In 1816 Pétion named a commission to revise the constitution; the principal alterations were to elect a President for life and to add to the Senate a Chamber of Deputies. Pétion, however, did not long enjoy his new dignity; he died in 1818, at the early age of forty-eight, it is said of fever, but the opinion is still prevalent in Hayti that he died of weariness of life, brought on by the loss of all his illusions and the constant public and private annoyances to which he was subject. During his illness he is said to have refused all restoratives, and even to have rejected food. Pétion, though not a great man, sincerely loved his country, and devoted his energies to govern it well; but he was feeble in his measures, and from love of popularity allowed every kind of abuse to flourish in the financial administration. M. Robin, however, says truly that he was “the most popular and humane chief that Hayti ever possessed.” Boyer, through the energetic intervention of the military, was unanimously chosen by the Senate President of the republic, and commenced his long career as chief of the state in March 1818. Though he committed many faults, he appears to have been the most energetic and honest of the series of Haytian rulers. His first care was to establish order in the finances; and if his only errors were not to have erected a statue to his predecessor or founded an hospital for beggars, with which M. Robin appears to reproach him, his friends may still be permitted to admire him. Fortune, or rather his energy, everywhere favoured him. In 1819 he put down the long-neglected insurrection of Goman in the far west, and then prepared to move against King Henry, whose savage rule had alienated the affection even of his own guards. Struck down by apoplexy, the chief of the northern department was deserted by all, and sought refuge from anticipated indignities in suicide. The north almost unanimously determined to rejoin the rest of the republic, and Boyer marched on Cap Haïtien, to be received there with enthusiasm as the first President of United Hayti.