The condition of the United States in the year 1812 presented a striking and most favorable contrast to that which they had exhibited at Washington's accession. The population had increased from four to about seven and a half millions. The sixteen States over which Washington presided had swelled to eighteen. Ohio and Louisiana had been admitted to the circle. But this was by no means the limit to territorial acquisition. It was President Jefferson who added to the domain of the Union that vast and fertile tract which is even now in rapid process of settlement, and which was known as the Louisiana purchase. This tract reached from the banks of the Mississippi to the base of the Rocky Mountains. It embraced nearly a million square miles, or more than the whole of the area of the Union as it then was; and fifteen millions of dollars were paid to France in exchange for it. A great invention had been put into practical operation during Jefferson's term. This was the steamboat. Robert Fulton put the _Clermont_ upon the Hudson in 1807; and thenceforth navigation by steam was to play a great part in the commerce and economical progress of the land. [Sidenote: Inventions.] [Sidenote: Causes of the War.] President Madison, who assumed the executive chair in 1809, inherited a quarrel with Great Britain from his predecessor, which soon ripened into war. The great contest which raged between France and Great Britain early in the century could not but affect the rest of the civilized world. American commerce had already grown into importance, and was now seriously crippled by the arbitrary course respecting trade adopted by both of the belligerents. Each power forbade neutral nations to trade with its foe. But while Napoleon followed the example of Pitt in making a decree to this effect, the bearing of Great Britain towards this country, in respect to the prohibition of trade, was far more arrogant and vexatious than that of France. American ships were captured on the high seas by British men-of-war, carried into port, adjudged, and confiscated. [Sidenote: The Right of Search.] A still more serious assault upon our national honor was made by the British government. It claimed the right to search American vessels for British seamen, and proceeded to execute it. Thus sailors were taken from our ships by the hundred; and, on one occasion, an American ship, the _Chesapeake_, was fired upon and forcibly boarded by a British man-of-war, within sight of the Virginia coast. For a while retaliation was attempted in the shape of an embargo upon American vessels; but this was soon found to tend to the utter extitinction of our commerce, and the embargo was abandoned. Remonstrance with Great Britain proved to be of no avail. The English ministry at that time was a strict Tory one, and far from friendly in disposition toward the United States. Despite the protests of our envoy, the practice of search was vigorously pursued. [Sidenote: War Declared.]