186 Naval War of 1812 



written an invaluable history; he must often have 

 known the truth when, as a matter of preference, he 

 chose either to suppress or alter it. Thus he ignores 

 all the small "cutting out" expeditions in which the 

 Americans were successful, and where one would 

 like to hear the British side. For example, Captain 

 Yeo captured two schooners, the Julia and Growler, 

 but Chauncy recaptured both. We have the Amer 

 ican account of this recapture in full, but James 

 does not even hint at it, and blandly puts down both 

 vessels in the total "American loss" at the end of his 

 smaller work. Worse still, when the Growler again 

 changed hands, he counts it in again, in the total, as 

 if it were an entirely different boat, although he in 

 variably rules out of the American list all recap 

 tured vessels. A more serious perversion of facts 

 are his statements about comparative tonnage. This 

 was at that time measured arbitrarily, the depth of 

 hold being estimated at half the breadth of beam; 

 and the tonnage of our lake vessels was put down ex 

 actly as if they were regular ocean cruisers of the 

 same dimensions in length and breadth. But on 

 these inland seas the vessels really did not draw 

 more than half as much water as on the ocean, and 

 the depth would of course be much less. James, 

 in comparing the tonnage, gives that of the Ameri 

 cans as if they were regular ocean ships, but in the 

 case of the British vessels, carefully allows for their 

 shallowness, although professing to treat the two 

 classes in the same way; and thus he makes out a 

 most striking and purely imaginary difference. The 



