Peace naries. envoys to treat of peace. The chief points to be prelimi provided for, according to the instructions, were, first, impressments, of which the settlement had been facilitated by an American law prohibiting the enlistment of British seamen in the service of the United States, and next, the matter of blockades, the only part of the anti-neutral system which had not been abandoned by the British, (March, 1813.) Great Britain declined the mediation of Russia, but offered to enter into negotiations either at London or at Gottenburg. The American government chose the latter place, and appointed five commissioners John Quincy Adams, James A. Bayard, Henry Clay, Jonathan Russell, and Albert Gallatinto negotiate a treaty, under much the same instructions as before, (January, February, 1814.) But on the news of the triumph of Great Britain and her allies over Napoleon, the demands of the United States were sensibly modified. The opposition alleged it to be from fear of the foe, whose power was so much increased by the issue of the European war. But the administration and its party declared that the pacification of Europe did away with the very abuses of which America had to complain; in other words, that there would be no blockades or impressments in time of peace. At all events, the envoys were directed to leave these points for future negotiation, confining themselves at present to the conclusion of a general treaty. They were also authorized to treat at London, if they thought the arrival of British commissioners at Gottenburg was likely to be delayed, (June.) The new instructions found the commissioners of both nations in session at Ghent, (August 8.) Treaty of terms. Four months and a half elapsed before coming to The British demands, especially on the point of retaining the conquests made during the war, were 66 altogether inadmissible. Fortunately, they were yielded; the disposal of the American question being desirable in the uncertain state of European affairs. "Some of our European allies," wrote Lord Liverpool, British premier, to Lord Castlereagh, British ambassador at the Congress of Vienna, then in session, " may not be indisposed to favor Americans, and if the Emperor of Russia should be desirous of taking up their cause, we are well aware that there is a most powerful party to support him." The command of the British forces in America was pressed upon the Duke of Wellington. He consented in case the war should be continued, but advised peace, being satisfied, as he said, that there was no vulnerable point of importance belonging to the United States" which could be held by the British "except New Orleans." Nor even this, as Sir Edward Pakenham soon afterwards found. Castlereagh wrote from Vienna that the American war made little sensation there. But when it was terminated by the negotiations at Ghent, those at Vienna were carried forward with much less difficulty than Great Britain had previously experienced. The treaty of Ghent restored the conquests on either side, and provided commissioners to arrange the boundary aud other minor questions between the nations, (December 24.) As for the American objects of the war, according to the declarations at its outbreak, they were not mentioned in the articles by which it was closed; yet the United States did not hesitate to ratify the treaty, (February 18.) Within a week afterwards, the president recommended "the navigation of American vessels exclusively by American seamen, either natives or such as are already naturalized;" the reason assigned being "to guard against incidents which, during the periods of war in Europe, might tend to interrupt peace." Protec tion of foreign ers. Though much was waived for the sake of peace, one principle, if no more, had been maintained for our country. In the first year of the war, the British had set out to treat some Irishmen taken while fighting on the American side, not as ordinary prisoners of war, but as traitors to Great Britain. On their being sent to be tried for treason in England, Congress aroused itself in their behalf, and authorized the adoption of retaliatory measures. An equal number of British captives was presently imprisoned, and when the British retorted by ordering twice as many American officers into confinement, the Americans did the same by the British officers in their power. The British government went so far as to order its commanders, in case any retaliation was inflicted upon the prisoners in American hands, to destroy the towns and their inhabitants upon the coast. It was at this juncture that Massachusetts, as already alluded to, appeared in the lines of nullification. The federalist majority in Massachusetts, caring little for the fate of the Irish prisoners, forbade the use of the state prisons for the British officers now ordered to be confined, (February, 1814.) The matter was set at rest by the retraction of the British government, who consented to treat the Irishmen as prisoners of war. Proclamation was made pardoning all past offences of the sort, but threatening future ones with the penalties of treason; a threat never attempted to be fulfilled, (July.) Indian Some months after the treaty of Ghent, a treaty treaty. was made with the Indians of the north-west. Such as had been at war agreed to bury the tomahawk, and to join with such as had been at peace in new relations with the United States, (September.) Algerine treaty. Another treaty had been made by this time. It was with the Dey of Algiers, who had gone to war with the United States in the same year that Great Britain did. The United States, however, had paid no attention to the inferior enemy until relieved of the superior. Then war was declared, and a fleet despatched, under Commodore Decatur, by which captures were made, and terms dictated to the Algerine. The treaty not only surrendered all American prisoners, and indemnified all American losses in the war, but renounced the claim of tribute on the part of Algiers, (June.) Tunis and Tripoli being brought to terms, the United States were no longer tributary to pirates. Exhaustion. Madison was reëlected president, with Elbridge Gerry as vice president, in the first year of the war. If he really consented to war as the price of his re-election, he had his reward. The difficulties of his second term, more serious than those of any administration before him, weighed upon him heavily. He welcomed peace, as his party welcomed it, in fact, as the whole nation welcomed it, - with the same sensations of relief that men would feel if the earth, yawning at their feet, should suddenly close. To see from what the government and the nation were saved, it is sufficient to read that systems of conscription for the army and of impressment for the navy were amongst the projects pending at the close of the war, races and that the public debt had been increased by one hunc. dred and twenty millions a far larger sum in those days than in these. Some parts of the country had suffered more than others; some industries, like those of commerce, had vanished. But as a whole, the people were in a state of temporary exhaustion. Indepen It was not so much in vain as it sometimes seems. dence. Indirectly, almost unconsciously, our fathers had perfected their independence of other nations. Never after, as before the treaty of Ghent, did the United States |