PART IV.

THE LATE WAR.

CHAPTER I.

Declaration of War against Great Britain-Battle of Tippecanoe.

"If the deeds of your fathers are yet blazing in your souls, assert and maintain the dignity and honour of your country."

"Here's an arm for thee, my country;

"T will far and sternly dare,

When the cloudy battle gathers dark,
And the war-shouts rend the air.

Land of our patriot fathers!

Land of the mighty free!'

Here's a loud hurrah for Washington,

And his home of liberty.

Lift the noble flag above us!

Let the stormy war-drums roll;

Those stars are high as the warrior's hopes-
That music speaks his soul.

Arm for the stirring conflict!

Let the serried spears flash high:
Arm! for the God of battle leads
Our hosts to victory!"

"What hallows ground where heroes sleep?
"T is not the sculptured piles you heap!
In dews that heavens far distant weep,
Their turf may bloom."-Campbell.

THE world is a kaleidoscope, and we now produce other pictures, which we hope may interest the reader. In our introduction to this part we must be brief, to find room to set forth the glory of our distinguished navy, together with a few great battles on the land.

On the 4th of June, 1812, a bill declaring war against Great Britain passed the House of Representatives by a majority of seventy-nine to forty-nine. After a discussion of this bill in the Senate till the 17th, it passed that body also, by a majority of nineteen to thirteen, and the succeeding day, 18th, received the signature of the President, James Madison.

The principal grounds of war, as set forth in a message of the president to Congress, June 1st, and further explained by the Committee on Foreign Relations, in their report on the subject of the message, were, summarily :-The impressment of American seamen by the British;-the blockade of her enemies' ports, supported by no adequate force, in consequence of which, the American commerce had been plundered in every sea, and the great staples of the country cut off from their legitimate markets;-and the British orders in council.

On these grounds the president urged the declaration of war. In unison with the recommendation of the president, the Committee on Foreign Relations concluded their report as follows:

"Your committee, believing that the freeborn sons of America are worthy to enjoy the liberty which their fathers purchased at the price of much blood and treasure, and seeing, by the measures adopted by Great Britain, a course commenced and persisted in, which might lead to a loss of national character and independence, feel no hesitation in advising resistance by force, in which the Americans of the present day will prove to the enemy and the world, that we have not only inherited that liberty which our fathers gave us, but also the will and power to maintain it. Relying on the patriotism of the nation, and confidently trusting that the Lord of Hosts will go with us to battle in a righteous cause, and crown our efforts with success, your committee recommend an immediate appeal to arms."

Against this declaration of war, the minority in the House of Representatives, among which were found the principal part of the delegation from New England, in an address to their constituents, solemnly protested, on the ground that the wrongs of which the United States complained, although in some respects grievous, were not of a nature, in the present state of the world, to justify war, or such as war would be likely to remedy. On the subject of impressment, they urged that the question between the two countries had once been honourably and satisfactorily settled, in the treaty negotiated with the British court by Messrs. Monroe and Pinckney; and although that treaty had not been ratified by Mr. Jefferson, the arrangements might probably again be made. In relation to the second cause of war, the minority replied, that this was not designed to injure the commerce of the United States, but was retaliatory upon France, which had taken the lead in aggressions upon neutral rights. In addition, it was said, that as the repeal of the French decrees had been officially announced, it was to be expected that a revocation of the orders in council would soon follow.

In the conclusion of the protest, the minority spoke as follows:

"The undersigned cannot refrain from asking, What are the United States to gain by this war? Will the gratification of some privateersmen compensate the nation for that sweep of our legitimate commerce by the extended marine of our enemy, which this desperate act invites? Will Canada compensate the Middle States for New York; or the Western States for New Orleans? Let us not be deceived. A war of invasion may invite a retort of invasion. When we visit the peaceable, and to us innocent colonies of Great Britain with the horrors of war, can we be assured that our own coast will not be visited with like horrors?

"At a crisis of the world such as the present, and under impressions such as these, the undersigned could not consider the war into which the United States have in secret been precipitated, as necessary, or required by any moral duty, or any political expediency."

As a difference of views respecting the war, which had now been declared, prevailed in Congress, so the country generally was divided into two opposite parties respecting it; the friends of the administration universally commending, and its opposers as extensively censuring and condemning the measure. By the former, the war was strenuously urged to be unavoidable and just; by the latter, with equal decision, it was pronounced to be impolitic, unnecessary, and unjust.

But before war was declared, though its approach appeared manifest, an engagement took place, May, 1811, between the American frigate President, commanded by Captain Rogers, and a British sloop of war, the Little Belt, commanded by Captain Bingham. The attack was commenced by the latter vessel, without provocation, and, in the rencontre, she suffered greatly in her men and rigging.

A court of inquiry was ordered on the conduct of Captain Rogers, which decided that it had been satisfactorily proved to the court, that Captain Rogers hailed the Little Belt first -that his hail was not satisfactorily answered-that the Little Belt fired the first gun-and that it was without previous provocation, or justifiable cause, &c. &c.

During the same year, it became obvious that the cloud of war, which had so long darkened our western frontier, must shortly burst, and pour out its contents of fury and desolation upon the unprotected habitations of the settlers.

The insidious enmity of the Indians, which had been kept alive and nourished so long by the sinister policy of England, began to assume a bolder aspect. Their murmurs were changed into threats; their complaints to vows of vengeful retribution. Great Britain also had strengthened the posts which she had retained in her possession, contrary to all good faith, and had placed Canada in a state of defence. Her outrages upon our commerce had become such as a brave nation could no longer palliate or excuse. The patience of the American people at length became exhausted, and throughout her wide domain, the democracy of the land demanded a vindication of their rights, and a redress of their wrongs. The prospect of war was viewed with enthusiasm in the West.

Governor Harrison, always foremost in the hour of his country's danger, applied to President Madison for authority to prepare the frontier for the approaching contest.

An armed force was instantly supplied him, from Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana; but he was ordered "to abstain from hostilities of any kind whatever, and to any degree, not indispensably required."

A more disadvantageous and trying position than that which Harrison occupied, cannot well be conceived. Before him was arrayed his enemy, in open preparation for battle; behind him lay a defenceless population, from which all the able-bodied men had been drafted, or had volunteered to form the army on the right and left stretched the forest, which it was impossible to guard, and through which the foe could, at any moment, fall back upon the unprotected settlers in the rear, and carry the torch and knife to the home and throats of every family. General Harrison had not the power to attack. Until blood had stained the tomahawk, or the victim had writhed beneath the torture, he could not even unsheath his sword. Every advantage was conferred upon the enemy. In the defile of the mountain, on the plain, by night or by day, in detachments, or en masse, he might come on, when, where, and as he chose.

The genius of Harrison-" the man who never lost a battle," who never yielded to a foreign foe-was equal to this crisis; and, by a master-stroke of policy, he conquered every disadvantage, and moved down upon the Prophet's town, where all the hostile Indians were assembled. We will not accompany him on his dreary march through the wilderness, nor recount the mishaps and adventures which befel him. Suffice it to say, that, on the 5th of November, he discovered the Prophet's town, about five miles in advance of him.

Harrison now used every precaution to guard against an attack. Interpreters were sent to the enemy, who refused to hear them. At length Captain Dubois was sent forward with a flag; but the Indians, in defiance of his sacred character, made an unsuccessful effort to cut him off from the army.