STATE PAPERS. 



395 



straiiit to tbe Uiiited States; in- 

 corporated by naturalization into 

 our political family, and fighting 

 under the authority of their adopted 

 country', in open and honourable 

 war, for the maintenance of its 

 rights and safety. Such is the 

 avowed purpose of a government, 

 which is in tlie practice of natu- 

 ralizing, by thousands, citizens of 

 other countries, and not only of 

 permitting but compelling them to 

 fight its battles against their native 

 country. 



" They have not, it is true, taken 

 into their own hands the hatchet 

 and the knife, devoted to indiscri- 

 minate massacre; but they have 

 let loose the savages, armed with 

 these cruel instruments ; have al- 

 lured them into their service, and 

 carried them to battle by their 

 sides, eager to glut their savage 

 thirst with the blood of the van- 

 quished, and to finish the work of 

 torture and death on maimed and 

 defenceless captives: and, what 

 was never seen before, British 

 commanders have extorted vic- 

 tory over the unconquerable valour 

 of our troops, by presenting to 

 the sympathy of their chief await- 

 ing massacre from their savage as- 

 sociates. 



" And now we find them, in 

 further contempt of the modes of 

 lionourable warfare, supplying the 

 place of a conquering force, by 

 attempts to disorganize our poli- 

 tical society, to difnicmbcr our 

 confederated republic. Happily, 

 like others, those will recoil on 

 the authors ; but they mark the 

 degenerate councils from which 

 they emanate ; and if they did not 

 belong to a series of unexampled 

 inconsistencies, might excite the 

 greater wonder, as proceeding from 



a government which founded the 

 very war in which it has been so 

 long engaged, on a charge against 

 the disorganizing and insurrec- 

 tional policy of its adversary. 



" To render the justice of the 

 war on our part the more conspi- 

 cuous, the reluctance to commence 

 it was followed by the earliest and 

 strongest manifestations of a dis- 

 position to arrest its progress. The 

 sword was scarcely out of the 

 scabbard before the enemy was 

 apprised of the reasonable terms 

 on which it would be re-sheathed. 

 Still more precise advances were 

 repeated, and have been received 

 in a spirit forbidding every reliance 

 not placed in the military resources 

 of the nation. 



" These resources are amply suf- 

 ficient to bring the war to an ho- 

 nourable issue. Our nation i?, in 

 number, more than half that of ihe 

 British isles. It is composed of a 

 brave, a free, a virtuous, and an 

 intelligent people. Our country 

 abounds in the necessaries, tlie 

 arts, and comforts of life. A se- 

 neral prosperity is visible in the 

 public countenance. The means 

 employed by the British cabinet 

 to undermine it, have recoiled on 

 themselves ; have given to our na- 

 tional faculties a more rapid deve- 

 lopement; and, draining or di- 

 verting the precious metals from 

 British circulation and British 

 vaults, have poured them into those 

 of the United States. It is a pro- 

 pitious consideration, that an un- 

 avoidable war should have found 

 this seasonable facility for the con- 

 tributions required to support it. 

 When the public voice called for 

 war, all knew, and still know, that 

 without them it could not be car- 

 ried on through the period which 



