause of which is never known and rarely inquired into. In the above list of crimes is found vitriol throwing, which probably is new to some of our readers, but is so common in Mexico, as the above author assures us, that its appalling evidences are frequently visible in the streets; and not only among the lower classes, but among the wealthy, who have fallen victims to the demoniac vengeance of these ignorant and brutal people.

The taking of Mexico was the crisis of the war. But though the enemy’s capital was in the hands of the Americans, they made use of their conquest for no other purpose than to establish peace. In vain Santa Anna endeavoured to carry on the war; his power was gone for the present, and in October, being abandoned by his troops, he once more became a fugitive. In the following February a treaty was laid before congress, and on the 29th of May, the treaty being signed between the two nations, peace was declared to the American army in Mexico.

The stipulations of the treaty were, that Mexico should be evacuated within three months, prisoners on each side released, and Mexican captures made by the Indians within the limits of the United States were to be restored. These limits, as they affect Mexico, begin at the mouth of the Rio Grande, and proceed thence along the deepest channel of that river to the southern boundary of New Mexico. From thence to the Pacific they follow the river Gela and the southern boundary of Upper California. The United States might, however, navigate the Colorado below the entrance of its affluent the Gela. If it were found practicable and judged expedient to construct a canal, road, or railway along the Gela, both nations were to unite in its construction and afterwards to participate in its advantages. The navigation of the river to be obstructed by neither nation. Mexican citizens within the limits of the relinquished territories of New Mexico and Upper California to be allowed a year to make their selection whether they would continue Mexican citizens and remove their property, for which every facility was to be furnished, or whether they would remain and become citizens of the United States. The United States stipulated to restrain the incursions of all the Indian tribes within its limits against the Mexicans, and to return all Mexican captives hereafter made by the Indians. In consideration of territory gained, the United States government agreed to pay to Mexico 15,000,000 dollars, and also to assume her debts to American citizens to the amount of 3,500,000 more. Three millions were paid down to Mexico at once, congress having the preceding winter placed that sum in the hands of the president in anticipation of this arrangement.

Thus was the contest ended, to the incalculable advantage of America, and of Mexico likewise, though her benefit will lie in the nearer proximity of a more enlightened government, free institutions, and an advancing people.

The territory of Wisconsin was admitted into the American Union as a state, in May, 1850.

A vast extent of country, as we have already said, fell into the hands of the United States government, in consequence of its Mexican conquests. An important portion of this was Utah, so called from the tribe of Indians inhabiting it, and which was formed into a territorial government as early as 1850. But this remarkable country, with its vast mountain chains, its deserts, its affluent valleys, and its great Salt Lake, together with its extraordinary people, the Mormons, deserve more than a mere summary mention. The Rocky Mountains on the east and the Sierra Nevada on the west, form the boundaries of Utah; besides these, two lofty chains intersect the country from north-east to south-west. The Great Basin, a considerable portion of which is sandy desert, is an elevated valley, composing the western portion of Utah; it is in circuit about 12,000 miles, and lies about 5,000 feet above the level of the sea. The great valley of the Colorado, on the east, although not fully explored, is said to be wonderfully fertile, abounding in wood, and admirably fitted for the purposes of agriculture. Its northern portion, and the whole district of the Great Salt Lake, are full of natural beauties, and abundantly repay cultivation.

The Great Salt Lake is perhaps the most singular feature of Utah. Its form is irregular, in extent it is about seventy miles, and contains many islands. It is extremely salty, and so shallow as not to be available for the purposes of navigation. Its western banks, intersected by rivulets impregnated with salt and sulphur, are totally devoid of vegetation, excepting such small shrubs as spring up among the glittering saline particles, and here the mirage frequently displays its fantastic show, as in the deserts of the East. Fresh water and green turf are unknown through an extent of one hundred miles, while a coating of solid salt incrusts the earth, upon which the mules pass as upon ice. This lake never freezes. The river Utah, or the Jordan as it is called by the Mormons, is a small river of fresh water which unites Lake Utah to the Great Salt Lake. Lake Utah, thirty-five miles long, receives the waters of a great number of fresh-water streams which descend from the mountains, and keep the waters of this lesser lake fresh, although on its southern limits a considerable vein of salt has been found imbedded in the clay.

These lakes are about 4,000 feet above the level of the sea.

Lake Utah, as well as the rivers which flow into it, abounds with excellent fish, which with the chase furnish a subsistence to the Indians of this district.[^[84]]

Into this singular region, with its snow-capped mountains, its elevated valleys, its sandy deserts, and salt and sulphurous waters, came, in the year 1848, a people whose social and religious system forms as singular an anomaly in the midst of modern civilisation as the country itself which they chose amid the more ordinary aspects of nature. These, as is well known, are the Mormons.

The commencement of this sect was only eighteen years previous to the great emigration westward, and has become an historical event. Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, a man of low origin, a native of Palmyra in the state of New York, pretended to have found written plates of gold, which he also pretended to translate by miraculous inspiration, and gave forth as the book of Mormon, representing himself to be a great prophet of the latter day, a new Moses or Mahomet. The character of Smith appears from his youth upwards to have been that of a religious enthusiast, if not impostor. When only fourteen, during one of those periods of religious excitement called revivals, he declared that he had been favoured with a heavenly vision, in which two angelic personages freed him from the power of the Enemy and forbade him to join himself to any Christian sect. As he approached manhood he pretended to a knowledge of the occult sciences, and used the divining rod in the discovery of gold, at which period he was known as “Joe the Money-Digger.” The greatest treasure, however, which came into his hand, whether by occult knowledge or by angelic revelation, was, he said, the Book of Mormon, though no one ever saw the golden plates on which he asserted that it was written. As regards this so-called Book of Mormon, it is now generally supposed to have been the production of one Solomon Spalding, a Presbyterian minister, who, after various unsuccesses, wrote a tedious work of fiction on the History of the North American Indians, as the descendants of the patriarch Joseph, from the reign of Zedekiah to the fifth century of the Christian era, and which purported to have been buried by Mormon, its original compiler. This work, which never found a publisher, some years after its author’s death fell by some means into the hands of Sidney Higdon, an associate of Smith’s. The Book of Mormon was published, and Joe Smith was impudently announced by it to be a second Prophet and Saviour of mankind, who should establish a great Zion in America. Ill-founded and absurd as his pretensions were, he soon obtained an immense influence over the ignorant, not only in America but in England, and his sect increased not by hundreds but thousands. The principles of this sect are as yet but imperfectly understood. If, however, they are to be inferred from their bible, they will be found based on Christianity, whatever extravagances and impurities they may have engrafted upon it. This book is said to contain, in the first place, the whole of the Christian Bible, to which are added the writings of later prophets, of whom Meroni and Mormon are asserted to be the last. These give a more definite prophecy of Christ, but still adhere to the details of his life as related by the Evangelists, but in no instances propound any new religious doctrines or theory. The sect asserts, however, that Joe Smith, being directly descended from these later prophets, not only inherited their divine gifts, but was endowed with the spiritual privilege of divine communication, which he had the power of imparting to others; and that by means of these divine and miraculous gifts he and his followers are brought into closer communication with Christ than any other body of Christians.

While we must believe that these high pretensions of Joe Smith’s are delusions if not imposture of the most daring kind, it is still an interesting question what was the secret of the wonderful influence which he possessed over such thousands in the present age, and by which he was able not only to form them into a vast organised society, but even after his death to leave them so firmly knit together that no sign of dissolution appears amongst them. No doubt, however, but that Joe Smith was an extraordinary man, however unprincipled, gifted with a measure of that far-seeing power which assumes to be prophetic, and possessed of that subtle influence which subdues to its dominion the minds of all who are brought within its sphere, besides which he had great knowledge of human nature, and framed his government upon a hierarchical basis so as to enslave the multitude to a powerful priesthood. As regards the prophetic gifts of their first leader, the Mormons declare that Joe Smith distinctly foretold the time and manner of his own death, so that when it occurred the sect, instead of being disheartened and broken up, only regarded it as the accomplishment of a divine ordination, as a testimony to the truth of their faith, and other men of a like spirit with Smith took his place.

The Mormons, in the year 1838, established themselves and built a temple at Kirtland in Ohio; they then removed into Michigan, afterwards into Missouri, whence they were expelled on the charge of an attempt to assassinate the governor. From Missouri they removed into Illinois, whence they were again driven out by the inhabitants. In this last state, however, they remained long enough to found a city called Nauvoo, in which they built, upon the fine slope of a hill, a vast and magnificent temple in a barbaric style of architecture, according as they asserted, to directions laid down in the book of Mormon, the effect, however, of which was extremely imposing. Mormonism was now flourishing. The wealth and population of the community increased greatly. Smith was not only Prophet and High Priest but Mayor of Nauvoo, and even, it is said, offered himself as candidate for the Presidentship of the Union. At Nauvoo also it was that the grossest feature of Mormonism first revealed itself—Smith pretended that he had received a revelation allowing him to have many wives. This and other things roused the public indignation, and Joe Smith and his brother, on the charge of having been concerned in robbery and murder, were lodged in prison at the town of Carthage; and while in prison were themselves murdered by a band of a hundred men who forcibly entered in disguise for that purpose. Although this outrage was as great as that for which the Mormon leader was incarcerated, the public indignation continued to be so unabating against them, that the following year they sold all their possessions in Illinois, deserted their city and temple, and again, like the children of Israel of old, commenced their wanderings in the wilderness, their chosen head and prophet on the death of Smith being Brigham Young, the son of an Eastern States’ farmer. After a long and arduous march of 3,000 miles, amid difficulties and dangers and the endurance of many sufferings, and having crossed the Rocky Mountains they reached the Great Salt Lake, on the fertile shores of which they settled down as in a land of Goshen. Here a great prosperity has again commenced for them; their numbers increase annually, and even so early as 1846 they were able to furnish 500 volunteers for the Mexican war.

At the present time the Mormons number about 30,000. They are building a vast city, twelve miles in circumference, the houses of which are of brick, and their new temple, on a scale still more magnificent than the former, is of stone, the plan it is said having been revealed to Brigham Young in a miraculous vision. About 13,000 inhabitants reside in the city, the remainder having established themselves on the banks of the Jordan, which river, as we have said, connects Lake Utah with the Great Salt Lake. They have already commenced the cultivation of the soil, which is found to produce seventy-five bushels of wheat per acre, and which is favourable to the growth of the potato, though the climate is too severe for the Indian corn. Rain is rare in the country, and irrigation is therefore indispensable. They have erected corn and saw-mills on the streams of water which descend from the mountains, wood being abundant for this purpose, besides which they have iron-works and coal-mines, and various factories. They have dug canals and built bridges. They have established regular mails with San Francisco on the Pacific and New York on the Atlantic. Public baths, supplied from the hot springs of that volcanic region are erected in the city, and they have founded also a university, where lectures on the sciences, conformable to Mormon views, are delivered. The climate is extremely salubrious.

The Mormon government is a hierarchy; and the one great doctrine which is impressed upon the people is submission in all things to the priesthood; but all sects and opinions are tolerated amongst them. If all is true which is said of their social life, morality amongst them is at a very low ebb. Nevertheless, accounts are so contrary, that Miss Bremer, for instance, states on what she considered good authority, “that the habits and organisation of the community were according to the Christian moral code, and extremely severe.” Whatever it may be however, whether it ministers to the evil or the good in human nature, there seems to be a very popular element in Mormonism, for it reckons about 100,000 members within its pale, both in Europe and America, and those in Europe seem to be rapidly removing themselves to this New Jerusalem on the banks of the Great Salt Lake. One cause of their success, doubtless, is the wonderful system of organisation which prevails amongst them. They do not undertake the task of establishing their settlements according to the usually independent mode of individual and ordinary squatters, but all is the result of organised industry, and the result astonishes all. Captain Stansbury, in his Survey of Utah, thus describes the mode which they adopt for the founding of a new town. “An expedition is sent out to explore the country, with a view to the selection of the best site. An elder of the church is then appointed to preside over the band designated to make the first improvement. This company is composed partly of volunteers and partly of such as are selected by the Presidency, due regard being had to a proper intermixture of mechanical artizans, to render the expedition independent of all without.” And still further to illustrate this system, we will extract a letter given by the author of a very comprehensive article on Mormonism in the “Edinburgh Review,” and to which we are already indebted. “In company of upwards of 100 wagons I was sent on a mission with G. A. Smith, one of the Twelve, to Iron County, 270 miles south of Salt Lake, in the depth of winter, to form a settlement in the valley of Little Salt Lake, now Parowan, as a preparatory step to the manufacturing of iron. After some difficulty in getting through the snow, we arrived safe and sound in the valley. After looking out a location, we formed our wagons into two parallel lines, some seventy paces apart; we then took the boxes from the wheels and planted them about a couple of paces from each other, so securing ourselves that we could not easily be taken advantage of by any unknown foe. This done, we next ran a road up the ravine, opening it to a distance of some eight miles, bridging the creek in some five or six places, making the timber and poles, of which there is an immense quantity, of easy access. We next built a large meeting-house, two stories high, of large pine-trees, all neatly joined together. We next built a square fort with a commodious cattle-yard inside the enclosure. The houses were some of hewn logs, others of dried bricks, all neat and comfortable. We next inclosed a field, five by three miles square, with a good ditch and pole-fence. We dug canals and water-ditches to the distance of thirty or forty miles. One canal to turn the water of another creek upon the field for irrigating purposes, was seven miles long. We built a saw-mill and grist-mill the same season. I have not time to tell you half the labours we performed in one season. Suffice it to say, that when the governor came along in the spring, he pronounced it the greatest work done in the mountains by the same amount of men.”

This system of judicious organisation, by which his proper place is appointed to every man, has been carried throughout the Mormon movements, and much of their success may be attributed to this cause. The march from Missouri to the Great Salt Lake was conducted on this system. Captain Kane, who was an eye-witness, describes 3,000 persons, among whom were many women and children, journeying across an unknown and wilderness country with all the discipline of a veteran army. “Every ten of their wagons was under the care of a captain; this captain of ten obeyed a captain of fifty; who in his turn obeyed a member of the High Council of the Church.”

The great route to the western states of Oregon and California by the South Pass, runs about sixty miles north of this city of the Mormons, and one still nearer may be taken. The inhabitants supply the travellers with fresh mules, oxen, and provisions for the journey. The road of Independence west of the Rocky Mountains is good, and the number of travellers which frequent it immense. The Mormons have established ferry-boats on the Platte and Green Rivers.[^[85]]

Such is the history and the present position of the Mormon settlement of Utah. Already in 1850 they petitioned congress for admission into the Union, under the designation of the State of Deseret, a name taken from their Book of Mormon, but as yet they rank only as a territorial government.

CHAPTER XXIII.
CALIFORNIA—STATISTICAL REVIEW OF THE UNITED STATES.

The American state of California, a portion of the Mexican Upper California, came, as we have already said, into the possession of the United States through their Mexican conquests, and, as the event has proved, has supplied an important epoch not only in the history of the United States, but of the world itself.

The first discoverer of Upper California was Sir Francis Drake, in the year 1579, when, having doubled Cape Horn, he coasted the Pacific shore in the vain hope of discovering a passage to the Atlantic Ocean, and took possession of the country, to which he gave the name of New Albion, in the name of his sovereign, Queen Elizabeth. This discovery, however, not being followed up by colonisation, the English lost the right of possession, which was claimed by the Spaniards as a portion of the conquests of Cortez, which were prior to the discovery of Sir Francis Drake.

In 1603, Philip III. of Spain sent out Sebastian Viscaino to examine the coast of Upper California in search of suitable harbours for the Spanish East India ships. He discovered and took possession of San Diego and Monterey, giving on his return glowing descriptions of the beauty and fertility of the country. The Spaniards, however, made but little progress in colonisation, owing in part to the hostility of the natives. Their principal, and in fact first permanent settlement was at San Diego, but the coast, nevertheless, was frequented by their ships on account of its valuable pearl-fisheries. Although the Spanish government did not consider the colonisation of Upper California worth the expense, priests of the Franciscan order established several missionary stations, in the hope of converting the natives. Twenty-one stations were thus formed on the most fertile lands, each occupying about fifteen square miles. The buildings of those stations were contained in an enclosure of adobe or sun-dried brick. To the principal missions was attached a presidio, where was a quadrangular fort, in which was placed a company of soldiers for the protection of the missionaries, and to assist them also in bringing the refractory natives under their influence. The result was, that about half the Indians in the missionary district became nominal Christians and menial labourers at the same time. The very constitution of these missions, however, was calculated to prevent any effectual colonisation of the country by the whites, inasmuch as, while the missionaries themselves were monks and nuns, the soldiers at the presidios were not permitted to bring their wives with them; so that homes did not immediately spring up there as among the wiser colonists, who understood by this means how to attach the settler at once to the soil. Neither was money allowed to be in circulation, and the Padre of the mission held everything under his control. As might be expected, therefore, these missions never took deep root in the country, and only the few places where families were allowed to settle, are those in which towns sprung up, of which Ciudad de Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco were the principal, no one of which, in the year 1840, contained 1,000 inhabitants. Of the general population of Upper California, Humboldt states, that in 1802 it consisted of 15,562 converted Indians and 1,300 of other classes; in 1840 it is estimated that the number of whites was 5,000, of mistigoes or mixed 2,000, and of natives about 18,000. From this time, when the American exploring parties, of which we shall speak presently, had opened as it were a door into these hitherto unknown regions, and the advancing tide of western emigration reached its threshold, population began rapidly to increase; so that the Hon. Butler King states, in his official report, that “in 1846 Colonel Fremont had little difficulty in calling to his standard some 500 fighting men, and that, at the close of the war with Mexico, from 10,000 to 15,000 Americans and Californians, exclusive of converted Indians, were then in the territory. The immigration of American citizens in 1849, the year following the cession of California to the United States, was estimated at 80,000, that of foreigners at 20,000.”

We are indebted to Mrs. Willard for the greater portion of the following rapid sketch:—

“This country during the Spanish rule constituted a part of the viceroyalty of Mexico or New Spain. When Mexico became a federal republic, not finding California sufficiently populous to form a state, she established over it a territorial government. The Californians, like the Mexicans, sometimes had their revolutions, and declared themselves independent; but they always returned again to their allegiance, and till the opening of the war between the republics of America and Mexico, they were governed as a territory of the latter. Los Angeles was the seat of the territorial government; a member of the eminent family of Pico was at its head, and General Castro, the military chief, made Monterey his residence.

“A few years since the country between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific was as little known as the centre of Africa. In the years 1803 and 1804, Messrs. Lewis and Clarke, sent out by President Jackson, explored the Missouri to its sources, crossed the Rocky Mountains in latitude 47°, then struck upon the head waters of the Columbia, and followed its source to the Pacific Ocean. Settlements succeeded these discoveries and those subsequently of Captain Grey. The purchase of Louisiana from France, in 1803, carried the American dominion from the Mississippi to the heights of the Rocky Mountains. All the country beyond those mountains and south of Oregon was, previous to the late war with Mexico, in the possession of that country, and in 1840 its place on the map of the world was a blank.

“The American government in 1838, sent out, chiefly for the benefit of trade and commerce, a naval exploring expedition under Captain Charles Wilkes, to coast the American continent to the south and west, and to explore the islands of the Pacific. Captain Wilkes was directed to make surveys and examinations of the coast of Oregon and the Columbia River, and afterwards along the coast of California, with especial reference to the Bay of San Francisco. After executing this order in August and September, 1841, he pronounced the harbour of San Francisco to be ‘one of the finest, if not the very best in the world.’ The town, then called Yerba Buono, he said, consisted of one large frame building, occupied by the Hudson Bay Company; the store of an American merchant, a billiard-room and a bar; the cabin of a ship occupied as a dwelling; besides out-houses, few and far between. The most prominent man in the region was Captain Sutter, a Swiss by birth, and once a lieutenant in the Swiss guards of Charles X. of France, but who had immigrated from Missouri to California. Having obtained from Mexico a grant of land thirty leagues square, he located his residence within it and near the confluence of the American river with the Sacremento; here he built a fort at the junction of the rivers and laid out a town, to which he gave the name of New Helvetia, but which has since been called Sacremento City. Captain Wilkes reported favourably of the soil and productions of the country.

“In 1842, John C. Fremont, at that time a lieutenant of topographical engineers, being ordered on an exploring tour, left the mouth of the Kansas in the month of June with a party of about twenty. He travelled along the fertile valley of this river; struck off upon the sterile banks of the Platte River, followed its South Fork to St. Vrain’s Fort, and thence northerly to Fort Laramie, on the North Fork of the same stream. Following up, from this point, the North Fork and then its affluent the Sweet Water River, he was conducted by a gentle ascent to that wonderful gateway in the Rocky Mountains called the South Pass. He had found on his lonely way a few straggling emigrants bound to Oregon, but not one to California. Having explored the vicinity of the South Pass, his orders were executed, and he returned.

“The next year, again under the auspices of government, and with a party of thirty-nine, he set out earlier in the season, with special orders to examine and report upon the country between the Rocky Mountains and the line of Captain Wilkes’s explorations on the Pacific coast. He now crossed the Rocky Mountains further south, and where they were 8,000 feet in height. He then examined and laid open, by his report, the region of the Salt Lake, having reached that extraordinary expanse of salt water by following its beautiful affluent, the Bear River.

“Fremont, now brevet captain, was, on September 19th, at Fort Hall, on his way to Oregon. Here he met a Mr. Chiles, the only emigrant he had yet seen to California. Having, in the manner dictated by his orders, explored Oregon, he turned south and commenced his route to California, by traversing in winter the terrible and dangerous snows of the Sierra Nevada. From this seemingly interminable way, the lost and famished wanderers emerged upon the waters of the Sacremento, and they followed its affluent, the American Fork, to Sutter’s Fort, ignorant of the golden treasures beneath their feet, soon to set in motion a rapidly concentrating population from every corner of the world. After their wants had been kindly supplied by Captain Sutter, the party travelled south and beheld and enjoyed the vernal beauties of the flowery valley of the San Joaquin. Turning then to the southern extremity of the Sierra Nevada, they next passed the arid waste of the Great Desert Basin.

“They had discovered and named on their way new rivers and mountain passes; and had laid open regions which had heretofore, except to the hunter and the savage, been but the hidden recesses of nature. They had explored California and made known an overland route.”

Mr. Polk entered upon the presidential office resolved to carry out the Mexican war, as well as to make its results advantageous to his country by putting her in possession not only of New Mexico but of California also, the importance of which he fully estimated as opening up a great commercial state on the Pacific, even before its almost fabulous wealth of gold had become known.

The Mexican war went on, the American interests being advanced at every step, and finally the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo established peace between the two republics, and gave the United States government possession of that vast territory which she coveted with a prescient wisdom, and which it assuredly was the will of God that she should people with her industrious and enterprising sons.

This treaty, which put the Americans in possession of California, was signed in February, 1848, and by a coincidence so extraordinary, that had it been imagined by a writer of fiction, it would have been considered improbable, if not impossible, the discovery of the gold was made within one month from that time. The first gold was found in the lands of that Captain Sutter whom we have already mentioned, on the American Fork of the Sacremento, and almost immediately afterwards in various other localities. The possession of the vast extent of what was so lately Mexican territory, with its framework of society so different to that of the United States, had caused considerable anxiety in the minds of many thoughtful men as to the result. It was feared that many years must pass before a sufficient number of American citizens had settled in these new lands to fuse the old elements into a congruous mass, and that before this should take place bloodshed and disruption might have made the acquired territory a dear purchase. But Providence, who overrules human events for the wisest and best purposes, signally set at rest all these doubts, by permitting the discovery of the gold, which would act as the most tempting lure to call away, not only from the older states, but from the very ends of the earth, a population which would at once sweep away the old influences and begin all anew. Gold, which in so many instances had been a dire curse, was here converted into a blessing.

The tide of emigration set in. In the following year, 1849, 30,000 souls from the United States alone emigrated to California. No outpouring of people in the Middle Ages ever equalled this. We will give a little sketch of this great movement from the graphic and elegant pen of Bayard Taylor, who saw with his own eyes what he describes:—

“Sacremento city was the goal of the emigration by the northern routes. From the beginning of August to the last of December, scarcely a day passed without the arrival of some man or company of men and families, from the mountains, to pitch their tents for a few days on the banks of the river, and rest from their months of hardship. The vicissitudes through which these people had passed, the perils which they had encountered, and the toils they had endured, seem to me without precedent in history. The story of 30,000 souls accomplishing a journey of more than 2,000 miles through a savage and but partially explored wilderness, crossing on their way two mountains equal to the Alps in height and asperity, besides broad tracts of burning desert and plains of nearly equal desolation, where a few patches of stunted shrubs and springs of brackish water was their only stay, has in it so much heroism, daring and sublime endurance, that we may vainly question the records of any age for its equal. Standing as I was at the closing stage of that grand pilgrimage, the sight of those adventurers, as they came in day by day, and the hearing of their stories, had a more fascinating, because more real interest, than the tales of the old travellers which so impress us in childhood.

“It would be impossible to give, in a general description of the emigration, viewed as one great movement, a complete idea of its wonderful phases. The experience of any single man, which a few years ago would have made him a hero for life, becomes mere common-place when it is but one of thousands; yet the spectacle of a great continent, through a region of 1,000 miles from north to south, being overrun with these adventurous bands, cannot be pictured without the relation of many episodes of individual bravery and suffering. Without giving an account of the emigration generally, I will content myself with a sketch of what was encountered by those who took the northern route, the great overland highway of the continent, that very route which we have described Captain Fremont as having opened.

“The great starting-point for this route was Independence, where thousands were encamped through the month of April, waiting until the grass should be sufficiently high for their cattle, before they ventured on the broad ocean of the plains. From the 1st of May to the 1st of June, company after company took its departure from the frontier of civilisation, till the emigrant trail from Fort Leavensworth on the Missouri, to Fort Laramie at the foot of the Rocky Mountains, was one long line of mule-trains and wagons. The rich meadows of the Nebraske, or Platte, were settled for the time, and a single traveller could have journeyed for the space of 1,000 miles, as certain of his lodgings and regular meals as if he were riding through the agricultural districts of the middle states. The wandering tribes of Indians on the plains, the Pawnees, Sioux, and Arapahoes, were alarmed and bewildered by this strange apparition. They believed that they were about to be swept away for ever from their hunting-grounds and graves. As the season advanced, and the great body of the emigrants got under way, they gradually withdrew from the vicinity of the trail, and betook themselves to grounds which the former did not reach. All conflicts with them were thus avoided.

“Another and more terrible scourge, however, was doomed to fall upon them. The cholera, ascending the Mississippi from New Orleans, reached St. Louis about the time of their departure from Independence, and overtook them before they were fairly embarked on the wilderness. The frequent rains of the early spring, added to the hardships and exposure of their travel, prepared the way for its ravages, and the first 300 or 400 miles of the trail were marked by graves. It is estimated that about 4,000 persons perished from this cause.

“By the time the companies reached Fort Laramie the epidemic had expended its violence, and in the pure air of the elevated region they were safe from further attack. But then the real hardships of their journey began. Up and down the mountains that arise in the Sweet Water Valley; over the spurs of the Wind River chain; through the Devil’s Gate, and past the stupendous mass of Rock Independence, they toiled slowly up to the South Pass, descended to the tributaries of the Colorado, and plunged into the rugged defiles of the Tampanozu Mountains. Here the pasturage became scarce, and the companies were obliged to take separate trails in order to find sufficient grass for their teams. Great numbers also suffered immensely for want of food, and were compelled to kill their horses and mules to keep themselves from starvation. Nor was it unusual for a mess, by way of variety to the tough mule-steaks, to kill a quantity of rattlesnakes, with which the mountains abounded, and have a dish of them fried for supper.”

We have already spoken of the assistance rendered to these vast trains of adventurers by the Mormons, then lately settled at their new city on the Great Salt Lake. “Remarkable,” says Bayard Taylor, “must have been the scene which was presented during the summer. There a community of religious enthusiasts, having established themselves beside an inland sea, in a grand valley shut in by snow-capped mountains, 1,000 miles from any other civilised spot, and dreaming only of rebuilding the Temple and creating a new Jerusalem, were aroused by the advance of these vast pilgrim-bands. And indeed, without this resting-place in mid-journey, the sufferings of the emigrants must have been much aggravated. The Mormons, however, whose rich grain lands in the valley of the Utah River had produced them abundance of supplies, were able to spare sufficient for those whose supplies were exhausted. Two or three thousand who arrived late in the season remained in the valley all winter.

“Those who set out for California had the worst yet in store for them. Crossing the alternate sandy wastes and rugged mountain chains of the Great Basin to the Valley of Humboldt’s River, they were obliged to trust entirely to their worn and weary animals for reaching the Sierra Nevada before the winter snows. The grass was scarce and now fast drying up in the scorching heat of midsummer. The progress of the emigrants along the valley of Humboldt’s River was slow and toilsome in the extreme. This river, which lies entirely within the Great Basin, and has no connexion with the sea, shrinks away towards the end of summer and finally loses itself in the sand at a place called the Sink. Here the single trail across the desert divided into three branches, many companies stopping at this place to recruit their exhausted animals, though exposed to the danger of being detained there the whole winter by the snows of the Sierra Nevada. Another large body took the upper route through Lawson’s Pass, which leads to the head of the Sacremento Valley; while the greater number fortunately chose the old and travelled trails leading to Bear Creek and the Yuba, by way of Truckee River, and to the head waters of the Rio Americano.

“After leaving the Sink of Humboldt’s River, and crossing a desert of about fifty miles in breadth, the emigrants reached the streams which are fed from the Sierra Nevada, where they found good grass and plenty of game. The passes, however, were terribly rugged and precipitous, leading directly up the face of the great snowy ridge. As, however, these mountains are not quite 8,000 feet above the level of the sea, and are reached from a plateau of more than 4,000 feet, the ascent is comparatively short, while on the western side more than 100 miles of mountain country must be passed before reaching the level of the Sacremento Valley. Many passes in the Sierra Nevada were never crossed before the summer of 1849. All the emigrants concurred in representing this western slope of the mountains as an abrupt and broken region, the higher peaks of barren granite, the valleys deep and narrow, yet in many places timbered with pine and cedar of immense growth.”

The advance parties arriving at San Francisco, brought the news of the thousands who remained behind, and who, but for help, would probably perish either among the terrible passes of the mountains or in the great desert of the Sink. Relief companies were, therefore, despatched into the Great Basin to succour the emigrants remaining there, and who for want of provisions could not proceed. Not only did the authorities of San Francisco exert themselves for this purpose, but private individuals also. Major Rucker despatched a party with supplies and fresh animals by way of the Truckee River to the Sink of Humboldt’s River, while he himself took the command of the expedition to Pitt River and Lawson’s Pass. The first party, after furnishing provisions on the road to all whom they found in need, reached the Sink, and started the families who were still encamped there, returning with them, and bringing in the last of the emigration only a day or two before the heavy snows came on, which entirely blocked up the passes. Major Rucker also brought in his company of emigrants after immense labour, and Mr. Peoples, an auxiliary whom he had found it necessary to send out in another direction, accomplished also his work of mercy. A violent storm, relates this gentleman, came on as they were passing the mountains of Deer Creek, and the mules, unaccustomed to the severe cold, sank down and died one after another. The people, whose spirit of enterprise and power of endurance seemed in many deadened by their sufferings, were forcibly compelled to hurry forward with the remaining animals. The women, who seemed to have much more energy and endurance than the men, were mounted on mules, and the whole party pushed on through the bleak passes of the mountains in the face of the storm. By extraordinary exertions, they were all finally brought into the Sacremento Valley, with the loss of many wagons and animals.

“The greater part of those who came in by the lower routes,” continues Bayard Taylor, “started after a season of rest for the mining region, where many of them arrived in time to build themselves log-huts for the winter. Some pitched their tents along the river, to wait for the genial spring season, while others took their axes and commenced the business of wood-cutting in the timber on its banks, and which wood, when shipped to San Francisco, paid them well.”

“By the end of December, the last man of the overland companies was safe on the western side of the Sierra Nevada, and the great interior wilderness resumed its ancient silence and solitude until the next spring; when again it would become populous with these modern crusaders.”

Nor was the emigration to California confined alone to those who reached it by land. Ships thronged the beautiful harbour of San Francisco, bringing in their thousands likewise. So great was the concourse, that between the 7th of December, 1848, and the 20th of January, 1849, ninety-nine vessels left the ports of the United States alone for California, and from Oct. 1849, to Oct. 1850, nearly 49,000 emigrants arrived by sea at San Francisco, and about 20,000 by land.

At the presidential election of 1848, General Zachary Taylor, the hero of the Mexican war, was chosen president, and Millard Fillmore, of New York, vice-president. The following year, Minnesota, adjacent to the head waters of the Mississippi, was admitted into the Union.

The vast growth of the national territory, and the consequent increase of states governments which would sooner or later take place, gave rise to the most violent contests between the slavery and the non-slavery parties which as yet had been known. The north and the south were again arrayed against each other, and the secession from the Union was the threat to which South Carolina again resorted. Whilst this great political battle was being fought in congress during the sessions of 1849–50, California, which had so suddenly acquired a population far exceeding that required by the Constitution for the establishment of a territorial government, could obtain no guidance or aid from congress, excepting merely a law regarding the revenue. Amid this perplexing and difficult state of affairs, however, the sagacity and prudence of the Californians themselves saved them from anarchy and ruin, and proved how true is the assertion that the American citizen is gifted with the innate power of self-government. The wisest senate that ever sat could not have reduced a social and political chaos into a state of more perfect harmony and order, than did these legislators of the far west by their simple and constitutional laws.

Again we turn to Bayard Taylor, whose work on California possesses all the merits and intrinsic value of the early annalists of the Puritan states. We will briefly follow him in his account of the state organisation of California.

“In the neglect of congress,” says he, “to provide for the establishment of a territorial, it was suggested that a convention should be called for the framing of a state constitution, and that California should be admitted at once into the Union, without passing through the territorial stage, leaping with one bound, as it were, from a state of semi-civilisation to be the thirty-first sovereign state of the American Confederacy.

“On the 4th of September, the convention met at Monterey, when Dr. Robert Semple, of the Sonoma district, was chosen president, and conducted to his seat by Captain Sutter and General Vallijo. Captain William G. Marey, of the New York volunteer regiment, was elected secretary, after which the various posts of clerks, assistant secretaries, translators, doorkeepers, sergeant-at-arms, etc., were filled. The day after their complete organisation they were sworn to support the Constitution of the United States.

“The building in which the convention met was probably the only one in California suited for the purpose. It is a handsome two-story edifice of yellow sandstone, situated on a gentle slope above the town. It is called Colton Hall, on account of its having been built by Don Walter Colton, former Alcade of Monterey, from the proceeds of a sale of city lots. The stone of which it is built is found near Monterey; it is of a fine mellow colour, easily cut, and will last for centuries in that mild climate. The upper story, in which the convention sat, formed a single hall about sixty feet in length by twenty-five in breadth. A railing running across the middle divided the members from the spectators. The former were seated at four long tables, the president occupying a rostrum at the further end, over which were suspended two American flags and an extraordinary picture of Washington, evidently the work of a native artist. The appearance of the whole body was exceedingly dignified and intellectual, and parliamentary decorum was strictly observed.

“The Declaration of Rights, which was the first subject before the convention, occasioned little discussion. Its sections being general in their character, and of a liberal republican cast, were nearly all adopted by a nearly unanimous vote. The clause prohibiting slavery was met by no word of dissent; it was the universal sentiment of the convention. Without capitulating the various provisions of the constitution, it is enough to say that they combined with few exceptions the most enlightened features of the constitutions of the older states. The election of judges by the people; the rights of married women to property; the establishment of a liberal system of education, and other reforms of late introduced into the States Governments east of the Rocky Mountains, were all transplanted to the new soil of the Pacific coast.

“The adoption of a system of pay for the officers and members of the convention occasioned some discussion. The Californian members, and a few of the Americans, demanded that the convention should work for nothing, the glory being sufficient. The majority overruled this, and it was finally decided that all should be paid, the members receiving sixteen dollars per day, and the different officers on a higher scale, in proportion to their duties. The expenses of the convention were paid out of the civil fund, an accumulation of the duties received at the ports. The funds were principally silver, and at the close of their labours, it was amusing to see the various members carrying away their pay tied up in handkerchiefs or slung in bags over their shoulders. The little Irish boy who acted as page was nearly pressed down by the weight of his wages.

“One of the most exciting questions was a clause which had been crammed through the convention on its first reading, prohibiting the entrance of free people of colour into the state. On the second reading it was rejected by a large majority; several attempts to introduce it in a modified form also signally failed.

“The boundary too, which came up towards the close of the convention, assumed a character of real interest and importance. The great point in dispute was the eastern boundary, the Pacific being the natural boundary on the west, the meridian of 42° on the north, and the Mexican line on the south. After many attempts to extend this eastern boundary, variously from the Sierra Nevada Chain, to the banks of the Colorado River, it was settled by following the old Mexican boundary, which after all appeared to satisfy every body. The state had thus 800 miles of sea coast, and an average of 250 miles in breadth, including both sides of the Sierra Nevada, and some of the best rivers of the Great Basin. As to the question of slavery, the character of the country will settle that. The whole central region, extending to the Sierra Madre of New Mexico, can never sustain a slave population. The greater part of it resembles in climate and general features the mountain Steppes of Tartary, and is better adapted for grazing than agriculture.”

Among other creditable facts of this convention, it is worthy of mention that various native Californians, with their chivalric Spanish names, sat among the members, and were even elected to offices under the new government.

On October the 12th, the convention brought its labours to an end, and a ball was given by the members of the convention to the citizens of Monterey, in the hall where they had sat, on the following evening.

Of the ball we need say nothing, but merely close our account with the signing of the convention, which might not unworthily take its place, as an historical picture, near that of the scene in the cabin of the Mayflower, when the Puritan Fathers solemnly put their names to the compact of good government before landing in the New World. Again we turn to our agreeable eye-witness.

“The morning after the ball, the members met at the usual hour to perform the last duty that remained to them, that of signing the constitution. They were all in the happiest humour, and the morning was so bright and balmy that no one seemed disposed to call an organisation. At length, Mr. Semple being sick, Captain Sutter, the old California pioneer, was appointed to his place. The chair was taken, and the members seated themselves round the sides of the hall, which still retained the pine-trees and banners left from last night’s decorations. The doors and windows were open, and a delightful breeze came in from the bay whose blue waters sparkled in the distance. The view of the balcony in front was bright and inspiring. The town below, the shipping in the harbour, the pine-covered hills behind, were mellowed by the blue October haze, but there was no cloud in the sky, and the mountains of Santa Cruz and the Sierra de Gavilan might be clearly seen on the northern horizon.

“An address to the people of California, which had been drawn up by committee, was first read and adopted without a dissenting voice. A resolution was then passed to pay Lieutenant Hamilton the sum of 500 dollars for engrossing the constitution on parchment, a higher amount than was ever paid before for similar services, but on a par with payment in California. Before the convention for the signature of their names, an adjournment of half an hour took place, during which I amused myself by walking through the town. Everybody knew that the convention was about closing, and it was generally understood that Captain Benton had loaded the guns at the fort, and would fire at the proper moment a salute of thirty-one guns, such, including California, being the number of the United States. The citizens therefore, as well as the members, were in an excited mood. Monterey never before looked so bright, so happy, so full of pleasant expectation.

“About one o’clock the convention met again. Mr. Semple was now present. First, salaries were voted; 10,000 dollars annually, and General Riley as governor of California, and 5,000 to Mr. Halleck as secretary of state, after which they affixed their names to the completed constitution. At this moment a signal was given; the American colours run up the flag-staff in front of the government buildings and streamed out on the air. The next moment the first gun boomed from the fort, and its stirring echoes came back from one hill after another till they were lost in the distance.

“All the native enthusiasm of Captain Sutter’s Swiss blood was aroused; he was the old soldier again. He sprang from his seat, and waving his hand round his head, as if swinging his sword, exclaimed, ‘Gentlemen, this the happiest day of my life. It makes me glad to hear those cannon; they remind me of the time when I was a soldier. Yes, I am glad to hear them! This is a great day for California!’ Then recollecting himself, he sat down, the tears streaming from his eyes. The members, with one accord, gave three tumultuous cheers, which were heard from one end of the town to the other. As the signing went on, gun followed gun from the fort, the echoes reverberating grandly around the bay, till finally, as the loud peal of the thirty-first was heard, there was a shout, ‘That’s for California!’ And everyone joined in giving three times three for the new star added to our Constitution.”

Thus was California, as was represented on her great seal of state, born full-grown, like Minerva, into the national confederacy.

The first Californian senators to congress were John C. Fremont and William M. Gwin. On February 13th, 1850, the constitution of California, together with her petition to be admitted into the Union, were sent to congress by the president.

The clause excluding slavery from the new state awoke all the old animosity of the slavery question, especially as the southern boundary of California lay south of the line of the Missouri compromise. Nor was this the only subject which agitated congress at this time. Texas claimed the whole country as far as the Rio Grande, thus embracing a portion of New Mexico, which the New Mexicans, of Santa Fe violently resisted, being determined not to come under the rule of Texas. Colonel Monroe was at this time American commandant of Santa Fe, and having received private instructions from Washington, a convention was called and a state constitution was framed, and while Texas was preparing to seize the disputed territory by force, New Mexico petitioned to be admitted into the Union. Again, on this very subject of disputed territory, the north and south came to issue, the southern states advocating the claim of Texas, which if established would extend the area of slavery, and the north opposing it for the very same cause.

At length, after the two hostile parties had waged war for some time without either gaining ground, Henry Clay brought in his Compromise Bill, the object of which he stated to be, “to settle and adjust amicably all existing questions of controversy between them, arising out of the institution of slavery, upon a fair, equitable and just basis.” The Compromise Bill was, in May, referred to a committee of thirteen, and in September its measures passed as mutual concessions and compromises for the sake of union, viz.: 1. California was admitted into the Union as a state, with her constitution excluding slavery, and her boundaries extending from Oregon to the Mexican possessions. 2. The Great Basin, east of California, containing the Mormon settlement near the Great Salt Lake, was erected, without mention of slavery, into a territory, by the Indian name of Utah. 3. New Mexico, with a boundary which satisfied her inhabitants, was also erected into a state without mention of slavery; congress giving to Texas, in relinquishment of her claims, ten millions of dollars, with which Texas was to pay former debts for which the United States had been in honour bound. 4. A law was passed abolishing the slave-trade, but not slavery, in the district of Columbia; and 5. The Fugitive Slave Law was passed, a law so cruel in its operations as to call forth, as it were, a universal groan from the non-slavery states, and to fan up afresh the otherwise cooling embers of hostility.

The census of 1850 reported the population of the United States to be 23,267,498, of which 3,197,589 were slaves. In the same year the amount of emigration from Europe to America exceeded 300,000.

We have thus brought down the history of the United States to the middle of the present century, and the reader cannot fail of having been impressed with a sense of the vitality which has ever marked the progress and development of the Anglo-American States, and which, from the smallest beginnings on the Atlantic shore, have now extended with an irresistible force to the far Pacific.

Politically and morally the Republic of the United States has been a grand, successful experiment. While the nation has grown with an unexampled rapidity, it has not overlooked the essential foundations of national greatness—the religious and social advancement of the people. The school-house and the place of worship have sprung up simultaneously with human dwellings in the wilderness. And though anomalies exist in the characters of her institutions, though the blot of slavery darkens the page of her history, and her abundant harvest fields have been watered by the blood of the Indian, still, even for the slave is there hope of the amelioration of his condition, and it may be of his redemption, through the growing enlightenment of the South. And as regards the Indian, missionary-labour is increasing among his people, and where they are capable of receiving the instruction and civilisation of the whites, it is given. In 1850, there were 570 missionaries, more than half of whom were women, labouring earnestly in the wilderness, together with 2,000 preachers and helpers among the natives themselves. A thousand churches, of various Christian denominations, have been erected, and the number of professing Christian Indians amounts at this time to 40,537. A great number of schools have been established, and are increasing daily, where the Indian children, to the number of 30,000, receive instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic, as well as in handicraft trades. The women easily acquire these latter. Printing presses have been introduced among them, and works in thirty different languages produced.[^[86]]

While these facilities are given for education among the Indians, those which are afforded for society at large are on the most ample and liberal scale. Education is indispensable to the man and woman of the New World, and a system of school education is being universally established there, which shall make the enlightenment of the moral and intellectual being common to all, irrespective of creeds and parties, open alike to man and woman.

We will conclude with a few facts drawn from the report of Messrs. Whitworth and Wallis on the Industry of the United States in 1850. “The energetic character of the American people,” say these gentlemen, “is nowhere more strikingly displayed than in the young manufacturing settlements that are so rapidly springing up in the northern states. A retired valley and its stream of water become in a few months the seat of manufactures; and the dam and water-wheel are the means of giving employment to busy thousands, where before nothing more than a solitary farm-house was found.

“Great facilities are afforded in many of these states for the formation of manufacturing companies. The liabilities of partners not actively engaged in the management are limited to the proportion of the capital subscribed by each, and its amount is published in the official statement of the company. In the case of the introduction of a new invention, or a new manufacture, the principle of limited liability produces most beneficial results.

“The cost of obtaining an act of incorporation is very trifling. In one case, where the capital of the company amounted to 600,000 dollars (£120,000), the total cost of obtaining an incorporation was fifty cents—two shillings and one penny!

“In America, where labour is more expensive than with us, great ingenuity has been used in the making of labour-saving machines. Timber is sawn up for all kinds of purposes in building, laths are cut, boards for flooring prepared and planed, doors, window-frames, or staircases made, planed, tenoned, mortised and joined by machinery, at a much cheaper rate than by hand-labour. Wood is sawn up at railroad stations, and other places where a great consumption of fuel is required, by sawing-machines, driven by horse-power. Boxes are made by the same means, being tongued and grooved properly and put together by machinery. These labour-saving machines are applied also to the making of furniture and agricultural implements, mowing and reaping machines, and self-acting churns, in the making of all of which labour-saving tools are again used. Among machines of this class must not be omitted the sewing-machine, the use of which is carried to great extent in the New England states. One large manufactory at Waterbury is occupied exclusively in the manufacture of under-vests and drawers, the cloth waistbands of the latter being stitched by the sewing-machine at the rate of 430 stitches per minute. In a shirt manufactory of New Haven, entire shirts, excepting only the gussets, are made by sewing-machines. By the aid of these machines one woman can do as much work as from twelve to twenty hand-sewers. The workwomen work by the piece, and are frequently able to finish their estimated day’s work by two o’clock, and when busy work overtime. When will the older countries be able to give sufficient remunerative employment to their women, so as, like these happier New England states, to dispense with the starvation-drudgery of the poor needlewoman, and make the “Song of the Shirt” applicable no longer?

“The railroads of America are constructed on a much less expensive scale than with us. Economy and speedy completion are the points which are especially considered in that country. A single line of rails nailed down to transverse logs, and a train at rare intervals, are deemed to be sufficient as a commencement, and as traffic increases additional improvements are made.

“As regards either a railroad or a telegraphic line, if a company or a private individual should propose or construct them, or could show that they would be beneficial to the public, an act may be obtained authorising him to proceed, as a matter of course; no private interests can oppose the passage of the line through any property; there are no committees, no counsel, no long array of witnesses and expensive hearings; compensation is made simply for damage done, the amount being assessed by a jury, and generally on a most moderate estimate. With a celerity that is surprising a company is incorporated, the line is built, and operations are commenced.

“As may be well conceived, the advantages derivable from the Electric Telegraph were at once appreciated by the United States, and that wonderful discovery, which opened a system of communication annihilating distance, received immediate encouragement both from the federal government in Washington and the governments of the different states. In 1844 congress made a liberal grant to put in operation the first telegraphic line that was erected in the states—that between Washington and Baltimore; and before seven years had elapsed, the committee on Post-offices and Post-roads presented to the senate their report on the route which they had selected for a gigantic telegraph line, nearly 2,500 miles in length, connecting San Francisco with Natchez on the Mississippi, and thence with the vast network of lines that by that time had covered the Atlantic states. Such was the rapid development of this system of communication, supported by the federal government and fostered by that of the states, which passed general laws authorising the immediate construction of telegraph lines whenever they could be conducive to the public interest, and affording every facility for companies for that purpose.

“The aggregate length of the telegraphic lines in the United States exceeded, in 1852, 15,000 miles, and this number is continually increasing. The average cost of constructing a line is estimated at £37 per mile. So moderate is the scale of charges by the telegraphic wires, that the electric telegraph is used by all classes of society as an ordinary means of transmitting intelligence; government dispatches and communications taking the precedence. Newspapers make great use of it, as well as commercial houses.

“The most distant points connected by electric telegraph are Quebec and New Orleans, which are 3,000 miles apart; while a network of lines extends to the west as far as Missouri, about 500 towns and villages in those remote wildernesses being provided with stations.

“The cotton manufactures of the United States are principally centralized in New England and Pennsylvania, but out of the thirty-one states of the Union there are seven only in which the spinning or manufacture of cotton is not carried on, viz., Louisiana, Texas, Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and California. The census of 1850 returns 1,054 establishments for the manufacture of cotton goods, consuming 641,240 bales of cotton, and manufacturing goods to the value of £1,000,000 sterling. The number of persons employed in these mills are 33,150 males and 59,136 females. In Alabama slave labour is said to be largely employed, with whites as overseers and instructors. The mills at Lowell, in Massachusetts, on the falls of Powtucket on the Merrimack river, are the most celebrated in the United States, as having been the first where advantage was taken of great natural advantages, with a large and well directed capital, resulting in extensive and systematic operations for the realisation of a legitimate profit; whilst the social position of the operative classes was sedulously cared for, and their moral and intellectual elevation promoted and secured. These works at Lowell were commenced about thirty years ago, and the town now contains 35,000 inhabitants. The example of the Lowell manufacturers has been followed throughout the Union, and in every case with the same favourable results. The number of operatives in the Lowell mills is 6,920 females and 2,378 males.

“By the census returns of 1850, twenty-four of the thirty-one states of the Union, and the district of Columbia, had establishments engaged in some department of the woollen manufacture. The seven states in which this branch of industry had not been commenced, were South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and California. The New England States had not so many establishments in operation as the two states of Pennsylvania and Virginia, and only five more than those of New York and Ohio. Thus it will be seen that, whilst the cotton manufacture is located more exclusively in the Eastern States, the woollen manufacture is extended in almost equal proportions over the whole of the Middle States, and extends itself into the western regions and towards the south. The extent of the woollen manufactures of Massachusetts, however, is seen in the fact, that whilst in the 380 mills of Pennsylvania the consumption of wool is 7,560,379 lbs., employing 3,490 males and 2,236 females, producing 10,099,234 yards of cloth and 1,941,621 lbs. of yarn, of the annual value of 5,321,866 dollars, about £1,300,000 sterling; 119 establishments in the first-named state consume 22,229,952 lbs. of wool, employ 6,167 males and 4,963 females, and produce 25,865,658 yards of cloth and 749,550 lbs. of yarn, of the annual value of 12,770,565 dollars, about £3,000,000 sterling. The difference of the modes of manufacture in the two states above-named, as illustrated by the cotton trade, is here shown again in the fact, that a very large proportion of the woollen mills of Pennsylvania is yarn only, a large amount of this being consumed in home manufacture for domestic use, or in the weaving of mixed goods and carpets by hand, and this, too, in addition to the home-spun woollen yarns mentioned as being worked up with the cotton yarns produced for that purpose. The 130 establishments in Ohio, as well as 121 in Virginia, 25 in Kentucky, and 33 in Indiana, would appear to manufacture the greater portion of the yarns spun therein; it is probable, therefore, that the yarns of Pennsylvania are largely used for the supply of the west in the materials for home weaving. After all, however, this department of industry is becoming daily more and more exceptional; but it is interesting as illustrating the early condition of a new country in its efforts to supply its own wants, in the absence of that larger development of manufacturing means and appliances which capital, skill, and a large and ever-increasing demand can alone establish on a firm and enduring basis.

“The total number of persons employed in the various establishments for the manufacture of woollen goods in the United States in 1850 was 22,678 males and 16,574 females.

“The state of Massachusetts is largely engaged in the manufacture of paper. At Lee, Berkshire County, there are 19 paper mills employing a capital of about 200,000 dollars (about £50,000 sterling). In Norfolk County, Massachusetts, there are 17 mills, and in Worcester County 15 mills, employing a capital of £100,000 sterling in this manufacture. In 1845, up to which date the last general statistical information on the state of Massachusetts is published, there were 89 paper mills consuming 12,886 tons of materials, and making 4,763 tons, giving 607,175 reams of paper per annum, the value of which was 1,750,373 dollars (about £430,000 sterling), and employing 1,369 operatives; and this certainly gives no exaggerated view of the general position of the paper trade in nearly all the New England states,—New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania,—at the present date.

“The materials used are chiefly raw cotton and mill waste. Linen rags are imported from Europe, but the principal consumption appears to be cotton, either as above-named or in rags. The general character of the printing paper is of a low quality, with a very small amount of dressing or size. In writing papers the make is quite equal to the general run of European papers, but the finish is not always so perfect. It is stated, however, that whilst the Americans try to imitate the English finish, the latter are trying to imitate that of makers of the United States.

“The printing operations are extensive and well conducted, particularly in book-work. The printing of newspapers alone forms a large item in the industry of the country. In the New England states, according to the Abstract of the Census of 1850, there were 424 newspapers; in the Middle states, 876; in the Southern states, 716, and in the Western states, 784; and the following table shows the daily, weekly, and monthly issues, and aggregate circulation, as given by the above authority:—

	Number.	Circulation.	Number of copies printed annually.
Dailies	350	750,000	235,000,000
Tri-weeklies	150	75,000	11,700,000
Semi-weeklies	125	80,000	8,320,000
Weeklies	2,000	2,875,000	149,500,000
Semi-monthlies	50	300,000	7,200,000
Monthlies	100	900,000	10,800,000
Quarterlies	25	29,000	80,000
	2,800	5,000,000	422,600,000

“With an educated people, taking a vital interest in all public questions, the newspaper press is likely to increase even in a greater ratio than it has done during the past decade. The number of German emigrants has caused the establishment of newspapers for their use; and at Cincinnati alone there are four daily newspapers published in the German language.

“Typefounding is carried on to a great extent at Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, and there are single establishments in several other of the large cities. The whole of the type used in the United States, besides a large quantity exported to the British provinces and the various states of South America, is produced in these foundries.

“The boot and shoe trade of the United States is of a very extensive character, and the systematic manner in which it is carried on worthy of being understood and adopted elsewhere. A scale or series of sizes is adopted, say in women’s and children’s shoes from one to six, and even higher numbers, the half constituting a size between each. The various portions of the boots and shoes are cut out to these sizes and half-sizes. These are put up with all the requisite trimmings necessary to complete the articles, in sets of 60 pairs for the common kinds, and 24 pairs for the finer qualities.

“Being cut out and made up into sets, they are sent to be ‘fitted’ for the maker—that is, the various parts of the upper leathers are stitched together. Much of this is now done by one of the various kinds of sewing machines. The neatness, accuracy and strength of stitch is superior to hand work. The upper leathers thus ‘fitted’ are then sent to the ‘binder,’ who finally prepares them for the ‘maker,’ by whom they are soled and heeled. Being complete in make they then go to the ‘trimmer,’ whose work consists in punching the string-holes, stringing and putting on buttons, and in ladies’ shoes, bows and rosettes.

“Soles are cut out by machinery. A knife with a curvilinear edge is set in a frame and worked with a treadle, after the manner of a lathe. By a lateral motion in the machine, it can be adapted to the cutting of any requisite width of sole, and being once fixed to a given width, the process of cutting is very rapid, and material is saved by the leather being cut at right angles to the surface, instead of diagonally, as by the ordinary knife.

“When finished, the goods are made up in boxes containing one dozen of assorted sizes. They are then sent in cases to the wholesale dealer, who supplies the retailer. A case contains five boxes making up the 60 pairs of assorted sizes of which a set of the commoner kind consists as manufactured. These manufactures are found in all parts of the New England states, but chiefly in the states of Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire. The finer quality of hoots for gentlemen are chiefly made at Randolph and Abington, Massachusetts; the heavier kind of shoes, and the coarsest kind, usually called ‘brogans,’ at Danvers in the same state. These ‘brogans’ are chiefly manufactured for the Southern markets, for the use of slaves, and are similar to the shoes worn by the miners of South Staffordshire.

“The following table, compiled from the ‘Statistics of the Condition and Products of certain branches of industry in Massachusetts for the year ending April 1st, 1845,’ will show the extent of the boot and shoe trade in the six above-named towns at that date:—

Towns.	Kinds.	Number of Pairs made.	Males employed.	Females employed.
Randolph	{Boots	227,131 }
	{Shoes	332,281 }	815	649
Danvers	Both	1,150,300	1,586	980
Lynn	{Boots	2,000 }
	{Shoes	2,404,722 }	2,719	3,209
Reading	Shoes	274,000	358	385
Woburn	{Boots	909 }
	{Shoes	350,920 }	425	484
Haverhill	Shoes	1,860,915	2,042	1,680

“Pennsylvania is the largest iron-producing state in the Union, although by the census of 1850, twenty-one states are returned as producing pig iron, and only two, Florida and Arkansas, as not having establishments for the manufacture of iron castings; whilst in nineteen states wrought iron is made.

“In the production of pig iron 377 establishments were in operation in 1850; and of these 180 were in Pennsylvania, 35 in Ohio, and 29 in Virginia.

“The capital invested amounted to 17,346,425 dollars (about £4,500,000 sterling), the produce being 564,755 tons per annum, employing 20,291 males and 150 females.

“In the manufacture of iron castings, 1,391 establishments were engaged. Of these 643 were in the states of New York and Pennsylvania,—323 in the former and 330 in the latter; 183 others being in the state of Ohio. The capital invested amounted to 17,416,361 dollars, being about the same as in pig iron. 322,745 tons of castings are produced per annum, giving employment to 23,541 males and 48 females; the value of the castings, and other products, being estimated at about £6,250,000 sterling.

“Wrought iron is manufactured at 422 establishments in 19 states. Pennsylvania has 131, New York 60, New Jersey 53, Tennessee 42, and Virginia 39; the remaining 97 being situated in 14 other states. The capital invested was 14,495,220 dollars, or about £3,500,000 sterling; 13,178 males and 79 females being employed. The quantity manufactured amounted to 278,044 tons, the value of which, with other products, was 16,747,074 dollars, or about £4,100,000 sterling.

“In nearly all the large cities, iron foundries are to be found, cast-iron being largely employed in the construction of buildings both of wood and brick; and in Philadelphia, as also to some extent in other cities, whole elevations of houses, used as retail shops in the principal streets, are of cast-iron. In these cases, the construction of the building is usually modified to suit the material of the front, and, in some instances, an approximation is made towards adapting the decorative part of the elevation to the material and the construction. In general, however, the ordinary forms, as used in stone and wood, are followed, and the whole painted and sanded in imitation of Connecticut red sandstone. The construction of some of these elevations is at once simple and effective, alike for strength as architectural effect, and there appears to be very little difficulty in taking out an old front and substituting a new one, as the whole is well braced together by ties and screws—the side walls sustaining the structure in all essential points. This use of cast-iron may eventually produce a style of street architecture of a different character to that which now prevails, and which is in imitation of European modes of construction and decoration.”

We have merely given above the slightest idea of the vast industrial operations of the United States, which embrace every branch of arts and manufactures; but that little is enough to show how great are their resources, and what an immense field is opened to their enterprise, to their skill and inventive genius.

As we have already said, education is one feature of the American national character, and art-education, as applied to manufactures, is now beginning necessarily to attract serious attention in the United States. Hence schools of design have been established in Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Baltimore and other cities; most of these being, however, intended for the art-education of women.

From art-education, which can only be available for a portion of the public, we pass to that which is made indispensable by the wise legislation of the United States.

“The compulsory educational clauses adopted in the laws of most of the states, and especially those of New England, by which some three months of every year must be spent at school by the young factory operative under fourteen or fifteen years of age, secure every child from the cupidity of the parent, or the neglect of the manufacturer; since to profit by the child’s labour during three-fourths of the year, he or she must be regularly in attendance in some public or private school conducted by some authorised teacher during the other fourth.

“This lays the foundation for that wide-spread intelligence which prevails amongst the factory operatives of the United States; and though at first sight the manufacturer may appear to be restricted in the free use of the labour offered to him, the system re-acts to the permanent advantage of both employer and employed.

“The skill of hand which comes of experience is, notwithstanding present defects, rapidly following the perceptive power so keenly awakened by early intellectual training. Quickly learning from the skilful European artizans thrown amongst them by emigration, or imported as instructors, with minds, as already stated, prepared by sound practical education, the Americans have laid the foundation of a wide-spread system of manufacturing operations, the influence of which cannot be calculated upon, and are daily improving upon the lessons obtained from their older and more experienced compeers of Europe.

“Commercially, advantages of no ordinary kind are presented to the manufacturing states of the American Union. The immense development of its resources in the west, the demands of a population increasing daily by emigration from Europe, as also by the results of a healthy natural process of inter-emigration, which tends to spread over an enlarged surface the population of the Atlantic States; the facilities of communication by lakes, rivers, and railways; and the cultivation of European tastes and consequently of European wants; all tend to the encouragement of those arts and manufactures which it is the interest of the citizens of the older states to cultivate, and in which they have so far succeeded that their markets may be said to be secured to them as much as manufacturers, as they have hitherto been, and will doubtless continue to be, as merchants. For whether the supply is derived from the home or foreign manufacturer, the demand cannot fail to be greater than the industry of both can supply. This once fairly recognised, those jealousies which have ever tended to retard the progress of nations in the peaceful arts, will be no longer suffered to interfere, by taking the form of restrictions on commerce and the free intercourse of peoples.”

THE END.

---

[1]. Hildreth.

[2]. Hildreth.

[3]. Bancroft.

[4]. Bancroft.

[5]. Hildreth.

[6]. Ibid.

[7]. Hildreth.

[8]. Bancroft.

[9]. Hildreth.

[10]. Hildreth.

[11]. Hildreth.

[12]. Willson.

[13]. Willson.

[14]. Hildreth.

[15]. Hildreth.

[16]. Hildreth.

[17]. Hildreth.

[18]. Hildreth.

[19]. Hildreth.

[20]. Hildreth.

[21]. Willard.

[22]. Hildreth.

[23]. Hildreth.

[24]. Hildreth.

[25]. Annual Register, 1779.

[26]. Annual Register, 1779.

[27]. Hildreth.

[28]. Knight’s “Pictorial History of England.”

[29]. Willard.

[30]. Hildreth.

[31]. Annual Register.

[32]. Hildreth.

[33]. Hildreth.

[34]. Hildreth.

[35]. Hildreth.

[36]. Annual Register, 1781.

[37]. Hildreth and Marcius Willson.

[38]. Mrs. Willard.

[39]. Hildreth.

[40]. Hildreth.

[41]. Annual Register and Hildreth.

[42]. Hildreth.

[43]. Annual Register.

[44]. Hildreth.

[45]. Hildreth.

[46]. Annual Register.

[47]. Annual Register.

[48]. Annual Register.

[49]. Hildreth.

[50]. Willson.

[51]. Wraxall’s Memoirs.

[52]. Knight’s “Pictorial History of England.”

[53]. Knight’s “Pictorial History of England.”

[54]. Hildreth

[55]. Hildreth.

[56]. Hildreth.

[57]. Hildreth.

[58]. Hildreth.

[59]. Hildreth.

[60]. Hildreth.

[61]. Hildreth.

[62]. Hildreth.

[63]. That is to say, slaves.

[64]. Hildreth.

[65]. Jared Sparkes.

[66]. There are very few national American ballads: so few, indeed, that whenever an historical event has become a portion of popular literature, we may be sure that it took an unusually strong hold on the popular mind, and as having done so it is additionally worthy of the historian’s notice. The Ballad Sainclaire’s Defeat is a sort of “Chevy Chase” of the Western Territory, and abounds with deep pathos:—

’Twas November the fourth, in the year of ninety-one,

We had a sore engagement, near to Fort Jefferson;

Sainclaire was our commander, which may remembered be,

For there we left nine hundred men, in t’West’n Ter’tory.

At Bunker’s Hill and Quebeck, where many a hero fell,

Likewise at Long Island—it is the truth I tell,—

But such a dreadful carnage, may I never see again,

As happened at St. Mary’s, upon the river plain.

Our army was attacked, just as the day did dawn,

And soon was overpowered and driven from the lawn,

They killed Major Ouldham, Levin, and Briggs likewise,

And horrid yells of sav’ges, resounded through the skies.

Major Butler, he was wounded by the very second fire;

His manly bosom swelled with rage, when forced to retire;

And as he lay in anguish, and scarcely could he see,

Exclaimed, “Ye hounds of hell! Oh! revenged will I be.”

We had not been long broken, when General Butler found,

Himself so badly wounded, was forced to quit the ground.

“My God!” says he, “what shall we do? we’re wounded every man;

Go charge them, valiant heroes, and beat them if you can.”

He leaned his back against a tree, and there resigned his breath,

And like a valiant soldier, sank in the arms of death,

When blessed angels did await, his spirit to convey,

And unto the celestial fields he quickly bent his way.

We charged again with courage firm, but soon again gave ground,

The war-whoop then redoubled, as foes did us surround;

They killed good Major Ferguson, which caused his men to cry,

“Our only safety is in flight, or fighting here we die!”

“Stand to your guns,” says valiant Ford, “let’s die upon them here,

Before we let the sav’ges know, we ever harboured fear!”

Our cannon-balls exhausted, and artill’ry men all slain,

Obliged were our musket-men, the en’my to sustain.

Yet three hours more we fought them, and then were forced to yield,

Three hundred bloody warriors lay stretched upon the field.

Says Colonel Gibson to his men, “My boys, be not dismayed,

I am sure that true Virginians were never yet afraid;

“Ten thousand deaths I’d rather die, than they should gain the field;”

With that he got a fatal shot, which caused him to yield.

Says Major Clarke, “My heroes, I can no longer stand;

We’ll try to form in order, and retreat the best we can.”

The word “retreat” being passed around, there was a dismal cry,

Then helter-skelter through the woods, like wolves and sheep they fly.

This well-appointed army, which but the day before,

Defied and braved all danger, had like a cloud passed o’er.

Alas! the dying and wounded, how dreadful was the thought,

To the tomahawk and scalping knife, in misery are brought.

Some had an arm and some a thigh broke on the field that day,

Who writhed in torments at the stake, to close the dire affray.

To mention our brave officers is what I wish to do;

No sons of Mars e’er fought more brave, or with more courage true.

To Captain Bradford I belonged, in his artillery;

He fell that day among the slain, and a valiant man was he.

[67]. Willson.

[68]. Hildreth.

[69]. Hildreth.

[70]. Tucker’s “Life of Jefferson.”

[71]. Life of Jefferson.

[72]. Life of Jefferson.

[73]. Life of Jefferson.

[74]. Ibid.

[75]. Willson.

[76]. Willson.

[77]. Knight’s Pictorial History.

[78]. Willson.

[79]. “Letters on Freemasonry,” by J. Q. Adams.

[80]. Willson.

[81]. Miss Bremer’s “Homes of the New World.”

[82]. Mrs. Willard.

[83]. R. H. Mason.

[84]. Goodrich’s United States.

[85]. Goodrich’s United States.

[86]. Miss Bremer’s “Homes of the New World.”

---

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THE RISE OF

THE DUTCH REPUBLIC.

A history.

By JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY.

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THE OLD REGIME

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BY

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A calm, philosophical inquiry into the causes of the French Revolution, and the working of the Old Regime. In this work, M. de Tocqueville has daguerreotyped French political society under the old monarchy; shown us where the real power lay, and how it affected individual Frenchmen in the daily avocations of life; what was the real condition of the nobility, of the clergy, of the middle classes, of the “people,” of the peasantry; wherein France differed from all other countries in Europe; why a Revolution was inevitable. The information derived under these various heads, it may safely be said, is now first printed. It has been obtained, as M. de Tocqueville informs us, mainly from the manuscript records of the old intendants’ offices and the Council of State. Of the labor devoted to the task, an idea may be formed from the author’s statement, that more than one of the thirty odd chapters contained in the volume, alone cost him a year’s researches.

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COMPLETION OF GROTE’S HISTORY OF GREECE.

A HISTORY OF GREECE,

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BY GEORGE GROTE, ESQ.

Vol. XII. contains Portrait, Maps, and Index. Complete in 12 vols. 12mo, Muslin, $9 00; Sheep, $12 00; Half Calf, $15 00.

It is not often that a work of such magnitude is undertaken; more seldom still is such a work so perseveringly carried on, and so soon and yet so worthily accomplished. Mr. Grote has illustrated and invested with an entirely new significance a portion of the past history of humanity, which he, perhaps, thinks the most splendid that has been, and which all allow to have been very splendid. He has made great Greeks live again before us, and has enabled us to realize Greek modes of thinking. He has added a great historical work to the language, taking its place with other great histories, and yet not like any of them in the special combination of merits which it exhibits: scholarship and learning such as we have been accustomed to demand only in Germans; an art of grouping and narration different from that of Hume, different from that of Gibbon, and yet producing the effect of sustained charm and pleasure; a peculiarly keen interest in events of the political order, and a wide knowledge of the business of politics; and, finally, harmonizing all, a spirit of sober philosophical generalization always tending to view facts collectively in their speculative bearing as well as to record them individually. It is at once an ample and detailed narrative of the history of Greece, and a lucid philosophy of Grecian history.—London Athenæum, March 8, 1856.

Mr. Grote will be emphatically the historian of the people of Greece.—Dublin University Magazine.

The acute intelligence, the discipline, faculty of intellect, and the excellent erudition every one would look for from Mr. Grote; but they will here also find the element which harmonizes these, and without which, on such a theme, an orderly and solid work could not have been written.—Examiner.

A work second to that of Gibbon alone in English historical literature. Mr. Grote gives the philosophy as well as the facts of history, and it would be difficult to find an author combining in the same degree the accurate learning of the scholar with the experience of a practical statesman. The completion of this great work may well be hailed with some degree of national pride and satisfaction.—Literary Gazette, March 8, 1856.

The better acquainted any one is with Grecian history, and with the manner in which that history has heretofore been written, the higher will be his estimation of this work. Mr. Grote’s familiarity both with the great highways and the obscurest by-paths of Grecian literature and antiquity has seldom been equaled, and not often approached, in unlearned England; while those Germans who have rivaled it have seldom possessed the quality which eminently characterizes Mr. Grote, of keeping historical imagination severely under the restraints of evidence. The great charm of Mr. Grote’s history has been throughout the cordial admiration he feels for the people whose acts and fortunes he has to relate. * * We bid Mr. Grote farewell; heartily congratulating him on the conclusion of a work which is a monument of English learning, of English clear-sightedness, and of English love of freedom and the characters it produces.—Spectator.

Endeavor to become acquainted with Mr. Grote, who is engaged on a Greek History. I expect a great deal from this production.—Niebuhr, the Historian, to Professor Lieber.

The author has now incontestably won for himself the title, not merely of a historian, but of the historian of Greece.—Quarterly Review.

Mr. Grote is, beyond all question, the historian of Greece, unrivaled, so far as we know, in the erudition and genius with which he has revived the picture of a distant past, and brought home every part and feature of its history to our intellects and our hearts.—London Times.

For becoming dignity of style, unforced adaptation of results to principles, careful verification of theory by fact, and impregnation of fact by theory—for extensive and well-weighed learning, employed with intelligence and taste, we have seen no historical work of modern times which we would place above Mr. Grote’s history.—Morning Chronicle.

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE, N. Y.

CURTIS’S HISTORY

OF THE

CONSTITUTION.

HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN, FORMATION, AND ADOPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. By George Ticknor Curtis. Complete in 2 vols. 8vo, Muslin, $4 00; Law Sheep, $5 00; Half Calf, $6 00.

A book so thorough as this in the comprehension of its subject, so impartial in the summing up of its judgments, so well considered in its method, and so truthful in its matter, may safely challenge the most exhaustive criticism. The Constitutional History of our country has not before been made the subject of a special treatise. We may congratulate ourselves that an author has been found so capable to do full justice to it; for that the work will take its rank among the received text-books of our political literature will be questioned by no one who has given it a careful perusal.—National Intelligencer.

We know of no person who is better qualified (now that the late Daniel Webster is no more), to undertake this important history.—Boston Journal.

It will take its place among the classics of American literature.—Boston Courier.

The author has given years to the preliminary studies, and nothing has escaped him in the patient and conscientious researches to which he has devoted so ample a portion of time. Indeed, the work has been so thoroughly performed that it will never need to be done over again; for the sources have been exhausted, and the materials put together with so much judgment and artistic skill that taste and the sense of completeness are entirely satisfied.—N. Y. Daily Times.

A most important and valuable contribution to the historical and political literature of the United States. All publicists and students of public law will be grateful to Mr. Curtis for the diligence and assiduity with which he has wrought out the great mine of diplomatic lore in which the foundations of the American Constitution are laid, and for the light he has thrown on his wide and arduous subject.—London Morning Chronicle.

To trace the history of the formation of the Constitution, and explain the circumstances of the time and country out of which its various provisions grew, is a task worthy of the highest talent. To have performed that task in a satisfactory manner is an achievement with which an honorable ambition may well be gratified. We can honestly say that in our opinion Mr. Curtis has fairly won this distinction.—N. Y. Courier and Enquirer.

We have seen no history which surpasses it in the essential qualities of a standard work destined to hold a permanent place in the impartial judgment of future generations.—Boston Traveler.

Should the second volume sustain the character of the first, we hazard nothing in claiming for the entire publication the character of a standard work. It will furnish the only sure guide to the interpretation of the Constitution, by unfolding historically the wants it was intended to supply, and the evils which it was intended to remedy.—Boston Daily Advertiser.

This volume is an important contribution to our constitutional and historical literature. * * * Every true friend of the Constitution will gladly welcome it. The author has presented a narrative clear and interesting. It evinces careful research, skillful handling of material, lucid statement, and a desire to write in a tone and manner worthy of the great theme.—Boston Post.

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Works by Thomas Carlyle.

History of Friedrich the Second,

called Frederic the Great. 4 vols. 12mo, Muslin, $1 25 each. Vols. I. and II., with Portraits and Maps, just ready.

The French Revolution.

A History. Newly Revised by the Author, with Index, &c. 2 vols. 12mo, Muslin, $2 00; Half Calf, $3 70.

Oliver Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches.

Including the Supplement to the First Edition. With Elucidations and Connecting Narrative. 2 vols. 12mo, Muslin, $2 00; Half Calf, $3 70.

Past and Present.

Chartism and Sartor Resartus. A New Edition. Complete in 1 vol. 12mo, Muslin, $1 00; Half Calf, $1 85.

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Harper & Brothers will send either of the following Works by Mail, postage paid (for any distance in the United States under 3000 miles), on receipt of the Money.

DICKENS AND BONNER’S

CHILD’S HISTORIES.

BOOKS FOR THE FIRESIDE, THE SCHOOL-ROOM, AND THE FAMILY AND SCHOOL LIBRARY. COMPRISING

A Child’s History of England. By Charles Dickens. 2 vols. 16mo, Muslin, 60 cents.

A Child’s History of the United States. By John Bonner. Illustrated. 2 vols. 16mo, Muslin, $1 00.

A Child’s History of Rome. By John Bonner. Illustrated. 2 vols. 16mo, Muslin, $1 00.

A Child’s History of Greece. By John Bonner. Illustrated. 2 vols. 16mo, Muslin, $1 00.

These works present the leading facts of history in the form of stories, which children will read for the pleasure they afford. The histories of Rome and Greece are written from an American point of view.

Capital little volumes. Though written in a simple and artless style to captivate juvenile students of history, they are not devoid of a philosophical spirit to prompt reflection.—Christian Register.

For writings intended for juvenile readers Mr. Bonner’s style is a model—sweet, flowing, animated, with a liberal use of colloquial expressions.—N. Y. Tribune.

Good books for the school and family library.—N. Y. Observer.

History presented in such a shape as to possess all the charms of a romance.—New Orleans Crescent.

Bonner’s Child’s History of Rome is the best in the market for young readers.—Church Journal.

A remarkably successful effort at adapting a historical narrative to the tastes of youthful readers.—Presbyterian.

Mr. Bonner writes with freedom and force, avoiding verbosity and pedantry, and a child of five or a man of seventy can alike understand his meaning.—N. Y. Daily Times.

Written with simplicity, and in a manner to engage the attention of youthful readers.—N. Y. Evening Post.

We welcome these volumes with most sincere pleasure. They have a permanent value, and are fitting companions for that beautiful Child’s History of England, by Dickens.—St. Louis Republican.

The press can not teem with too many just such books.—Savannah Georgian.

Mr. Bonner excels as a historian for the young. His simple, vigorous style, absence of profound reflections, and power of condensing, by grasping the prominent points and leaving out minor incidents, admirably fit him for a task like the present.—Boston Journal.

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Harper’s Catalogue.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.