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was placed at the discretion of the Admiralty Courts of England, and a still greater amount was submitted to the French Council of Prizes, or Council of State. In this situation an Act of Congress was passed, by which no vessel was allowed either to leave or enter the American ports. This embargo was a necessary measure, to put an end to the seizure and confiscation of property,-to recall the ships and seamen, and prevent them from being employed abroad in the licensed trade.

The distress felt in America, in consequence of these prohibitions, was very great; insomuch, that she made an attempt to regain, by an amicable settlement with France or England, the commercial freedom which she once enjoyed. To France she proposed to re-establish her commerce on such a footing, that Britain should not share in the benefit to be derived from it; and she hinted, that if the peaceful communication between the two countries should be interrupted by England, that then she would join in the war against her. To Britain she proposed, if she would agree to rescind her orders in council, to repeal her embargo, and also to shut her ports against France, provided France persisted in her hostile decrees.

France declared that the decrees of Berlin and Milan were repealed, but the American commerce in France was impeded in various ways. The introduction of colonial articles was prohibited, and vessels arriving with the productions of the United States were subject to exorbitant duties, tedious examinations, and forced exportations. Great Britain, therefore, doubted the fact of the repeal of those decrees, and refused to revoke or modify her orders in council, and the act of commercial non-intercourse was enforced against her.

The temper of the government in the United States, at the commencement of the year 1812, rendered it evident that nothing could prevent extremities with Great Britain, except the repeal, by the latter, of its orders in council, or a dread in the former of entering into a very hazardous contest, with a prospect of much domestic discontent. The spring passed in the discussion of various measures of preparation by the

Congress, in which the war party displayed a manifest preponderance.

An act for an embargo on all the shipping of the United States, for the term of ninety days from its date, passed the Congress in the beginning of April; the purpose of which was to expedite the fitting out of the American ships of war, and to prevent any more pledges from remaining in the power of an enemy on the commencement of hostilities. The result of the discussions in Congress was an act passed on the 18th June, declaring the actual existence of war between the United States and Great Britain.

With the view of putting an end to the war, Russia, in August, 1813, had proffered her mediation, which was accepted by the United States, but declined by England. This power, however, afterwards proposed to treat directly with the American government; and, in consequence of this, the American plenipotentiaries, then at St. Petersburgh, repaired first to Gottenburgh, and afterwards to Ghent. Here, after some months of negotiation, a treaty was signed on the 24th December, 1814. In this treaty the parties mutually agreed that certain disputed boundaries should be settled by a commission, that peace should be made with the Indian tribes, and that the treaty should become binding four months after its ratification. On the original ground of dispute between the parties, nothing is said; the cessation of hostilities in Europe having changed the circumstances out of which the war arose, neither party felt itself under the necessity of discussing the claims for which it took up arms. The treaty, after being submitted to Congress, was ratified by the President, on the 17th of February, 1815.

We have thus briefly sketched the principal events connected with the declaration of war against Great Britain, as they were the immediate cause of the investment of capital, hitherto employed in commerce, in iron works and other manufactures. To protect the capital thus invested, heavy duties were fixed on the foreign manufactures, so that they amounted almost to a prohibition of the English bariron.

The restrictive commercial regulations of Europe, and the late war with England, gave a great stimulus to American manufactures, and their progress during the course of a few years was almost incredible. Many new branches were introduced, and those which had been already established were carried to a much greater extent. The principal cause of the neglect of manufactures, formerly, was the great profits afforded by agriculture, with the high price of labour. All the materials for manufactures are found in America. Fuel is inexhaustible; the ores of the most useful metals are in great abundance. In the year 1809, the Secretary of the Treasury unfolded the resources of the country, in relation to the raw material, and proposed various means for the promotion of manufactures, - protecting and prohibitory duties, drawbacks, premiums, bounties, encouragement to new inventions, arrangements for facilitating pecuniary remittances, &c.

The immense capital which had been employed in commerce, previously to the restrictions, was transferred to manufactures, and workshops, mills, and machinery for the fabrication of various commodities, were erected as if by enchantment. Foreign artists and tradesmen were encouraged to settle in the country. The implements, tools, and even the furniture of emigrant mechanics, were made free of duty. In Pennsylvania such persons were admitted as freeholders on the day of their arrival, provided they declared their intention of becoming citizens within the time prescribed by law. A knowledge of machinery, and processes for the saving of labour, were communicated, through the daily journals, to all descriptions of people. Mineralogy became an object of attention, and every district was ransacked for useful minerals.

In 1810, M. Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, presented to Congress a report on the manufactures, in which, amongst many other branches, iron, and the manufactures of iron, are mentioned as being firmly established

supplying, in several instances, the greater, and, in all, a considerable portion of the consumption of the United States. "The furnaces, forges, and bloomeries, of the United States amount to 530, of which the State of New York furnishes

sixty-nine. The annual value of iron and its manufactures is estimated at 12,000,000 or 15,000,000 of dollars. The average value of imported metal, in bar-iron and steel, at 4,000,000 dollars. The Franconia Iron Works, in New Hampshire, established in 1810, employ a capital of 100,000 dollars. The Vergennes Iron Works, in Vermont, promise to be very important. The price of bar-iron at this establishment is 140 dollars per ton, the ore three dollars, charcoal four dollars and a half per 100 bushels: 19,000 muskets are annually made at the two public armories of Springfield and Harper's Ferry. There is now a considerable surplus

of small arms.'

Some of the ores of iron are found in every State in the Union; and, about the period of M. Gallatin's report, mines of this metal were worked in New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, New York*, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina.

According to the "Statistical Annals of the United States," by Adam Seybert, founded on official documents, the manu

*Fulton's first steamboat was launched at New York the 3rd October 1807. There is a most interesting account of Fulton's experiments, and the introduction of steam navigation, in Baines's History of Liverpool, Chap. 17. Paley, speaking of our discoveries, or rather our projects, which turn out to be imitations of nature, says: "Some years ago, a plan was suggested of producing propulsion by reaction in this way: by the force of a steam-engine, a stream of water was to be shot out of the stern of a boat, the impulse of which stream upon the water in the river was to push the boat itself forward; it is, in truth, the principle by which skyrockets ascend in the air. Of the use or practicability of the plan, I am not speaking; nor is it my concern to praise its ingenuity; but it is certainly a contrivance. Now, if naturalists are to be believed, it is exactly the device which nature has made use of for the motion of some species of aquatic insects. The larva of the dragon-fly, according to Adams, swims by ejecting water from its tail; is driven forward by the reaction of water in the pool, upon the current issuing in a direction backward from its body."-Nat. Theo.

In a work entitled "Spiritalia seu Pneumatica," it is recorded that Hero of Alexandria constructed a machine 120 years B. C., which was worked by the mechanical force of steam, or the vapour of water. A hollow globe or ball was placed upon pivots, upon which it was made to revolve. Steam was communicated to the globe through a tube from the boiler. This steam filled the globe, and also the hollow arms which were fixed thereon, like the spokes of a wheel; a lateral orifice at the side end of each arm allowed the steam to escape in a jet, and the pressure with which the steam escaped caused the arms and the globe with the axis to rotate in the opposite direction. By the rotation of the globe and axis, a pulley fixed on the axis was capable of communicating motion by

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facture of iron in the year 1810 was as follows:-153 furnaces, making 53,908 tons of iron; 330 forges, making 24,541 tons of bar-iron; 316 trip hammers; 34 rolling and slitting mills, which required 6500 tons of iron; 410 nailiries, in which 15,727,914 lbs. of nails had been made.* Manufacture of iron, value 14,364,526 dollars.

A commercial treaty between Great Britain and the United States was signed on the 3rd of July, 1815, to remain in force during four years, according to which each country was to enjoy reciprocal freedom of commerce. No higher duties to be imposed than those which extend to all other nations, in relation to articles imported and exported; and the vessels which carry them to be subject to the same duties and entitled to the same bounties.

Duties payable by law on iron imported into the United States of America, commencing on the 30th June, 1816

Iron bars and bolts, excepting iron manufactured by rolling Iron bars and bolts, when manufactured by rolling, and on anchors

Iron, cast, and all manufactures of which iron is the material of chief value

45c. per cwt.

- 1 dol. 50c.

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- 20 per cent. ad val.

In the year 1818 an alteration was made in the tariff of the United States; and, again, in 1824, to come into operation on the 1st July of that year; and, in the year 1828, a still further alteration was made, particularly affecting British iron -it commenced on the 1st September.†

The following statement shows the rate of duty at the

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means of a belt to any machinery attached. This is an application of the principle mentioned by Paley, and is identical with that of the rotatory engine. * Mr. Perkins, of Newbury Port, invented a machine for cutting nails, by means of which 200,000 may be cut in a day.

† Previous to the settlement of the tariff of 1828, a committee was appointed by Congress to examine into and take evidence respecting the state of the home manufacturers,

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