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ERRATA.

From the rapidity with which this volume was forced through the press, the following errors, amongst others probably undiscovered, have occurred-more justly imputable to the Author than to the Printer.

Page 16, For were read was.

76, For is read was.

100, For gives read give.

152, For BIDDLE, read PREBLE.

162, For Capt. Stewart, read Lieut. Stewart

273, For Charleston read Charlestown.

276, For solicited read appointed.

291, For controlled read constrained.

INTRODUCTION.

ADDRESSED TO THE ATTENTION OF THE YOUNGER CLASS OF READERS.

Memories of the ancient colonists of America, and heroes of the Army and Navy of the Revolution.-They were always freemen-were always their own defenders.-Presumption and ignorance of British officers in the "French War."-WILLIAM PITT.-The result of the French war in America.-British ambition and cupidityHer attempts to coerce Americans-their resistance by argumentthe eloquence of their statesmen in the senate, and firmness of their soldiers in the Army.-NAVAL HEROES of the REVOLUTION. -Congress, the States, and individuals aid them.-Vandalism of British officers and soldiers.-Firmness of Americans in resistance.

IN the long catalogue of the worthies and benefactors of the human race amongst the exalted spirits who have rescued MEN from the degradation of ignorance, and stimulated them to manifest their moral and intellectual powerswho have roused them from the humiliated state of bondage to the dignified attitude of Freemen, the Statesmen of the "OLD CONGRESS"-the officers of the American ARMy and NAVY in the WAR OF THE REVOLUTION, are entitled to pre-eminent rank. We might, in retrospect, by the rapid glance of historical recollection, transport the mind to a period still more remote, and contemplate, with solemn admiration, the great champions who laid the foundation of the two grand pillars upon which our REPUBLIC began to rise, and is still rapidly rising-CIVIL LIBERTY and RELIGIOUS FREEDOM. From their toils and unceasing perseverance, our noble cities, charming towns and delightful villages have been rescued from a wilderness. From their

science and literature, the language and the arts of civilzation are heard and enjoyed, where yelling savages and howling beasts poured forth "horrid harmony," and the arrow and the hook furnished ferocious barbarians with precarious subsistence. When the present race of Americans reflect that these blessings were commenced in the seventeenth-were advanced and secured in the eighteenth -and that in the nineteenth century we are in the full fruition of all the enjoyments which the best and freest government on earth can impart, it surely becomes our duty, and ought to be our pleasure, to render all the grateful homage to the memories of our unrivalled ancestors which man may render to man, and all the adoration which man can render to his Creator.

It is the pastime of the untutored Laplanders to detail and to chaunt the achievements of their sleeping ancestors; and the savages of America, still exult in the fame of Alknomok and Ouconnostota-of Logan and Philip. If barbarians thus commemorate the achievements of their progenitors, which, perhaps, were nothing more than encountering and conquering wild beasts, or capturing and torturing a christian or savage enemy, how much more imperious and obligatory upon us is the injunction-" HONOUR THY FATHERS."

Our expanded and rapidly expanding Republic, in the full enjoyment of every blessing which political wisdom and science-moral and religious principles, and the diffusion of useful knowledge can impart, might now (1823) be in an bumiliated colonial state under George IV.-his voluptuous lords temporal, and his corrupted lords spiritual, had it not been for the exalted and majestic spirit of freedom and independence which inspired the noble bosoms of

our unrivalled ancestors. Let the free and high-minded people who inhabit that portion of the "WESTERN WORLD" which lies north of the Isthmus of Darien, contrast their situation with that of their fellow creatures south of that natural division, of the American Continent. Although SOUTH America is centuries older in what is called civilization than NORTH America, yet the north is two centuries older in the enjoyment of the Rights of Man than the south. From the days of the blood-glutted Pizarro, to this time, South Americans have been the most degraded vassals, to the most tyrannical monarchy, that ever wielded the sceptre of despotic power, and the most subjugated slaves to the most detestable and satanic priesthood, that ever imposed a chain upon the human mind. But from the time that true Englishmen, the descendants of true Saxons, landed in the North, they have ever been free; and their progeny may exclaim with the first of apostles, and one of the first of men "WE WERE BORN FREE." While the Christian world may well exclaim" The Sun of Righteousness arose in the East," and is diffusing his redeeming rays over the earth, an emancipated world will hereafter admit that The Sun of Freedom arose in the West and that in freedom, there is also a redeeming spirit which will ere long wrest from the hands of tyrants the rod of abused power-convert the chains they have forged for their subjects into ropes of sand, and make their thrones vanish beneath them like the "baseless fabrick of a vision.”

The "Thirteen Colonies of North America" may at this time be called the germe of twenty-four Independent States, confederated together by a voluntary ligament that unites them to the American Republic. These ancient colonies, if the expression is admissible, may be said to be “self

created."--They neither originated from royal favour, nor were fostered by princely munificence. They were not acquired by the resistless arm of a potent monarch, but by the purchases of emigrant pilgrims from the oppressed countries of the old world, or by the voluntary conveyances of the native, and sole proprietors of the soil. It is inconsistent with the limits of these introductory remarks to the following "Sketches" to discuss the question whether the benefits which Europeans have gained, and the original rights which the aborigines have irretrievably lost, by the discovery of America, can be justified by the code usually called "The Law of Nations." Having had occasion to allude very briefly to this subject in two previous publications,* I hope to be excused for referring the reader to the hasty remarks made in these volumes.

The British monarch and the British nation, as well by intuitive, as by logical deductions, knew well that national wealth was national power, and that both essentially conduced to national glory. They therefore were assiduously engaged in draining from the East and the West Indies, their immense wealth into their own coffers. They thought little of infant colonies, in an hitherto unexplored region, over a vast expanse of ocean. But France, their natural enemy, were either in actual possession, or had uncontrolled sway, over the whole western and northern boundaries of "His Britannic Majesty's Colonies in North America" from the mouth of the Mississippi, to the mouth of the St. Lawrence, two of the most important streams on earth. That aspiring monarchy cast an eye of cupidity upon these growing colonies which had, almost unobserved by East"Memoirs of Jackson,"

* "President's Tour," 3d ed. p. 268, 269. 5th ed. p. 48, 49.

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