I have read with attention your excellent report on the Battle of New Orleans, to be submitted to the Governor of Tennessee, in conjunction with the report of our commission on the subject. I have ventured to indicate by question marks in two or three places phrases or statements which I think could be changed to advantage. These, however, are merely questions of verbiage, not of fact. In point of fact, I think you have made a most interesting and important assemblage of the essential points to be considered in connection with the Battle of New Orleans, and have shown conclusively that the opinion so frequently expressed by historians, that the battle was unnecessary, is a sentimental inaccuracy which ought to be corrected. You have done a useful and important piece of work, and I congratulate you upon its completion. May I beg you to be good enough to favor me with a copy when the work is printed? I should like to prepare a review of it for one of our local newspapers. Yours very truly, John S. Kendall. _Details of Research_ Crusade Sword. Voltaire, French Cynic, Is Quoted as Saying That History Is Made Up of Lies Agreed Upon. Here Is One Almost Agreed Upon, Now Overhauled and Exposed. Louisiana Domain. The Louisiana spoken of in this volume refers to the great Louisiana Domain purchased by President Jefferson from France in 1803. That original Domain now comprehends all or most of sixteen states, as follows: Arkansas, Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming. CHAPTER I. An Interview Containing an Outline. It was the 8th of January. I sat down for lunch at a small table in a Nashville hotel. Presently the head waiter conducted to a seat opposite me a young man, seemingly about 22 years of age. He was a handsome, wholesome looking young man, and had an air of self-reliance. He impressed me at first sight as being a typical young American; at any rate he was decidedly attractive to the narrator, whose grey head could but reveal his advanced years. While awaiting the lunches, a casual remark about the weather opened conversation. A waiter brought an afternoon paper. On the front page was a picture of Andrew Jackson, and big headlines over accounts of celebrations in memory of the victory at New Orleans in 1815. The young man, with the superiority of youthful knowledge, exclaimed: