1863.] 269 [Sharswood. 



composed to the knowledge of an important branch of jurisdiction, 

 but little cultivated, whose principles and practice, fully presented, 

 form a useful and interesting portion of law, seeming to supplant all 

 other law and to exist without law." In this introduction, after 

 tracing the history of the law of legations to the earliest times, and 

 discussing in a succinct and clear method the well-established prin- 

 ciples in regard to the inviolability of ambassadors and other public 

 ministers, he concludes as follows: "It has long been among my 

 fondest fancies, that this tran.satlantic country, with its free, benign, 

 and pacific institutions, should deem it a part of American destiny 

 to meliorate the law of nations by giving greater liberty to the sea, 

 greater exten.sion to commerce, and thereby diminishing the occasions 

 of war. In this amelioration, foreign missions must perform impor- 

 tant parts. The Federal Constitution, by elevating consuls to the rank 

 of diplomatic agents as respects jurisdiction, made a first and important 

 step towards this great change. Government, especially the Federal 

 judiciary, may accomplish the rest. In nothing is the literature of 

 English law so deficient as that of nations. America must make 

 amends for it. Independence of bad precedents, offspring of angry 

 conflicts, recurrence to first principles, restoration without innovation, 

 by American judges and foreign ministers, may render this country 

 the renovator, the arbiter and founder of a law of nations promoting 

 general peace." 



In 1835, a dispute, which arose between the City of Philadelphia 

 and the Schuylkill Navigation Company, turned his attention to a 

 subject of the class in which he especially delighted, and he pub- 

 lished a short work on "River Rights," in which he discussed that 

 important head of law with his accustomed research and ability. 



In the year 1845, Mr. IngersoU committed to the press the first 

 volume of his " Historical Sketch of the Second War between the 

 United States of America and Great Britain, declared by Act of 

 Congress the 18th of June, 1812, and concluded by peace the 15th 

 February, 1815," followed by a second volume in 1849, and completed 

 by two additional volumes in 1852. In the preparation of this work 

 he engaged con amove. He was not only a contemporary and interested 

 spectator of all the events of the period, but could say with truth, 

 Quorum pars magna fui. He knew personally the principal actors 

 in the scene ; he had studied closely the political complications of 

 the plot, and wrote his history not during the heat of the contest, 

 but thirty years afterwards, in the spirit of a calm, unimpassioned 

 judge. It is this which gives the greatest interest and importance 



