{349}in the Chesapeake, and beyond the western edge of civilization; before the defences of Baltimore and New Orleans, and in the waters of the South Pacific. And her expeditions had been especially fatal to their commanders: Gen. Brock had fallen at Queenstown, Gen. Tecumseh at the Thames, Ross and Sir Peter Parker before Baltimore, Pakenham and Gibbs at New Orleans, with many of lower rank but hardly less responsibility; while seven commanders of her men-of-war--Lambert, Downie, Dickenson, Manners, Peake, Barrette, and Blythe--had all died on their bloody decks. But by her sacrifice of life and property she had gained absolutely nothing. She had not acquired an inch of territory, or established any principle of international law, or purchased for herself any new privilege, or secured any old one. The war had cost the United States a hundred million dollars in money, and thirty thousand lives; and a large portion of both the money and the lives had been squandered, when with ordinary skill and care they might have been saved. But she had something to show for it. If she had not fully relieved her from tier of the atrocities of the Indians, she had at least cut off their supplies from British sources, and possessed herself of all the western posts; she had put an end to the systematic violation of her rights on {350}the ocean, and in so doing had demonstrated the superiority of American seamanship; she had completely established her national independence. It is to be hoped that no American youth who reads this little history will cherish any feeling of resentment or hatred toward the people whose fathers were so grievously unjust to ours. The day for that--if ever there was a day for it--has gone completely by. England has evidently passed the zenith of her power and glory; America is still rising toward hers, and how great she shall ultimately become, will be measured mainly by the breadth and generosity of the American mind. In the past sixty years we have lived down the most celebrated sneer in history. Five years after this war, the Rev. Sydney Smith wrote in the _Edinburgh Review_: "In the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American book? or goes to an American play? or looks at an American picture or statue? What does the world yet owe to American physicians or surgeons? What new substances have their chemists discovered, or what old ones have they analyzed? What new constellations have been discovered by the telescopes of Americans? What have they done in mathematics? Who drinks out of American glasses, or eats from American plates, or wears American coats or gowns, or sleeps in {351}American blankets? Finally, under which of the old tyrannical governments of Europe is every sixth man a slave, whom his fellow citizens may buy and sell and torture?" If Mr. Smith were now living, he might be answered--if it were worth while to answer him at all--that the most widely circulated of all novels was written by