PREFACE. 



To these personal wrongs and outrages, were 

 added others of a public nature, which were se- 

 verely felt by every lover of his country. The burn- 

 ing of Washington and Havre de Grace ; the sacking 

 of Hampton and Alexandria ; the ravages committed 

 on the seacoast ; the scalpings of the western fron- 

 tier, and the whole system of warfare stimulated by 

 the love of plunder, and the hope of revenge, all 

 were calculated to awaken feelings of keener hosti- 

 lity, than those which generally originate in national 

 contests. The author does not enter into this reca- 

 pitulation with a view of exciting a renewal of 

 heart burnings, but simply to indicate, that if he oc- 

 casionally indulged in any remarks derogatory to 

 the character of the enemy, he was not without 

 ample provocation. 



But the author wishes to be perfectly impartial, and 

 while he pleads in justification of his own feelings, 

 is wiUing to oifer some excuse for those of the Quar- 

 terly Reviewer. At the time the Review, of which 

 the author proposes a short examination, was writ- 

 ten, it may be recollected, the public feeling in 

 England was excessively irritable on the subject of 

 this country. The defeats of their ships of war, oc- 

 curring so very frequently, and with so little variety, 

 must have tired and disgusted them with their same- 

 ness : while the failure of their armies ; the total 

 defeat of all their plans of subjugation; and, finally, 

 the deplorable catastrophe of New Orleans, must 

 necessarily have given them a general distaste to 

 American literature, which was finally destined to 

 record and perpetuate the memory of such mortify- 

 ing disasters. 



The author cannot therefore but confess, that the 

 temper of the Reviewer toward himself, his brother 

 Officers, and his countrymen at large, is not alto- 



