now exposed to much danger from the hostilities of the Indians. Major Dade, with over a hundred soldiers, was sent from Fort Brooke, at the head of Tampa Bay, to the relief of Clinch; and on the 28th of December (1835) he fell into an ambush, when himself and his followers were all massacred excepting four men, who afterward died from the effects of the encounter. That sad event occurred near Wahoo Swamp, on the upper waters of the Withlacoochee. On the same day Osceola and a small war party stole unobserved up to a store a few yards from Fort King (about sixty miles southwest of St. Augustine), where General Thompson and five of his friends were dining, and murdered them. Osceola killed and scalped General Thompson with his own hand, and so he enjoyed the revenge he had sought. Three days later, General Clinch had a sharp fight with the Seminoles on the Withlacoochee; and on the last day of February, 1836, General Gaines was assailed at the same place. The Creeks helped their brethren in Florida by attacking white settlers within their ancient domain, in the spring of 1836. Made bold by success, they extended their depredations and murderous forays into Georgia and other parts of Alabama, attacking mail-carriers on horseback, stage-coaches on the land, and steamboats on the rivers; and finally they assailed villages, until thousands of men, women and children, were seen flying for their lives from place to place to escape the tomahawk, the bullet, and the scalpingknife. General Winfield Scott was now in chief command in the South, and he prosecuted the war with so much vigor that the Creeks were speedily subdued; and during the summer of 1836, thousands of them were removed to the wilderness west of the Mississippi. At mid-autumn, General Call of Georgia led about two thousand militia and volunteers from that State against the Seminoles. Near the place of the massacre of Dade's command, a detachment of them, about five hundred in number, had a severe battle with the savages on the 25th of November; but like all other encounters with these Indians in their swampy fastnesses, it was not decisive. In that region the United States troops suffered dreadfully from miasmatic fevers, the bites of venomous serpents, and the stings of insects; and the year 1836 closed with no prospect of peace. Indeed the war continued all the winter; but finally, in March, 1837, several chiefs appeared before General Jesup, then in chief command there, at his quarters at Fort Dade, and signed a treaty, which was intended to secure an immediate peace and the instant departure of the Seminoles to the new home prepared for them. The wily Osceola caused this treaty to be violated. The war was renewed; and during the summer of 1837, many more troops perished in the swamps while pursuing the savages. At length the treacherous chief became a CHAP. XVII. WAR WITH THE SEMINOLES. 1339 prisoner in the hands of General Jesup. That officer received Osceola and other chiefs, with a train of seventy warriors, under a flag of truce, in a grove of magnolias in the dark swamp. As the chief arose to speak, Jesup gave a signal, when two or three of his soldiers rushed forward and seized and bound Osceola with strong cords. He made no resistance; but several of his excited followers drew their gleaming hatchets from their belts. The muskets and bayonets of Jesup's troops restrained them, and they were dismissed without their leader, who was sent to Charleston and confined in Fort Moultrie. There he died of a fever, and a small monument was erected over his grave near the main entrance to the fort. Jesup was severely censured for this violation of the sanctity of a flag; his plea in his justification was that it was the only way to stop the distressing war, for Osceola could not be held by the most solemn obligations of a treaty. Osceola's captivity was a severe blow to the Seminoles; but under other leaders they continued to resist notwithstanding almost nine thousand United States troops were in their territory at the close of 1837. Their fastnesses in the everglades could not be penetrated by the troops and they defied them, even after they received a severe chastisement from six hundred national soldiers under Colonel Zachary Taylor (afterward President of the United States), who had succeeded General Jesup. This chastisement was given them in a battle fought on Christmas day, on the northern border of Macaco Lake. For more than two years afterward Taylor and his men endured great hardships in trying to bring the war to a close. A treaty for that purpose was made in May, 1839, but so lightly did its obligations bind the Indians that they continued their depredations. It was not until 1842 that a permanent peace was secured, when scores of valuable lives and millions of treasure had been wasted in a. war that had its origin in the injustice of the white man toward his dusky neighbor. In the intercourse of President Jackson's administration with foreign governments, his instructions given to Minister McLane, already alluded to, formed the basis of action. He demanded what was right with vigor, and refused to submit to what was wrong on all occasions; and by this course he secured to our republic the profound respect of the nations of the globe. At the end of his first term, the foreign relations of our government were very satisfactory, excepting with France. That government, by a treaty which he had vigorously pressed to a conclusion, had agreed to pay to the United States $5,000,000, by instalments, as indemnity for injury to American commerce, which the operations of the various decrees of Napoleon from 1806 until 1811 had inflicted. The legislative branch of the French government did not promptly comply with the provisions of the treaty, and the President assumed a hostile attitude. The affair was finally settled in 1836, before Jackson left the chair of state. Similar claims were made against Portugal, and payment obtained; and for similar reasons the king of Naples agreed to pay to the United States $1,720,000. Commercial treaties were made with several European states and with the Sultan of Turkey; and when Jackson retired from office in the spring of 1837, our republic, with its national debt extinguished, was more respected than ever by the powers of the earth. During the administration of President Jackson, of eight years, two new States were admitted into the Union, making the whole number twenty-six. These were Arkansas and Michigan. The former was admitted in June, 1836, and the latter in January, 1837. At that time Jackson's administration was drawing to a close. Martin Van Buren, who had been nominated. for the Presidency, with the understanding that if elected he would continue the general policy of Jackson, was chosen to that office by a very CHAP. XVII. JACKSON'S LAST OFFICIAL ACT. 1341 large majority of the popular vote. The people failed to elect a VicePresident, when the Senate chose Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky for that office. President Jackson offended a large class of the people of the United States by his last official act. So loud was the public clamor against the "Specie Circular," that a bill for the partial repeal of the measure was passed by both Houses of Congress at near the close of the session in 1837. The President refused to sign this bill; and to prevent its becoming a law by a two-thirds vote after he should veto it, he kept it in his hands until Congress had adjourned. His message giving his reasons for withholding his signature was dated "March 3d, 1837, a quarter before 12 P. M." President Jackson now retired to his seat "The Hermitage," in Tennessee. He was then seventy years of age. He never entered public life again; and there, at that beautiful retreat, he died in June, 1845, when he was more than seventy-eight years of age. CHAPTER ་་ XVIII. INAUGURATION OF MR. VAN BUREN-A COMMERCIAL REVULSION-EXTRA SESSION OF CONGRESS- I OREGON PRESIDENT T seemed to be the opening of a new era in the history of our Republic, when, on the 4th of March, 1837, Martin Van Buren of New York, of Dutch descent, was inaugurated the eighth President of the United States. His predecessors in that office were all of British stock, and had been personally engaged in the events of the old war for independence; he was born at near the close of that war, and was in the fifty-fifth year of his age when he entered the chair of state. The day of his inauguration was bright and serene, and he rode from the Presidential mansion to the Capitol by the side of the venerable Jackson, in a phaeton made largely of wood of the frigate Constitution, which the political friends of the general had presented to him. They were escorted by the military, horse and foot, and the new President, when he had taken the oath of office and delivered his inaugural address, was warmly greeted by the shouts of a great multitude of people. Mr. Van Buren's administration began at an inauspicious time, for the fearful commercial revulsion, already alluded to, had just begun. During March and April, 1837, there were mercantile failures in the city of New York to the amount of more than one hundred million dollars. Only fifteen months before, property to the amount of more than twenty million dollars had been consumed by a great fire, which occurred in December, 1835, when more than five hundred buildings were destroyed. The effects of these losses and failures at the commercial emporium were felt in every part of the Union, and business confidence received a paralyzing shock. A deputation of merchants and bankers of New York waited upon the President in May with a petition praying him to defer the collection of duties, rescind |