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“Neither can I agree with those who complain of the shock of
consternation throughout Great Britain as having been greater
than the occasion required.
It cannot be too deeply felt
that the sacred spell of the invincibility of the British navy was
broken by those unfortunate captures. ”
Of all spells that could be cast on a nation, that of believing
itself invincible was perhaps the one most profitably broken; but
the process of recovering its senses was agreeable to no nation,
and to England, at that moment of distress, it was as painful as
Canning described. The matter was not mended by the Courier
and Morning Post, who, taking their tone from the Admiralty,
complained of the enormous superiority of the American frigates,
and called them line-of-battle ships in disguise. ” Certainly the
American forty-four was a much heavier ship than the British
thirty-eight, but the difference had been as well known in the
British navy before these actions as it was afterward; and Cap-
tain Dacres himself, the Englishman who best knew the relative
force of the ships, told his court of inquiry a different story:-
«I am so well aware that the success of my opponent was owing
to fortune, that it is my earnest wish, and would be the happiest
period of my life, to be once more opposed to the Constitution,
with them (the old crew] under my command, in a frigate of
similar force with the Guerrière. ” After all had been said, the
unpleasant result remained that in future, British frigates, like
other frigates, could safely fight only their inferiors in force.
What applied to the Guerrière and Macedonian against the Con-
stitution and United States, where the British force was inferior,
applied equally to the Frolic against the Wasp, where no inferi-
ority could be shown. The British newspapers thenceforward
admitted what America wished to prove, that, ship for ship,
British were no more than the equals of Americans.
Society soon learned to take a more sensible view of the sub-
ject; but as the first depression passed away, a consciousness of
personal wrong took its place. The United States were supposed
to have stabbed England in the back at the moment when her
hands were tied, when her existence was in the most deadly peril
and her anxieties were most heavy. England never could forgive
treason so base and cowardice so vile. That Madison had been
from the first a tool and accomplice of Bonaparte was thence-
forward so fixed an idea in British history that time could not
shake it. Indeed, so complicated and so historical ha the causes
-


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HENRY ADAMS
115
of war become that no one even in America could explain or
understand them, while Englishmen could see only that America
required England as the price of peace to destroy herself by
abandoning her naval power, and that England preferred to die
fighting rather than to die by her own hand. The American
party in England was extinguished; no further protest was heard
against the war; and the British people thought moodily of
revenge.
This result was unfortunate for both parties, but was doubly
unfortunate for America, because her mode of making the issue
told in her enemy's favor. The same impressions which silenced
in England open sympathy with America, stimulated in America
acute sympathy with England. Argument was useless against
people in a passion, convinced of their own injuries. Neither
Englishmen nor Federalists were open to reasoning. They found
their action easy from the moment they classed the United States
as an ally of France, like Bavaria or Saxony; and they had no
scruples of conscience, for the practical alliance was clear, and the
fact proved sufficiently the intent.
The loss of two or three thirty-eight-gun frigates on the
ocean was a matter of trifling consequence to the British govern-
ment, which had a force of four ships-of-the-line and six or eight
frigates in Chesapeake Bay alone, and which built every year
dozens of ships-of-the-line and frigates to replace those lost or
worn out; but although American privateers wrought more in-
jury to British interests than was caused or could be caused by
the American navy, the pride of Engand cared little about mer-
cantile losses, and cared immensely for its fighting reputation.
The theory that the American was a degenerate Englishman -a
theory chiefly due to American teachings — lay at the bottom of
British politics. Even the late British minister at Washington,
Foster, a man of average intelligence, thought it manifest good
taste and good sense to say of the Americans in his speech of
February 18th, 1813, in Parliament, that "generally speaking,
they were not a people we should be proud to acknowledge as
our relations. ” Decatur and Hull were engaged in a social
rather than in a political contest, and were aware that the
serious work on their hands had little to do with England's
power, but much to do with her manners. The mortification of
England at the capture of her frigates was the measure of her
previous arrogance.


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Every country must begin war by asserting that it will never
give way; and of all countries England, which had waged innu-
merable wars, knew best when perseverance cost more than con-
cession. Even at that early moment Parliament was evidently
perplexed, and would willingly have yielded had it seen means of
escape from its naval fetich, impressment. Perhaps the perplexity
was more evident in the Commons than in the Lords; for Castle-
reagh, while defending his own course with elaborate care, visibly
stumbled over the right of impressment. Even while claiming
that its abandonment would have been vitally dangerous if not
fatal” to England's security, he added that he would be the
last man in the world to underrate the inconvenience which the
Americans sustained in consequence of our assertion of the right
of search. ” The embarrassment became still plainer when he
narrowed the question to one of statistics, and showed that the
whole contest was waged over the forcible retention of some
eight hundred seamen among one hundred and forty-five thou-
sand employed in British service. Granting the number were
twice as great, he continued, “would the House believe that there
was any man so infatuated, or that the British empire was driven
to such straits that for such a paltry consideration as seventeen
hundred sailors, his Majesty's government would needlessly irri-
tate the pride of a neutral nation or violate that justice which
was due to one country from another? ” If Liverpool's argument
explained the causes of war, Castlereagh's explained its inevitable
result; for since the war must cost England at least 10,000,000
pounds a year, could Parliament be so infatuated as to pay 10,000
pounds a year for each American sailor detained in service, when
one-tenth of the amount, if employed in raising the wages of the
British sailor, would bring any required number of seamen back
to their ships ? The whole British navy in 1812 cost 20,000,000
pounds; the pay-roll amounted to only 3,000,000 pounds; the
common sailor was paid four pounds bounty and eighteen pounds
a year, which might have been trebled at half the cost of an
American war.


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HENRY ADAMS
117
1
WHAT THE WAR OF 1812 DEMONSTRATED
1
A
1
1
From History of the United States): copyright 1890, by Charles Scribner's Sons
PEOPLE whose chief trait was antipathy to war, and to any
system organized with military energy, could scarcely develop
great results in national administration; yet the Americans
prided themselves chiefly on their political capacity. Even the
war did not undeceive them, although the incapacity brought into
evidence by the war was undisputed, and was most remarkable
among the communities which believed themselves to be most
gifted with political sagacity. Virginia and Massachusetts by turns
admitted failure in dealing with issues so simple that the newest
societies, like Tennessee and Ohio, understood them by instinct.
That incapacity in national politics should appear as a leading
trait in American character was unexpected by Americans, but
might naturally result from their conditions. The better test of
American character was not political but social, and was to be
found not in the government but in the people.
The sixteen years of Jefferson and Madison's rule furnished
international tests of popular intelligence upon which Americans
could depend. The ocean was the only open field for competition
among nations. Americans enjoyed there no natural or artificial
advantages over Englishmen, Frenchmen, or Spaniards; indeed,
all these countries possessed navies, resources, and experience
greater than were to be found in the United States, Yet the
Americans developed, in the course of twenty years, a surprising
degree of skill in naval affairs. The evidence of their success was
to be found nowhere so complete as in the avowals of English-
men who knew best the history of naval progress. The Ameri.
can invention of the fast-sailing schooner or clipper was the more
remarkable because, of all American inventions, this alone sprang
from direct competition with Europe. During ten centuries of
struggle the nations of Europe had labored to obtain superiority
over each other in ship-construction; yet Americans instantly
made improvements which gave them superiority, and which
Europeans were unable immediately to imitate even after seeing
them. Not only were American vessels better in model, faster in
sailing, easier and quicker in handling, and more economical in
working than the European, but they were also better equipped.
The English complained as a grievance that the Americans


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HENRY ADAMS
adopted new and unwarranted devices in naval warfare; that their
vessels were heavier and better constructed, and their missiles of
unusual shape and improper use. The Americans resorted to
expedients that had not been tried before, and excited a mixture
of irritation and respect in the English service, until “Yankee
smartness » became a national misdemeanor.
The English admitted themselves to be slow to change their
habits, but the French were both quick and scientific; yet Ameri-
cans did on the ocean what the French, under stronger induce-
ments, failed to do. The French privateer preyed upon British
commerce for twenty years without seriously injuring it; but no
sooner did the American privateer sail from French ports than
the rates of insurance doubled in London, and an outcry for pro-
tection arose among English shippers which the Admiralty could
not calm. The British newspapers were filled with assertions
that the American cruiser was the superior of any vessel of its
class, and threatened to overthrow England's supremacy on the
ocean.
Another test of relative intelligence was furnished by the
battles at sea. Instantly after the loss of the Guerrière the
English discovered and complained that American gunnery was
superior to their own. They explained their inferiority by the
length of time that had elapsed since their navy had found on
the ocean an enemy to fight. Every vestige of hostile fleets had
been swept away, until, after the battle of Trafalgar, British
frigates ceased practice with their guns. Doubtless the British
navy had become somewhat careless in the absence of a danger-
ous enemy, but Englishmen were themselves aware that some
other cause must have affected their losses. Nothing showed that
Nelson's line-of-battle ships, frigates, or sloops were, as a rule,
better fought than the Macedonian and Java, the Avon and
Reindeer. Sir Howard Douglas, the chief authority on the
subject, attempted in vain to explain British reverses by the
deterioration of British gunnery.
His analysis showed only that
American gunnery was extraordinarily good. Of all vessels, the
sloop-of-war-on account of its smallness, its quick motion, and
its
accurate armament of thirty-two-pound carronades -
offered the best test of relative gunnery, and Sir Howard Douglas
in commenting upon the destruction of the Peacock and Avon
could only say:— “In these two actions it is clear that the fire of
the British vessels was thrown too high, and that the ordnance
more


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HENRY ADAMS
119
of their opponents were expressly and carefully aimed at and
took effect chiefly in the hull. ”
The battle of the Hornet and Penguin, as well as those of
the Reindeer and Avon, showed that the excellence of American
gunnery continued till the close of the war. Whether at point-
blank range or at long-distance practice, the Americans used guns
as they had never been used at sea before.
None of the reports of former British victories showed that
the British fire had been more destructive at any previous time
than in 1812, and no report of any commander since the British
navy existed showed so much damage inflicted on an opponent in
so short a time as was proved to have been inflicted on them-
selves by the reports of British commanders in the American
war. The strongest proof of American superiority was given by
the best British officers, like Broke, who strained every nerve to
maintain an equality with American gunnery. So instantaneous
and energetic was the effort that according to the British historian
of the war, “A British forty-six-gun frigate of 1813 was half as
effective again as a British forty-six-gun frigate of 1812;" and as
he justly said, “the slaughtered crews and the shattered hulks of
the captured British ships proved that no want of their old fight-
ing qualities accounted for their repeated and almost habitual
mortifications.
Unwilling as the English were to admit the superior skill of
Americans on the ocean, they did not hesitate to admit it, in
certain respects, on land. The American rifle in American hands
was affirmed to have no equal in the world. This admission
could scarcely be withheld after the lists of killed and wounded
which followed almost every battle; but the admission served to
check a wider inquiry. In truth, the rifle played but a small part
in the war.
Winchester's men at the river Raisin may have
owed their over-confidence, as the British Forty-first owed its
losses, to that weapon, and at New Orleans five or six hundred
of Coffee's men, who were out of range, were armed with the
rifle; but the surprising losses of the British were commonly due
to artillery and musketry fire. At New Orleans the artillery was
chiefly engaged. The artillery battle of January ist, according to
British accounts, amply proved the superiority of American
gunnery on that occasion, which was probably the fairest test
during the war. The battle of January 8th was also chiefly an
artillery battle: the main British column never arrived within fair
1
1
1


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I 20
HENRY ADAMS
musket range; Pakenham was killed by a grape-shot, and the
main column of his troops halted more than one hundred yards
from the parapet.
The best test of British and American military qualities, both
for men and weapons, was Scott's battle of Chippawa. Nothing
intervened to throw a doubt over the fairness of the trial Two
parallel lines of regular soldiers, practically equal in numbers,
armed with similar weapons, moved in close order toward each
other across a wide, open plain, without cover or advantage of
position, stopping at intervals to load and fire, until one line
broke and retired. At the same time two three-gun batteries,
the British being the heavier, maintained a steady fire from posi-
tions opposite each other. According to the reports, the
infantry lines in the centre never came nearer than eighty yards.
Major-General Riall reported that then, owing to severe losses,
his troops broke and could not be rallied. Comparison of official
reports showed that the British lost in killed and wounded four
hundred and sixty-nine men; the Americans, two hundred and
ninety-six. Some doubts always affect the returns of wounded,
because the severity of the wound cannot be known; but dead
men tell their own tale. Riall reported one hundred and forty-
eight killed; Scott reported sixty-one. The severity of the losses
showed that the battle was sharply contested, and proved the
personal bravery of both armies. Marksmanship decided the re-
sult, and the returns proved that the American fire was superior
to that of the British in the proportion of more than fifty per
cent. if estimated by the entire loss, and of two hundred and
forty-two to one hundred if estimated by the deaths alone.
The conclusion seemed incredible, but it was supported by the
results of the naval battles. The Americans showed superiority
amounting in some cases to twice the efficiency of their enemies
in the use of weapons.
The best French critic of the naval war,
Jurien de la Gravière, said: -“An enormous superiority in the
rapidity and precision of their fire can alone explain the differ-
ence in the losses sustained by the combatants. ” So far from
denying this conclusion, the British press constantly alleged it,
and the British officers complained of it. The discovery caused
great surprise, and in both British services much attention was
at once directed to improvement in artillery and musketry. Noth-
ing could exceed the frankness with which Englishmen avowed
their inferiority. According to Sir Francis Head, "gunnery was


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HENRY ADAMS
I 21
in naval warfare in the extraordinary state of ignorance we have
just described, when our lean children, the American people,
taught us, rod in hand, our first lesson in the art. ” The English
text-book on Naval Gunnery, written by Major-General Sir How-
ard Douglas immediately after the peace, devoted more attention
to the short American war than to all the battles of Napoleon,
and began by admitting that Great Britain had entered with too
great confidence on war with a marine much more expert than
that of any of our European enemies. ” The admission appeared
"objectionable even to the author; but he did not add, what
was equally true, that it applied as well to the land as to the sea
service.
No one questioned the bravery of the British forces, or the
ease with which they often routed larger bodies of militia; but
the losses they inflicted were rarely as great as those they suf-
fered. Even at Bladensburg, where they met little resistance, their
loss was several times greater than that of the Americans. At
Plattsburg, where the intelligence and quickness of Macdonough
and his men alone won the victory, his ships were in effect sta-
tionary batteries, and enjoyed the same superiority in gunnery.
« The Saratoga,” said his official report, “had fifty-five round-shot
in her hull; the Confiance, one hundred and five. The enemy's
shot passed principally just over our heads, as there were not
twenty whole hammocks in the nettings at the close of the action. ”
The greater skill of the Americans was not due to special
training; for the British service was better trained in gunnery, as
in everything else, than the motley armies and fleets that fought
at New Orleans and on the Lakes. Critics constantly said that
every American had learned from his childhood the use of the
rifle; but he certainly had not learned to use cannon in shooting
birds or hunting deer, and he knew less than the Englishman
about the handling of artillery and muskets. The same intelli-
gence that selected the rifle and the long pivot-gun for favorite
weapons was shown in handling the carronade, and every other
instrument however clumsy.
Another significant result of the war was the sudden develop-
ment of scientific engineering in the United States. This branch
of the military service owed its efficiency and almost its existence
to the military school at West Point, established in 1802. The
school was at first much neglected by government. The number
of graduates before the year 1812 was very small; but at the


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HENRY ADAMS
outbreak of the war the corps of engineers was already efficient.
Its chief was Colonel Joseph Gardner Swift, of Massachusetts,
the first graduate of the academy: Colonel Swift planned the
defenses of New York Harbor. The lieutenant-colonel in 1812
was Walker Keith Armistead, of Virginia, - the third graduate,
who planned the defenses of Norfolk. Major William McRee, of
North Carolina, became chief engineer to General Brown and
constructed the fortifications at Fort Erie, which cost the British
General Gordon Drummond the loss of half his army, besides the
mortification of defeat. Captain Eleazer Derby Wood, of New
York, constructed Fort Meigs, which enabled Harrison to defeat
the attack of Proctor in May, 1813. Captain Joseph Gilbert
Totten, of New York, was chief engineer to General Izard at
Plattsburg, where he directed the fortifications that stopped the
advance of Prevost's great army. None of the works constructed
by a graduate of West Point was captured by the enemy; and
had an engineer been employed at Washington by Armstrong
and Winder, the city would have been easily saved.
Perhaps without exaggeration the West Point Academy might
be said to have decided, next to the navy, the result of the war.
The works at New Orleans were simple in character, and as far
as they were due to engineering skill were directed by Major
Latour, a Frenchman; but the war was already ended when the
battle of New Orleans was fought. During the critical campaign
of 1814, the West Point engineers doubled the capacity of the
little American army for resistance, and introduced a new and
scientific character into American life.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE CONSTITUTION AND THE GUER-
RIÈRE
From (History of the United States): copyright 1890, by Charles Scribner's Sons
A
s BROKE's squadron swept along the coast it seized whatever
it met, and on July 16th caught one of President Jefferson's
sixteen-gun brigs, the Nautilus. The next day it came on
a richer prize. The American navy seemed ready to outstrip the
army in the race for disaster. The Constitution, the best frigate
in the United States service, sailed into the midst of Broke's five
ships. Captain Isaac Hull, in command of the Constitution, had
been detained at Annapolis shipping a new crew until July 5th,


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HENRY ADAMS
123
the day when Broke's squadron left Halifax; then the ship got
under way and stood down Chesapeake Bay on her voyage to
New York. The wind was ahead and very light. Not until July
1oth did the ship anchor off Cape Henry lighthouse, and not till
sunrise of July 12th did she stand to the eastward and northward.
Light head winds and a strong current delayed her progress till
July 17th, when at two o'clock in the afternoon, off Barnegat on
the New Jersey coast, the lookout at the masthead discovered
four sails to the northward, and two hours later a fifth sail to the
northeast. Hull took them for Rodgers's squadron. The wind
was light, and Hull being to windward determined to speak the
nearest vessel, the last to come in sight. The afternoon passed
without bringing the ships together, and at ten o'clock in the
evening, finding that the nearest ship could not answer the night
signal, Hull decided to lose no time in escaping.
Then followed one of the most exciting and sustained chases
recorded in naval history. At daybreak the next morning one
British frigate was astern within five or six miles, two more were
to leeward, and the rest of the fleet some ten miles astern, all
making chase. Hull put out his boats to tow the Constitution;
Broke summoned the boats of the squadron to tow the Shannon.
Hull then bent all his spare rope to the cables, dropped a small
anchor half a mile ahead, in twenty-six fathoms of water, and
warped his ship along. Broke quickly imitated the device, and
slowly gained on the chase. The Guerrière crept so near Hull's
lee beam as to open fire, but her shot fell short. Fortunately the
wind, though slight, favored Hull. All night the British and
American crews toiled on, and when morning came the Belvidera,
proving to be the best sailer, got in advance of her consorts,
working two kedge anchors, until at two o'clock in the afternoon
she tried in her turn to reach the Constitution with her bow
guns, but in vain. Hull expected capture, but the Belvidera
could not approach nearer without bringing her boats under the
Constitution's stern guns; and the wearied crews toiled on, towing
and kedging, the ships barely out of gunshot, till another morn-
ing came.
The breeze, though still light, then allowed Hull to
take in his boats, the Belvidera being two and a half miles in his
wake, the Shannon three and a half miles on his lee, and the
three other frigates well to leeward. The wind freshened, and
the Constitution drew ahead, until, toward seven o'clock in the
evening of July 19th, a heavy rain squall struck the ship, and by
.


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I 24
HENRY ADAMS
taking skillful advantage of it Hull left the Belvidera and Shan-
non far astern; yet until eight o'clock the next morning they
were still in sight, keeping up the chase.
Perhaps nothing during the war tested American seamanship
more thoroughly than these three days of combined skill and
endurance in the face of the irresistible enemy. The result
showed that Hull and the Constitution had nothing to fear in
these respects. There remained the question whether the superi-
ority extended to his guns; and such was the contempt of the
British naval officers for American ships, that with this experi-
ience before their eyes they still believed one of their thirty-eight-
gun frigates to be more than a match for an American forty-four,
although the American, besides the heavier armament, had proved
his capacity to outsail and out-manæuvre the Englishman. Both
parties became more eager than ever for the test. For once, even
the Federalists of New England felt their blood stir; for their
own President and their own votes had called these frigates into
existence, and a victory won by the Constitution, which had been
built by their hands, was in their eyes a greater victory over
their political opponents than over the British. With no half-
hearted spirit the seagoing Bostonians showered well-weighed
praises on Hull when his ship entered Boston Harbor, July 26th,
after its narrow escape, and when he sailed again New England
waited with keen interest to learn his fate.
Hull could not expect to keep command of the Constitution.
Bainbridge was much his senior, and had the right to a prefer-
ence in active service. Bainbridge then held and was ordered to
retain command of the Constellation, fitting out at the Wash-
ington Navy Yard; but Secretary Hamilton, July 28th, ordered
him to take command also of the Constitution on her arrival in
port. Doubtless Hull expected this change, and probably the
expectation induced him to risk a dangerous experiment; for
;
without bringing his ship to the Charlestown Navy Yard, but
remaining in the outer harbor, after obtaining such supplies as he
needed, August 2d, he set sail without orders, and stood to the
eastward. Having reached Cape Race without meeting an enemy,
he turned southward, until on the night of August 18th he spoke
a privateer, which told him of a British frigate near at hand.
Following the privateersman's directions, the Constitution the next
day, August 19th, (1812,] at two o'clock in the afternoon, latitude
41 deg. 42 min. , longitude 55 deg. 48 min. , sighted the Guerrière.
1


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HENRY ADAMS
125
The meeting was welcome on both sides. Only three days
before, Captain Dacres had entered on the log of a merchantman
a challenge to any American frigate to meet him off Sandy Hook.
Not only had the Guerrière for a long time been extremely offens-
ive to every seafaring American, but the mistake which caused
the Little Belt to suffer so seriously for the misfortune of being
taken for the Guerrière had caused a corresponding feeling of
anger in the officers of the British frigate. The meeting of Au-
gust 19th had the character of a preconcerted duel.
The wind was blowing fresh from the northwest, with the sea
running high. Dacres backed his main topsail and waited. Hull
shortened sail, and ran down before the wind. For about an
hour the two ships wore and wore again, trying to get advantage
of position; until at last, a few minutes before six o'clock, they
came together side by side, within pistol shot, the wind almost
astern, and running before it, they pounded each other with all
their strength. As rapidly as the guns could be worked, the
Constitution poured in broadside after broadside, double-shotted
with round and grape; and without exaggeration, the echo of
these guns startled the world. "In less than thirty minutes from
the time we got alongside of the enemy,” reported Hull, she
was left without a spar standing, and the hull cut to pieces in
such a manner as to make it difficult to keep her above water. ”
That Dacres should have been defeated was not surprising;
that he should have expected to win was an example of British
arrogance that explained and excused the war. The length of the
Constitution was one hundred and seventy-three feet, that of the
Guerrière was one hundred and fifty-six feet; the extreme breadth
of the Constitution was forty-four feet, that of the Guerrière was
forty feet: or within a few inches in both cases. The Consti-
tution carried thirty-two long twenty-four-pounders, the Guerri.
ère thirty long eighteen-pounders and two long twelve-pounders;
the Constitution carried twenty thirty-two-pound carronades, the
Guerrière sixteen. In every respect, and in proportion of ten to
seven, the Constitution was the better ship; her crew was more
numerous in proportion of ten to six. Dacres knew this very
nearly as well as it was known to Hull, yet he sought a duel.
What he did not know was that in a still greater proportion
the American officers and crew were better and more intelligent
seamen than the British, and that their passionate wish to repay
old scores gave them extraordinary energy. So much greater


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126
JOHN ADAMS
was the moral superiority than the physical, that while the
Guerrière's force counted as seven against ten, her losses counted
as though her force were only two against ten.
Dacres's error cost him dear; for among the Guerrière's crew
of two hundred and seventy-two, seventy-nine were killed or
wounded, and the ship was injured beyond saving before Dacres
realized his mistake, although he needed only thirty minutes of
close fighting for the purpose. He never fully understood the
causes of his defeat, and never excused it by pleading, as he
might have done, the great superiority of his enemy.
Hull took his prisoners on board the Constitution, and after
blowing up the Guerrière sailed for Boston, where he arrived on
the morning of August 30th. The Sunday silence of the Puritan
city broke into excitement as the news passed through the quiet
streets that the Constitution was below in the outer harbor with
Dacres and his crew prisoners on board. No experience of his-
tory ever went to the heart of New England more directly than
this victory, so peculiarly its own: but the delight was not confined
to New England, and extreme though it seemed, it was still not
extravagant; for however small the affair might appear on the
general scale of the world's battles, it raised the United States
in one half-hour to the rank of a first class Power in the world.
Selections used by permission of Charles Scribner's Sons, Publishers.
JOHN ADAMS
(1735-1826)
OHN ADAMS, second President of the United States, was born
at Braintree, Mass. , October 19th, 1735, and died there July
4th, 1826, the year after his son too was inaugurated Presi-
dent. He was the first conspicuous member of an enduringly pow-
erful and individual family. The Adams race have mostly been
vehement, proud, pugnacious, and independent, with hot tempers and
strong wills; but with high ideals, dramatic devotion to duty, and the
intense democratic sentiment so often found united with personal
aristocracy of feeling. They have been men of affairs first, with large
practical ability, but with a deep strain of the man of letters which
in this generation has outshone the other faculties; strong-headed and
hard-working students, with powerful memories and fluent gifts of
expression.


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JOHN ADAMS.


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JOHN ADAMS
127
All these characteristics went to make up John Adams; but their
enumeration does not furnish a complete picture of him, or reveal the
virile, choleric, masterful man. And he was far more lovable and far
more popular than his equally great son, also a typical Adams, from
the same cause which produced some of his worst blunders and mis-
fortunes,- a generous impulsiveness of feeling which made it impos-
sible for him to hold his tongue at the wrong time and place for
talking. But so fervid, combative, and opinionated a man was sure
to gain much more hate than love; because love results from compre-
hension, which only the few close to him could have, while hate —
toward an honest man—is the outcome of ignorance, which most of
the world cannot avoid. Admiration and respect, however, he had
from the majority of his party at the worst of times; and the best
encomium on him is that the closer his public acts are examined, the
more credit they reflect not only on his abilities but on his unselfish-
ness.
Born of a line of Massachusetts farmers, he graduated from Har-
vard in 1755. After teaching a grammar school and beginning to read
theology, he studied law and began practice in 1758, soon becoming
a leader at the bar and in public life. In 1764 he married the noble
and delightful woman whose letters furnish unconscious testimony to
his lovable qualities. All through the germinal years of the Revolu-
tion he was one of the foremost patriots, steadily opposing any
abandonment or compromise of essential rights. In 1765 he was
counsel for Boston with Otis and Gridley to support the town's
memorial against the Stamp Act. In 1766 he was selectman.
In 1768
the royal government offered him the post of advocate-general in the
Court of Admiralty, - a lucrative bribe to desert the opposition; but
he refused it. Yet in 1770, as a matter of high professional duty, he
became counsel (successfully) for the British soldiers on trial for the
« Boston Massacre. ) Though there was a present uproar of abuse,
Mr. Adams was shortly after elected Representative to the General
Court by more than three to one. In March, 1774, he contemplated
writing the “History of the Contest between Britain and America! »
On June 17th he presided over the meeting at Faneuil Hall to con-
sider the Boston Port Bill, and at the same hour was elected Repre-
sentative to the first Congress at Philadelphia (September 1) by the
Provincial Assembly held in defiance of the government. Returning
thence, he engaged in newspaper debate on the political issues till
the battle of Lexington.
Shortly after, he again journeyed to Philadelphia to the Congress
of May 5th, 1775; where he did on his own motion, to the disgust
of his Northern associates and the reluctance even of the Southern-
ers, one of the most important and decisive acts of the Revolution,-


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128
JOHN ADAMS
induced Congress to adopt the forces in New England as a national
army and put George Washington of Virginia at its head, thus
engaging the Southern colonies irrevocably in the war and securing
the one man who could make it a success. In 1776 he was a chief
agent in carrying a declaration of independence. He remained in
Congress till November, 1777, as head of the War Department, very
useful and laborious though making one dreadful mistake: he was
largely responsible for the disastrous policy of ignoring the just
claims and decent dignity of the military commanders, which lost the
country some of its best officers and led directly to Arnold's treason.
His reasons, exactly contrary to his wont, were good abstract logic
but thorough practical nonsense.
In December, 1777, he was appointed commissioner to France to
succeed Silas Deane, and after being chased by an English man-of-
war (which he wanted to fight) arrived at Paris in safety. There
he reformed a very bad state of affairs; but thinking it absurd to
keep three envoys at one court (Dr. Franklin and Arthur Lee were
there before him), he induced Congress to abolish his office, and
returned in 1779. Chosen a delegate to the Massachusetts constitu-
tional convention, he was called away from it to be sent again to
France. There he remained as Franklin's colleague, detesting and
distrusting him and the French foreign minister, Vergerines, embroil-
ing himself with both and earning a cordial return of his warmest
dislike from both, till July, 1780. He then went to Holland as volun-
teer minister, and in 1782 was formally recognized as from an inde-
pendent nation. Meantime Vergennes intrigued with all his might to
have Adams recalled, and actually succeeded in so tying his hands
that half the advantages of independence would have been lost but
for his contumacious persistence. In the final negotiations for peace,
he persisted against his instructions in making the New England fish-
eries an ultimatum, and saved them. In 1783 he was commissioned
to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain, and in 1785 was
made minister to that power. The wretched state of American affairs
under the Confederation made it impossible to obtain any advantages
for his country, and the vindictive feeling of the English made his
life a purgatory, so that he was glad to come home in 1788.
In the first Presidential election of that year he was elected Vice-
President on the ticket with Washington; and began a feud with
Alexander Hamilton, the mighty leader of the Federalist party and
Chief organizer of our governmental machine, which ended in the
overthrow of the party years before its time, and had momentous
personal and literary results as well. He was as good a Federalist
as Hamilton, and felt as much right to be leader if he could; Hamil-
ton would not surrender his leadership, and the rivalry never ended


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JOHN ADAMS
129
till Hamilton's murder. In 1796 he was elected President against
Jefferson. His Presidency is recognized as one of the ablest and most
useful on the roll; but its personal memoirs are most painful and
scandalous. The cabinet were nearly all Hamiltonians, regularly laid
all the official secrets before Hamilton, and took advice from him to
thwart the President. They disliked Mr. Adams's overbearing ways
and obtrusive vanity, considered his policy destructive to the party
and injurious to the country, and felt that loyalty to these involved
and justified disloyalty to him. Finally his best act brought on an
explosion. The French Directory had provoked a war with this coun-
try, which the Hamiltonian section of the leaders and much of the
party hailed with delight; but showing signs of a better spirit, Mr.
Adams, without consulting his Cabinet, who he knew would oppose it
almost or quite unanimously, nominated a commission to frame a
treaty with France. The storm of fury that broke on him from his
party has rarely been surpassed, even in the case of traitors outright,
and he was charged with being little better. He was renominated
for President in 1800, but beaten by Jefferson, owing to the defections
in his own party, largely of Hamilton's producing. The Federalist
party never won another election; the Hamilton section laid its death
to Mr. Adams, and American history is hot with the fires of this
battle even yet.
Mr. Adams's later years were spent at home, where he was always
interested in public affairs and sometimes much too free in comments
on them; where he read immensely and wrote somewhat. He
heartily approved his son's break with the Federalists on the Em-
bargo. He died on the same day as Jefferson, both on the fiftieth
anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
As a writer, Mr. Adams's powers show best in the work which
can hardly be classed as literature, — his forcible and bitter political
letters, diatribes, and polemics. As in his life, his merits and defects
not only lie side by side, but spring from the same source, — his
vehemence, self-confidence, and impatience of obstruction. He writes
impetuously because he feels impetuously. With little literary grace,
he possesses the charm that belongs to clear and energetic thought
and sense transfused with hot emotion. John Fiske goes so far as to
say that “as a writer of English, John Adams in many respects sur-
passed all his American contemporaries. ” He was by no means with-
out humor, - a characteristic which shows in some of his portraits, —
and sometimes realized the humorous aspects of his own intense and
exaggerative temperament. His remark about Timothy Pickering,
that “under the simple appearance of a bald head and straight hair,
he conceals the most ambitious designs,” is perfectly self-conscious in
its quaint naiveté.
1-9


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130
JOHN ADAMS
His Life and Works,' edited by his grandson, Charles Francis
Adams, Sr. , in ten volumes, is the great storehouse of his writings.
The best popular account of his life is by John T. Morse, Jr. , in the
(American Statesmen ' series.
AT THE FRENCH COURT
From his Diary, June 7th, 1778, with his later comments in brackets
WENI
ENT to Versailles, in company with Mr. Lee, Mr. Izard
and his lady, Mr. Lloyd and his lady, and Mr. François.
Saw the grand procession of the Knights du Saint-Esprit,
or du Cordon Bleu. At nine o'clock at night, went to the grand
couvert, and saw the king, queen, and royal family, at supper;
had a fine seat and situation close by the royal family, and had
a distinct and full view of the royal pair.
[Our objects were to see the ceremonies of the knights, and
in the evening the public supper of the royal family. The
kneelings, the bows, and the courtesies of the knights, the
dresses and decorations, the king seated on his throne, his
investiture of a new created knight with the badges and orna-
ments of the order, and his majesty's profound and reverential
bow before the altar as he retired, were novelties and curiosities
to me, but surprised me much less than the patience and perse-
verance with which they all kneeled, for two hours together,
upon the hard marble of which the floor of the chapel was made.
The distinction of the blue ribbon was very dearly purchased at
the price of enduring this painful operation four times in a year.
The Count de Vergennes confessed to me that he was almost
dead with the pain of it. And the only insinuation I ever heard,
that the king was in any degree touched by the philosophy of
the age, was, that he never discovered so much impatience,
under any of the occurrences of his life, as in going through
those tedious ceremonies of religion, to which so many hours of
his life were condemned by the catholic church.
The queen was attended by her ladies to the gallery opposite
to the altar, placed in the centre of the seat, and there left alone
by the other ladies, who all retired. She was an object too
sublime and beautiful for my dull pen to describe. I leave this
enterprise to Mr. Burke. But in his description, there is more
of the orator than of the philosopher. Her dress was everything
that art and wealth could make it. One of the maids of honor


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JOHN ADAMS
131
a
told me she had diamonds upon her person to the value of
eighteen millions of livres; and I always thought her majesty
much beholden to her dress, Mr. Burke saw her probably but
once. I have seen her fifty times perhaps, and in all the varie-
ties of her dresses. She had fine complexion, indicating
perfect health, and was a handsome woman in her face and
figure. But I have seen beauties much superior, both in counte-
nance and form, in France, England, and America.
After the ceremonies of this institution are over, there is a
collection for the poor; and that this closing scene may be as
elegant as any of the former, a young lady of some of the first
families in France is appointed to present the box to the knights.
Her dress must be as rich and elegant, in proportion, as the
Queen's, and her hair, motions, and curtsies must have as much
dignity and grace as those of the knights. It was a curious
entertainment to observe the easy air, the graceful bow, and the
conscious dignity of the knight, in presenting his contribution;
and the corresponding ease, grace, and dignity of the lady, in
receiving it, were not less charming. Every muscle, nerve, and
fibre of both seemed perfectly disciplined to perform its func-
tions. The elevation of the arm, the bend of the elbow, and
every finger in the hand of the knight, in putting his louis d'ors
into the box appeared to be perfectly studied, because it was
perfectly natural. How much devotion there was in all this I
know not, but it was a consummate school to teach the rising
generation the perfection of the French air, and external polite-
ness and good-breeding. I have seen nothing to be compared
to it in any other country.
At nine o'clock we went and saw the king, queen, and royal
family, at the grand couvert. Whether M. François, a gentleman
who undertook upon this occasion to conduct us, had contrived a
plot to gratify the curiosity of the spectators, or whether the
royal family had a fancy to see the raw American at their
leisure, or whether they were willing to gratify him with a con-
venient seat, in which he might see all the royal family, and all
the splendors of the place, I know not; but the scheme could
not have been carried into execution, certainly, without the
orders of the king. I was selected, and summoned indeed, from
all my company, and ordered to a seat close beside the royal
family. The seats on both sides of the hall, arranged like the
seats in a theatre, were all full of ladies of the first rank and


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132
JOHN ADAMS
fashion in the kingdom, and there was no room or place for me
but in the midst of them. It was not easy to make room for
one more person. However, room was made, and I was situated
between two ladies, with rows and ranks of ladies above and
below me, and on the right hand and on the left, and ladies
only. My dress was a decent French dress, becoming the station
I held, but not to be compared with the gold, and diamonds,
and embroidery, about me. I could neither speak nor under
stand the language in a manner to support a conversation, but I
had soon the satisfaction to find it was a silent meeting, and
that nobody spoke a word but the royal family to each other,
and they said very little. The eyes of all the assembly were
turned upon me, and I felt sufficiently humble and mortified, for
I was not a proper object for the criticisms of such a company.
I found myself gazed at, as we in America used to gaze at the
sachems who came to make speeches to us in Congress; but I
thought it very hard if I could not command as much power of
face as one of the chiefs of the Six Nations, and therefore deter-
mined that I would assume a cheerful countenance, enjoy the
scene around me, and observe it as coolly as an astronomer con-
templates the stars. Inscriptions of Fructus Belli were seen on
the ceiling and all about the walls of the room, among paint-
ings of the trophies of war; probably done by the order of
Louis XIV. , who confessed in his dying hour, as his successor
and exemplar Napoleon will probably do, that he had been too
fond of war. The king was the royal carver for himself and all
his family. His majesty ate like a king, and made a royal
supper of solid beef, and other things in proportion.
took a large spoonful of soup, and displayed her fine person and
graceful manners, in alternately looking at the company in vari-
ous parts of the hall, and ordering several kinds of seasoning to
be brought to her, by which she fitted her supper to her taste. )
The queen
THE CHARACTER OF FRANKLIN
From Letter to the Boston Patriot, May 15th, 1811
RANKLIN had a great genius, original, sagacious, and inventive,
ments in the fine arts and the mechanic arts. He had a
vast imagination, equal to the comprehension of the greatest
objects, and capable of a cool and steady comprehension of them.


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133
He had wit at will. He had humor that when he pleased was
delicate and delightful. He had a satire that was good-natured
or caustic, Horace or Juvenal, Swift or Rabelais, at his pleasure.
He had talents for irony, allegory, and fable, that he could adapt
with great skill to the promotion of moral and political truth.
He was master of that infantine simplicity which the French call
naiveté, which never fails to charm in Phædrus and La Fontaine,
from the cradle to the grave. Had he been blessed with the
same advantages of scholastic education in his early youth, and
pursued a course of studies as unembarrassed with occupations
of public and private life as Sir Isaac Newton, he might have
emulated the first philosopher. Although I am not ignorant that
most of his positions and hypotheses have been controverted, I
cannot but think he has added much to the mass of natural
knowledge, and contributed largely to the progress of the human
mind, both by his own writings and by the controversies and
experiments he has excited in all parts of Europe. He had abil.
ities for investigating statistical questions, and in some parts of
his life has written pamphlets and essays upon public topics with
great ingenuity and success; but after my acquaintance with him,
which commenced in Congress in 1775, his excellence as a legis-
lator, a politician, or a negotiator most certainly never appeared.
No sentiment more weak and superficial was ever avowed by the
most absurd philosopher than some of his, particularly one that
he procured to be inserted in the first constitution of Pennsyl-
vania, and for which he had such a fondness as to insert it in
his will. I call it weak, for so it must have been, or hypocritical;
unless he meant by one satiric touch to ridicule his own republic,
or throw it into everlasting contempt.
I must acknowledge, after all, that nothing in life has morti.
fied or grieved me more than the necessity which compelled me
to oppose him so often as I have. He was a man with whom I
always wished to live in friendship, and for that purpose omitted
no demonstration of respect, esteem, and veneration in my power,
until I had unequivocal proofs of his hatred, for no other reason
under the sun but because I gave my judgment in opposition to
his in many points which materially affected the interests of our
country, and in many more which essentially concerned our
happiness, safety, and well-being. I could not and would not
sacrifice the clearest dictates of my understanding and the purest
principles of morals and policy in compliance to Dr. Franklin.


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134
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
( 1767-1848)
ate.
he chief distinction in character between John Adams and
his son is the strangest one imaginable, when one remem-
bers that to the fiery, combative, bristling Adams blood was
added an equal strain from the gay, genial, affectionate Abigail Smith.
The son, though of deep inner affections, and even hungering for good-
will if it would come without his help, was on the surface incom-
parably colder, harsher, and thornier than his father, with all the
socially repellent traits of the race and none of the softer ones. The
father could never control his tongue or his temper, and not always
his head; the son never lost the bridle of either, and much of his ter-
rible power in debate came from his ability to make others lose
theirs while perfectly keeping his own. The father had plenty of
warm friends and allies, - at the worst he worked with half a party;
the son in the most superb part of his career had no friends, no
allies, no party except the group of constituents who kept him in
Congress. The father's self-confidence deepened in the son to a soli-
tary and even contemptuous gladiatorship against the entire govern-
ment of the country, for long years of hate and peril. The father's
irritable though generous vanity changed in the son to
an icy
contempt or white-hot scorn of nearly all around him. The father's
spasms of acrimonious judgment steadied in the son to a constant
rancor always finding new objects. But only John Quincy Adams
could have done the work awaiting John Quincy Adams, and each of
his unamiable qualities strengthened his fibre to do it. And if a
man is to be judged by his fruits, Mr. Morse is justified in saying
that he was not only pre-eminent in ability and acquirements, but
more to be honored for profound, immutable honesty of pur-
pose, and broad, noble humanity of aims. ”
It might almost be said that the sixth President of the United
States was cradled in statesmanship. Born July uth, 1767, he was a
little lad of ten when he accompanied his father on the French miss-
ion. Eighteen months elapsed before he returned, and three months
later he was again upon the water, bound once more for the French
capital. There were school days in Paris, and other school days in
Amsterdam and in Leyden; but the boy was only fourteen, — the ma-
ture old child ! — when he went to St. Petersburg as private secretary
and interpreter to Francis Dana, just appointed minister plenipoten-
tiary to the court of the Empress Catherine. Such was his appren-
ticeship to a public career which began in earnest in 1794, and lasted,
even


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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
135
with slight interruptions, for fifty-four years. Minister to the United
Netherlands, to Russia, to Prussia, and to England; commissioner to
frame the Treaty of Ghent which ended the war of 1812; State Sen-
ator, United States Senator; Secretary of State, a position in which
he made the treaty with Spain which conceded Florida, and enun-
ciated the Monroe Doctrine before Monroe and far more thoroughly
than he; President, and then for many years Member of the National
House of Representatives, - it is strange to find this man writing in
his later years, “My whole life has been a succession of disappoint-
ments. I can scarcely recollect a single instance of success to any-
thing that I ever undertook. ”
It is true, however, that his successes and even his glories always
had some bitter ingredient to spoil their flavor. As United States
Senator he was practically boycotted,” for years, even by his own
party members, because he was an Adams. In 1807 he definitely
broke with the Federalist party- for what he regarded as its slavish
crouching under English outrages, conduct which had been for years
estranging him— by supporting Jefferson's Embargo, as better than
no show of resistance at all; and was for a generation denounced by
the New England Federalists as a renegade for the sake of office and
a traitor to New England. The Massachusetts Legislature practically
censured him in 1808, and he resigned.
His winning of the Presidency brought pain instead of pleasure:
he valued it only as a token of national confidence, got it only as
a minority candidate in a divided party, and was denounced by the
Jacksonians as a corrupt political bargainer. And his later Congress-
ional career, though his chief title to glory, was one long martyrdom
(even though its worst pains were self-inflicted), and he never knew
the immense victory he had actually won. The "old man eloquent,”
after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home
district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his
death. For a long time he bore the anti-slavery standard almost
alone in the halls of Congress, a unique and picturesque figure, rous-
ing every demon of hatred in his fellow-members, in constant and
envenomed battle with them, and more than a match for them all.
He fought single-handed for the right of petition as an indefeasible
right, not hesitating to submit a petition from citizens of Virginia
praying for his own expulsion from Congress as a nuisance. In 1836
he presented a petition from one hundred and fifty-eight ladies,
citizens of Massachusetts, "for, I said, I had not yet brought myself
to doubt whether females were citizens. " After eight years of per-
sistent struggle against the « Atherton gag law,” which practically
denied the right of petition in matters relating to slavery, he carried
a vote rescinding it, and nothing of the kind was again enacted. He


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136
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
had a fatal stroke of paralysis on the floor of Congress February
21st, 1848, and died two days later.
As a writer he was perspicuous, vigorous, and straightforward.
He had entered Harvard in the middle of the college course, and
been graduated with honors. He had then studied and practiced
law. He was Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard from
1806 to 1809, and was well drilled in the use of language, but was
too downright in his temper and purposes to spend much labor upon
artistic effects. He kept an elaborate diary during the greater part
of his life, - since published in twelve volumes of “Memoirs” by
his son Charles Francis Adams; a vast storehouse of material relat-
ing to the political history of the country, but, as published, largely
restricted to public affairs. He delivered orations on Lafayette, on
Madison, on Monroe, on Independence, and on the Constitution; pub-
lished essays on the Masonic Institution and various other matters;
a report on weights and measures, of enormous labor and permanent
value; Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory; a tale in verse on the Con-
quest of Ireland, with the title Dermot MacMorrogh'; an account of
Travels in Silesia; and a volume of Poems of Religion and Society. '
He had some facility in rhyme, but his judgment was not at fault in
informing him that he was not a poet. Mr. Morse says that “No
man can have been more utterly void of a sense of humor or an
appreciation of wit ”; and yet he very fairly anticipated Holmes in
his poem on (The Wants of Man,' and hits rather neatly a familiar
foible in the verse with which he begins Dermot MacMorrogh':-
«'Tis strange how often readers will indulge
Their wits a mystic meaning to discover;
Secrets ne'er dreamt of by the bard divulge,
And where he shoots a duck, will find a plover;
Satiric shafts from every line promulge,
Detect a tyrant where he draws a lover:
Nay, so intent his hidden thoughts to see,
Cry, if he paint a scoundrel —That means me. ) »
Selections from Letters and Memoirs used by permission of
J. B. Lippincott Company
LETTER TO HIS FATHER
(At the Age of Ten)
D
EAR SIR, - I love to receive letters very well; much better than
I love to write them. I make but a poor figure at compo-
sition, my head is too fickle, my thoughts are running after
birds eggs play and trifles, till I get vexed with myself. Mamma


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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
137
has a troublesome task to keep me steady, and I own I am
ashamed of myself. I have but just entered the third volume of
Smollett, tho' I had designed to have got it half through by this
time. I have determined this week to be more diligent, as Mr.
Thaxter will be absent at Court, and I cannot pursue my other
studies. I have Set myself a Stent and determine to read the 3rd
volume Half out. If I can but keep my resolution, I will write
again at the end of the week and give a better account of myself.
I wish, Sir, you would give me some instructions, with regard to
my time, and advise me how to proportion my Studies and my
Play, in writing, and I will keep them by me, and endeavor to
follow them. I am, dear Sir, with a present determination of
growing better, yours.
P. S. — Sir, if you will be so good as to favor me with a Blank
Book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurances I meet
with in my reading, which will serve to fix them upon my mind.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
(At the Age of Eighteen)
A "
PRIL 26TH, 1785. — A letter from Mr. Gerry of Feb.