While war and misery reigned in the eastern part of the Mediterranean, commerce with the north African nations was rapidly obliterating the memories of piracy and reprisal, which had once made Berber scimeter and Yankee cutlass cross. Peace and friendship were assiduously cultivated, and our officers were received with marked kindness and attention. Our three little wars with the Moslems of the Mediterranean, from 1794 to 1797, from 1801 to 1804, and in 1815, seem at this day incredible and dream-like. In view of the Bey of Tunis, on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln sending a special envoy to express sympathy, and presenting his portrait to the State Department, and at the Centennial Exposition joining with us; and of Algeria being now the play ground of travelers, one must acknowledge that a mighty change has passed over the spirit of the Berbers since this century opened. Sickness broke out on the big ship _North Carolina_, and at one time four lieutenants and one-hundred and twenty-five men were down with small-pox and catarrh. The wretchedness of the weather at first allowed little abatement of the trouble, but under acting Master Commandant Perry’s vigorous and persistent hygienic measures, including abundant fumigation, the scourge was checked. His methods were very obnoxious to some of the officers and crew, but were indispensable to secure a clean bill of health. The commodore wrote from Malta, February 14th, 1827, that the condition of the ship’s people had greatly improved. The balmy spring breezes brought recuperation. The ship, clean and in splendid condition, was ready to sail homewards. The boatswain’s call, so welcome and always heard with a thrill of delight—“All hands up anchor for home,”—was sounded on the 31st of May. The _North Carolina_, leaving behind her classic waters, moved towards “the free hearts’ hope and home.” The old weather-beaten hulk that now lies in the Wallabout is the same old _North Carolina_. What a change from glory to dry rot! It came to pass that the American line-of-battle ships, while the most showy, were also the most unsatisfactory class of ships in our navy. They all ended their days as store ships or as firewood. “The naval mind of the United States could not work well in old world harness.” ----- [5] See description in the novel _Trafalgar_, New York, 1885. CHAPTER X. THE CONCORD IN THE SEAS OF RUSSIA AND EGYPT. THE stormy administration of Andrew Jackson, which began in 1829, and the vigorous foreign policy which he inaugurated, or which devolved upon him to follow up, promised activity if not glory for the navy. The boundary question with England, and the long-standing claims for French spoliations prior to 1801, also pressed for solution.