Soon after his marriage, Lieutenant Perry was invited by Commodore Decatur to join him on the _President_. In this ship, nearly rebuilt, with a crew of over four hundred picked sailors, most of them tall and robust native Americans, the “Bayard of the seas” expected to make a voyage to the East Indies. Unfortunately, seized with a severe fit of sickness, Perry was obliged to leave the ship, and in eager anticipation of speedy departure, Decatur appointed another lieutenant in his place. The bitter pill of disappointment proved, for Perry, good medicine. Owing to the vigor of the blockade, the _President_ did not get away until January 15, 1815, and then only to be captured by superior force. In answer to an application for service, Matthew Perry was ordered to Warren, R. I., to recruit for the brig _Chippewa_. Meanwhile, negotiations for ending the war had begun, starting from offers of mediation by Russia. With the allies occupying Paris, and Napoleon exiled to Elba, there was little chance of “peace with honor” for the United States. The war party in England were even inquiring for some Elba in which to banish Madison. “The British government was free to settle accounts with the upstart people whose ships had won more flags from her navy, in two years, than all her European rivals had done in a century.” One of the first moves was to dispatch Packenham, with Wellington’s veterans, to lay siege to New Orleans, with the idea of gaining nine points of the law. From Patterson and Jackson, they received what they least expected. Before Perry’s work at Warren fairly began, the British ship _Favorite_, bearing the olive branch, arrived at New York, February 11, 1815. It was too late to save the bloody battle of New Orleans, or the capture of the _Cyane_ and _Levant_. The treaty of Ghent had been signed December 3, 1813; but neither steam nor electricity were then at hand to forefend ninety days of war. The navy, from the year 1815, was kept up on a war footing; and, for three years, the sum of two millions of dollars was appropriated to this arm of the service. Commodore Porter, eager to improve and expand our commerce, conceived the project of a voyage of exploration around the world. The plan embraced an extended visit to the islands of the Pacific, the north-west coast of America, Japan and China. The expedition was to consist of several vessels of war. The project of this first American expeditionary voyage fell stillborn, and was left to slumber until Matthew Perry and John Rodgers accomplished more than its purpose.