278 



FORCE, PETEE. 



discovery in 1492, to the adoption of the Fed- 

 eral Constitution in 1789; but to secure the 

 more ready cooperation of Congress since no 

 private means were adequate for such an un- 

 dertaking he commenced with the fourth 

 series, covering the Stamp-Act controversy, 

 and the initial history of the American Revo- 

 lution (1765-1775). He prosecuted his work 

 with so much vigor, that, between 1837 and 

 1844, he had completed this series in six folio 

 volumes. He then entered with equal zeal 

 upon the preparation of the fifth series, which 

 was to extend from 1775 to 1778, and by the 

 summer of 1853 had published three more 

 volumes, bringing the history down to 1776, 

 and had prepared for the press most of the re- 

 mainder of this series, when the work was 

 suddenly stopped by the refusal of Mr. Marcy, 

 then Secretary of State, to approve' the vol- 

 umes thus prepared. Mr. Force was at this 

 time sixty-three years of age, and this unex- 

 pected act of Secretary Marcy stunned him. He 

 could not be persuaded to go on with the work, 

 or to make any effort to have the Secretary's 

 decision reversed. Thus it came to pass that 

 the one man whose knowledge on this subject 

 was encyclopedic, and whose collections and 

 notes for its preparation were more complete 

 than any other's could be, was prevented from 

 putting into available shape the material from 

 which our early national history must be 

 drawn. But though Mr. Force never resumed 

 the studies which had occnpied him for twenty 

 of the best years of his life, he had not lost 

 his interest in American history, as the publi- 

 cation of four large volumes of historical (po- 

 litical) tracts, of the Revolutionary period, and 

 his eager investigations of all points of the 

 early history of the country, fully evinced. 

 Meantime his accumulation of books relative 

 to the history of America went on. Five 

 spacious rooms of a large building were occu- 

 pied with his books and pamphlets, the former 

 numbering over twenty thousand, and the 

 latter thirty thousand ; in addition to these he 

 had over eight hundred volumes of news- 

 papers, besides files innumerable, occupying 

 the entire basement of his house. He had in 

 person or through his agents ransacked the 

 bookshops, and the farm-houses and garrets, 

 from Maine to Savannah, for historical books 

 and pamphlets, and though much of his collec- 

 tion was procured at a moderate expense, he 

 never hesitated between paying a large price 

 for a valuable book, and letting it pass out of 

 his reach. He had actually mortgaged his 

 real estate to obtain the means of making his 

 collection more complete. It was, of course, 

 rich in autographs, maps, portraits, and en- 

 gravings, and among other things contained a 

 copy of every army order issued by the War 

 Department. But it is not so generally known 

 that he had made another collection, on a dif- 

 ferent subject, which was more complete than 

 perhaps any other in this country. He had 

 a passion for the art of printing (his own early- 



FRANCE. 



chosen profession), and had procured a very 

 large number of books printed in the infancy 

 of the art; thus he had nearly two hundred 

 folios and quartos printed between 1467 and 

 1500, most of them remarkably fine copies, and 

 several hundred volumes illustrating the print- 

 ing of the sixteenth century. 



In 1866, the librarian of Congress began to 

 agitate with great earnestness the question of 

 purchasing this vast, valuable, and unique li- 

 brary, to be incorporated with the library of 

 Congress. Mr. Force had hitherto been un- 

 willing to dispose of it, during his lifetime, 

 but, feeling the desirableness of having it kept 

 together and in a place of safety, he finally 

 consented to accept from Congress the price 

 which had been offered by parties in New 

 York, and refused one hundred thousand 

 dollars. The bill making the appropriation 

 passed through Congress without an obj-ection, 

 and in the spring of 1867 the library was re- 

 moved to its future home. But the loss of his 

 accustomed companions preyed upon the spirits 

 of the venerable old man, and though he was 

 as free to use the library of Congress, and his 

 own collection as a part of it, as if it had still 

 been in his possession, he gradually pined 

 away, losing his appetite and strength, home- 

 sick for the loss of what had been the ruling 

 passion of his life, till at last he passed away 

 quietly and peacefully. 



FRANCE, an empire in Europe. Emperor, 

 Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III.), born April 20, 

 1808 ; chosen hereditary Emperor by the plebia- 

 cite of November 21 and November 22, 1852. 

 Heir-apparent, Napoleon Eugene Louis Jean 

 Joseph, born March 16, 1856. The area 

 amounts to 209,428 square miles. 



A remarkable fact in the movement of pop- 

 ulation is the decrease in the agricultural dis- 

 tricts. It appears, from the tables of the last 

 census (1866), that the population of France has 

 increased in 178 arrondissements, and dimin- 

 ished in 185. This does not include the three 

 departments annexed in 1860. In 50 arrondisse- 

 ments it has even considerably advanced, and 

 in 128 the population has remained stationary. 

 The specially agricultural arrondissements have 

 suffered a diminution of two, four, six, eight, 

 ten, and eleven thousand inhabitants. Thus, 

 that of Argentin, in the Orne, has lost, during 

 the twenty years, 14,000 (in 1846 it reckoned 

 110,000, and in 1866 only 96,000), and that of 

 Vesoul suffered a decrease of 12,000 within the 

 same period. On the other hand, all the ar- 

 rondissements of which the population has in.- 

 creased possessed either important towns or 

 some very active centres of manufacture. In 

 the departments, in which an arrondissement 

 includes a large town or manufacturing dis- 

 trict, and in which there are also agricultural 

 arrondissements, we find that the population 

 increases in the former and diminishes in the 

 latter. 



The following table exhibits the population 

 of each department (according to the census of 



