Clair, whose ill health disabled him from performing the active duties of commander, determined to withdraw from the field the remnant of his troops. The instant that the directions to retire were given, a disorderly flight commenced. Fortunately for the survivers, the victorious Indians were soon recalled from pursuit to the camp, by their avidity for plunder; and the vanquished continued their retreat unmolested to the frontier settle

ments.

36. In this battle, the numbers engaged on each side were supposed to be equal. Of the whites, the slaughter was almost beyond example. Six hundred and thirty were killed and missing, and two hundred and sixty were wounded-a loss which proves at once the obstinacy of the defence, and the bravery of the assailants. On receiving information of this disaster, congress, resolving to prosecute the war with increased vigor, made provision for augmenting, by enlistment, the military force of the nation to 5000 men.

37. In the autumn of 1792, general Washington was again unanimously elected president of the American republic, and in March, 1793, was inducted into office. Mr. Adams was reelected vice-president, in opposition to George Clinton, of NewYork. In the progress of these elections, but little party feeling was exhibited; the repose of society was not disturbed, but the citizens raised to posts of the highest honor those whom their judgments and affections designated as the most worthy.

38. While the Americans, with but little alloy, were enjoying, under a government of their own choice, the blessings of independence and freedom, the people of France, by whose aid these blessings had been acquired, were experiencing all the miseries of anarchy. Grievously oppressed by institutions originating in times of ignorance and barbarism, they had risen in the majesty of physical strength, and declared their determination to be free. Against a whole people, aroused by their sufferings to demand their rights, what effectual resistance can be opposed? Before their energetic exertions, prompted by enthusiasm and directed by fatal skill, their ancient government crumbled to the dust. 39. Passing at once from abject slavery to entire liberty, their conduct was marked by the most shocking excesses. The mild virtues of their king, alleviating but slightly the evils of despotism, could not save him from that resentment which consigned to indiscriminate destruction the hereditary orders. Himself, his queen, and many thousands of the nobility and clergy, suffered death on the scaffold. A new government was instituted, having, for its fundamental principle, the universal

equality of man. Its form was often changed, and the reins of authority were successively but unsteadily, held by the temporary favorites of an unenlightened and capricious people.

40. The Americans could not regard with indifference this struggle of their allies for freedom. They considered their excesses as the first effects of sudden relief from oppression, and hoped that experience would produce sobriety of conduct and reverence for law. They hailed the French revolution as the offspring of their own, and cherished the flattering expecta tion that, by the diffusion of the principles of liberty, the whole civilized world would become partakers of its blessings.

41. The French people, at the same time, regarded the Americans as their brethren, bound to them by the ties of gratitude; and when the kings of Europe, dreading the establishment of republicanism in her borders, assembled in arms to restore monarchy to France, they looked across the Atlantic for sympathy and assistance. The new government, recalling the minister whom the king had appointed, despatched the citizen Genet, of ardent temper and a zealous republican, to supply his place. In April, 1793, he arrived at Charleston, in South-Carolina, where he was received, by the governor and the citizens, in a manner expressive of their warm attachment to his country, and their cordial approbation of the change in her institutions.

42. Flattered by his reception, and presuming that the nation and the government were actuated by similar feelings, he assumed the authority of expediting privateers from that port to cruise against the vessels of nations who were enemies to France, but at peace with the United States, a procedure forbidden by the laws of nations, and derogatory to the government of the country. Notwithstanding this illegal assumption of power, he received, on his journey to Philadelphia, extravagant marks of public attachment; and, on his arrival there," crowds flocked from every avenue of the city to meet the republican ambassador of an allied nation." Intoxicated by these continued and increased demonstrations of regard, he persisted in forming and executing schemes of hostility against the enemies of France.

43. The British minister complained to the president, who, by the unanimous advice of his cabinet, directed Mr. Jefferson, the secretary of state, to lay before the minister of France the principles which would regulate the conduct of the executive in relation to the powers at war. These principles forbade the course which Mr. Genet had pursued. Relying on the popularity of his nation, he attempted, by insolent and offensive declar

ations, to drive the president from the ground he had taken. He threatened to appeal from the government to the people, a measure which other agents of the French republic had adopted with success in Europe. Here the result was different. The people rallied around rulers, having the same interest as themselves. The minister was abandoned by most of his friends; his government, at the request of the president, annulled his powers; and fearing to return, he remained in the country, a striking example of the imbecility of a factious individual among a people confiding in their rulers, and contented with their lot.

44. This conduct of Mr. Genet, the atrocities committed by the French people, and the dreaded danger of their example, alienated from them many of the citizens of the United States, especially those belonging to the federal party. And as the world was then agitated by the mighty contest between France and Great Britain-a contest which permitted not neutrality of feeling-those who became hostile to the former became naturally the friends of the latter. To her they were besides attracted by identity of origin, by resemblance of institutions, by similarity of language, by community of laws, of literature, and of religion.

45. The republicans retained an unabated affection for the French, whose services they remembered with gratitude, and whose struggles for freedom, against the league of European tyrants, engaged all their sympathy. Over these two parties Washington, admitting no thought but for his own country, watched with anxious solicitude, striving to restrain their aberrations, and to temper their mutual animosities.

46. After the defeat of St. Clair by the Indians, in 1791, general Wayne was appointed to cominand the American forces. Taking post near the country of the enemy, he made assiduous and long protracted endeavors to negotiate a peace. Failing in these, he marched against them, at the head of three thousand men. On the 20th of August, 1794, an action took place in the vicinity of one of the British garrisons, on the banks of the Miami. A rapid and vigorous charge roused the savages from their coverts, and they were driven more than two miles at the point of the bayonet. Broken and dismayed, they fled without renewing the combat. Their houses and cornfields were destroyed, and forts were erected on the sites of the towns laid waste. In 1795, a treaty was concluded at Grenville, which, long and faithfully observed, gave peace and security to the frontier inhabitants, permitting the abundant population of the eastern states

to spread, with astonishing rapidity, over the fertile region northwest of the Ohio.

47. The tax which had been imposed upon spirits distilled within the country, bearing heavily upon the people in the western counties of Pennsylvania, produced there disaffection and disturbance. All excise taxes, of which this was one, being considered hostile to liberty, great exertions were made to excite the public resentment against those who should willingly pay it, and especially against the officers appointed to collect it. In September, 1791, a large meeting of malcontents was held at Pittsburgh, at which resolutions, encouraging resistance to the laws, were passed; and subsequently other meetings were held, at which similar resolutions were adopted. Committees of correspondence were also appointed to give unity of system to their measures, and to increase the number of their associates.

48. A proclamation of the president, exhorting all persons to desist from illegal combinations, and calling on the magistrates to execute the laws, was disregarded. The marshall of the state, while serving processes upon delinquents and offenders, was resisted and fired upon. The inspector of the revenue, dreading the indignation of the populace, procured a small detachment of soldiers to guard his house. These were attacked by a body of five hundred insurgents, who, setting fire to several contiguous buildings, obliged the soldiers to leave the house, and deliver themselves up. Several individuals, zealous in supporting the government, were ordered to quit the country and compelled to obey. An intention was openly avowed of forcibly resisting the general government with the view of extorting a repeal of the offensive laws. The effective strength of the insurgents was computed at seven thousand men.

In

49. The president, conceiving himself bound by the most so lemn obligations, " to take care that the laws be faithfully executed," determined to call out a part of the militia of Pennsylvania, and the adjacent states, to suppress this insurrection. the autumn of 1794, fifteen thousand were detached, and being placed under the command of governor Lee, of Virginia, were marched into the disaffected counties. The strength of this army rendering resistance desperate, none was offered, and no blood was shed. A few of the most active leaders were seized and detained for legal prosecution. The great body of the insurgents on submission were pardoned, as were also the leaders, after trial and conviction of treason. The government acquired the respect of the people, by this exertion of its force, and their affection, by this display of its lenity.

50. Since the peace of 1783, Great Britain and the United States, had each incessantly complained that the other had viola ted the stipulations contained in the treaty. The former was accused of having carried away negroes at the close of the revolutionary war; and of retaining in her possession certain military posts situated in the western wilderness, and within the limits of the United States, in consequence of which the Americans were deprived of their share of the fur trade, and the Indians incited to make incursions upon the frontier settlements. The latter were accused of preventing the loyalists from regaining possession of their estates, and British subjects from recovering debts contracted before the commencement of hostilities.

51. For the purpose of adjusting these mutual complaints, and also of concluding a commercial treaty, Mr. Adams, in 1785, was appointed minister to London. Great Britain, aware that the articles of confederation did not authorize congress to bind the states by a commercial treaty, declined then to negotiate. After the constitution was ratified, ministers were interchanged, and the discussion was prosecuted with no little acrimony and zeal.

52. In 1794, Mr. Jay being then minister from the United States, a treaty was concluded, which, in the spring of the next year was laid before the senate. That body advised the president to ratify it, on condition that an alteration should be made in one of the articles. Its contents having, in the mean time, been disclosed, the republican party exclaimed, in intemperate language, against most of the stipulations it contained. The partisans of France swelled the cry of condemnation. Public meetings were held in various parts of the union, at which resolutions were passed expressing warm disapprobation of the treaty, and an earnest wish that the president would withhold his ratification. Such appeared to be the wish of a great majority of the people.

53. General Washington, believing that an adjustment of differences would conduce to the prosperity of the republic, and that the treaty before him was the best that could, at that time, be obtained, gave it his assent, in defiance of popular clamor. So great was the confidence reposed, by the people, in their beloved chief-magistrate, that the public sentiment began immediately to change. The friends of the treaty not only increased in numbers, but gained courage to speak in its defence. And during the summer of 1795, the nation was agitated by a zealous and animated discussion of its merits.

54. At the next session of congress, it became a subject of consideration in the house of representatives. The treaty, its