Mr Jackson retired from the city of Washington to New York, Nov. 13. first expressing, through Mr Oakley, the secretary of legation, his regret that he should be compelled to do so. The charge, however, at which offence had been taken he again repeated and justified. "One of the facts alluded to," Mr Oakley said, "has been admitted by the secretary of state himself, namely, that the three conditions forming the substance of Mr Erskine's original instructions, were submitted to him by that gentleman. The other, namely, that that instruction is the only one in which the conditions were prescribed to Mr Erskine for the conclusion of an arrangement on the matter, is known to Mr Jackson by the instructions which he has himself received. In stating these facts, and in adhering to them as his duty im periously enjoined him to do, he could not imagine that offence could be taken at it by the American government, as most certainly none could be intended on his part; but having now been informed that no farther communication will be received from him, he has no alternative, consistent with what is due to the King's dignity, but to withdraw from the seat of the American government, and wait the arrival of his Majesty's commands upon the unlooked-for turn which has been given to his affairs in this country.

At this time the insolence of the French faction, encouraged by the apparent probability of those direct hostilities between the two countries, which it was their object to provoke, displayed itself in open violence. Several of our officers, who had offered no provocation, were insulted in the town of Hampton, and violently assaulted, so as to be put in imminent

danger: and Mr Jackson found it indispensable for his own safety, and that of his family and the gentlemen attached to the mission, to call upon the American government for special passports or safeguards; this, he said, was the more necessary, because some of the newspapers of the United States were daily using language, of which the only tendency could be to excite the people to commit violence upon his person. Fortunately for Mr Jackson, his personal safety was secured by the known power of Great Britain, for otherwise the conduct of the government was such as seemed to afford him little security. The president, at the open- Nov. 27. ing of Congress, brought a direct charge against England of breach of faith in disavowing Mr Erskine's arrangement; and in referring to the affair of the Chesapeake, called it a murderous aggression,-a phrase which Mr Smith also used about the same time, in one of his published dispatches to the American minister at London. Resolutions were brought into the House of Representatives, that the executive government, in breaking off all communication with Mr Jackson, had manifested a just regard to its own dignity and honour, as well as to the character and interests of the American people, and the Congress solemnly pledged itself to stand by and support the executive government upon this point, and, if necessary, to call into action the whole force of the nation to repel such insults as had been offered by the British minister. An act was also brought in,expressly levelled at Mr Jackson, under the title of "A Bill to prevent the Abuse of the Privileges and Immunities enjoyed by Foreign Ministers while in the United States." It empower

ed the president, upon any just occasion given, to issue a warrant for enforcing the departure of any ambassador, minister, or other person, taking due precautions to avoid improper or unnecessary violence in executing such warrant.

The difference of the president's feelings towards Buonaparte and England was strongly marked in the manner in which he mentioned France, in that same speech wherein he spoke of our murderous aggressions. "With France," he said, "the other belligerent, whose trespasses on their com mercial rights had long been the subject of just remonstrance, the posture of their relations did not correspond with the measures taken on the part of the United States to effect a favourable change." The French Admiral Willaumez, indeed, had forcibly taken four French deserters out of an American ship,-the fact was related in the American newspapers, and yet it was not even complained of, nor once alluded to among the trespasses which were the subject of remonstrance. American subjects seized under the Berlin decree were starving in French prisons. General Armstrong, then ambassador at Paris, regretted that he could do nothing for them at present, and assured them that he would lose no opportunity of restoring them to their country. This was all the redress they could obtain from him, and their captivity and sufferings were never enumerated by their govern. ment among the trespasses which were the subject of remonstrance. The Americans at Paris were equally insensible to all outrages and acts of tyranny on the part of Buonaparte. At their anniversary of the independence of the United States, a standard was carried, bearing this inscrip.

tion, "Liberty of Navigation for Neutrals, or War with England;" and in the hall where they dined, France and America were represented as reposing together in the Temple of Peace, with England at their feet! the American ambassador and legation being present, and sanctioning these insults to Great Britain. The French government did not fail to profit by the disavowal of Mr Erskine's arrangement; they renewed their negociations with General Armstrong, urging him to accede to the system by which France was aiming to recover the liberty of the seas. But however desirous the more infatuated, or more corrupt, partizans of Buonaparte in the United States might be of instigating their country to hostilities against Great Britain, this was a measure too obviously ruinous to be ventured upon at present, even by the existing government, and there was yet a numerous party in the Northern States who understood their real interest. Resolutions were past by the legislature of Massachusetts, condemning the conduct of the executive general government with respect to Mr Jackson, showing that the object of France was, by instigating a war between England and America, to recover possession of Canada, and declaring their own persuasion that no just cause existed for a rupture with Great Britain; but that they deemed it their duty to use all the means in their power for allaying the existing irritations, and preparing the way for the restoration of a friendly intercourse between two nations, whose interests were in so many points essenially united.

The immediate object of France, in exciting America to hostilities with England, was clearly seen by the

New-Englanders, and they saw also that it was the design of that insatiable government, after it had used the United States as a means of recovering Canada, then to add the country of their allies to their empire. The views by which the American go. vernment could be bribed to a conduct so inconsistent with its own real interest, were not so apparent; but they began to develope themselves. A minister was sent from Spain to America in the name of Ferdinand 7th., and the president refused to acknowledge him, saying, he could receive no minister from Spain while that country remained in its present

unsettled state. He assured him at the same time, that no minister would be received from Joseph Buonaparte. Had there been nothing more in this than the avowal that America, regardless of all other rights, waited to acknowledge the right of the strongest, it would have been sufficiently disgraceful to her rulers. The events of the ensuing year discovered that there was a secret understanding between her and France upon this point, and that while the president thus affected impartiality, he was, in fact, making arrangements for secu ring a part of the colonial spoils of Spain.

THE north of Europe presented but a mournful prospect at the beginning of the year. The people of Denmark, however strongly and indignantly they must have resented the attack upon Copenhagen, felt far more fear and hatred of their tyrannical allies than of the English, their unwilling enemies. The contrast between the Spanish and French troops who had been quartered upon them produced a striking effect. The Spaniards cheerfully paid for whatever they desired to have beyond the ordinary allowance, and never behaved arrogantly towards the men nor improperly towards the women; while the French, carrying their system of free quarters into whatever country was cursed with their presence, rioted at the expence of their hosts, and in sulted the wives and daughters of the Danes before their eyes with gross indecency. The people, therefore, dreaded nothing so much as these allies, and they looked on with melancholy forebodings to the consequences of the unnatural connection between Denmark and France. But the temper of the court was altogether

The

different. Mortified that the plans which they had formed in concert with Buonaparte against this country had been frustrated, taking advantage too of the manner in which this had been done, to justify themselves, perhaps even to their own hearts, for the preposterous and ruinous policy in which they were involved, they pursued the war with a spirit of inveterate enmity that scrupled at no hostile act, however disgraceful. Hence Denmark was the first power to acknowledge the intruder Joseph as King of Spain, and even engaged in hostilities against Romana's army, and detained such of his troops in prison as could not effect their escape. Hence also the court entered eagerly into all the schemes of France for ruining our commerce. The king complained both to the French and Dutch governments, that vessels were in the practice of clearing from Rus. sia, and passing the Sound under Dutch colours, though they were notoriously bound for England; and these governments, less scrupulous than the American ministry, because they were sincere in their intentior,

of cutting off the intercourse which they prohibited, required him to seize the ships so offending, and to imprison the crews. Our trade suffered a more serious annoyance from that kind of warfare which gun-boats and privateers carry on to such advantage in narrow seas. The Swedes wondered that we did not give some check to this, by taking possession of the islands of Bornholm and Ertholmen, nests from whence these enemies annoyed the Baltic more than from any other station, and which might have been made the rendezvous for all vessels bound to or from the ports in those seas. This would have been advisable; but the bolder and better policy would have been, to have once more attacked Copenhagen, and have added Zealand to the dominions of Great Britain.

The Danish ministry, extending its hostility to Sweden as well as England, affected to make preparations for invading that country. Surgeons were called upon to give in their names, and hold themselves in readiness to accompany the expedition; and it was rumoured that the king would take the command in person. In Denmark it was reported that the threatened invasion greatly alarmed the Swedes; so much so, that on the coast of Scania their troops spent the night in the open air, notwithstanding the severity of the season. It was said also, that measures were taken for the defence of Stockholm, the winter having set in so rigorously that the court of Sweden apprehended it might be practicable for their assailants to march across the Gulph of Bothnia. The Russians, in fact, did cross the ice from Abo, and take possession of the isles of Aland, where they fortified themselves, meaning to retain

these islands as dependencies upon Swedish Finland, now, so Alexander foolishly supposed, irrevocably annexed to Russia. Buxhovden collected ice-boats, as if he designed to transport troops from thence to Swe. den, the distance to the nearest coast being little more than thirty miles. These things, the Danes were assu. red, had so alarmed Gustavus, who had experienced the inutility of his alliance with England, that in his despair he was about to go to Peters. burgh, either thinking it possible to produce some change in the mind of the czar by personal conference, or meaning to throw himself upon his generosity.

There was more truth in the reports circulated at Copenhagen, that the French party was becoming formi. dable in Sweden, and that Gustavus himself was in danger. The King of Denmark did not scruple to foment the treasonable spirit which was beginning to manifest itself; balloons with proclamations exciting the Swedes to revolt, and join the continental powers against Great Britain, were launched from the Danish shore; some of them fell near Helsingburg, and were car. ried by the peasantry who found them to the magistrates. The Swedish peasantry, indeed, were uncor rupted; but they were hopeless, and their sufferings at this time were such that any thing which promised change seemed to offer alleviation. The season was severer than any within remembrance; it set in early in November, and in the middle of March the whole surface of the country, land, lakes, rivers, and the sea itself, were still covered with ice and snow. The last crop had failed, and, to aggravate the evil, the herrings, which of late years had arrived in decreasing numbers, during the last entirely