Volume Ii Part 21 (1/2)

From the outset the West proved more loyal than he hoped, and when, at the critical moment, Wilkinson betrayed him, he knew that all was lost.

Sinking his chests of arms in the river near Natchez, he took to the Mississippi woods, only to be recognized, arrested by Jefferson's order, and dragged to Richmond to jail. As no overt act was proved, he could not be convicted of treason; and even the trial of him for misdemeanor broke down on technical points. The Federalists stood up for Burr as if he had been their man, while Jefferson on his part pushed the prosecution in a fussy and personal way, ill becoming a President.

Jefferson's most lasting work as national chief-magistrate was his diplomacy in purchasing for the Union the boundless territory beyond the Mississippi, prized then not for its extent or resources, both as yet unknown, but as a.s.suring us free navigation of the river, which sundry French and Spanish plots had demonstrated essential to the solid loyalty of the West. Louisiana, ceded by France to Spain in 1762, became French again in 1801. Napoleon had intended it as the seat of a colonial power rivalling Great Britain's, but, pressed for money in his new war with that kingdom, concluded to sell. He wished, too, the friends.h.i.+p of the United States against Great Britain, and knew not the worth of what he was bargaining away. Willing to take fifty million francs, he offered for one hundred million, speedily closing with Livingston and Monroe's tender of eighty, we to a.s.sume in addition the French spoliation claims of our citizens. The treaty of purchase was signed May 2, 1803, and ratified by the Senate the 17th of the following October.

This stupendous transaction a.s.sured to our Republic not only leading hand in the affairs of this continent, but place among the great powers of the world. Its 1,124,685 square miles doubled the national domain. It opened path well toward, if not to, the Pacific, and made ours measureless tracts of agricultural and mining lands, rich as any under the sun.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

Stephen Decatur.

If it originated many of the most perplexing questions which have agitated our national politics, as those relating to slavery in this territory itself, to the acquisitions from Mexico, to the Pacific railways, and to the Indians and the Chinese, all this has been amply compensated by the above and countless other benefits.

Equally brilliant if less impressive was another piece of Jefferson's foreign policy. He might be over-friendly to France, but elsewhere he certainly did not believe in peace at any price. The Barbary powers had begun to annoy our commerce soon after Independence. The Betsey was captured in 1784, next year the Maria, of Boston, and the Dauphin, of Philadelphia, and their crews of twenty-one men carried to a long and disgraceful captivity in Algiers.

The Dey's bill for these captives, held by him as slaves, was:

3 Captains at $6,000 $18,000 2 Mates at $4,000 8,000 2 Pa.s.sengers at $4,000 8,000 14 Seamen at $1,400 19,600 --------- $53,600 For custom, eleven per cent 5,896 --------- $59,496

Later a single cruise lost us ten vessels to these half-civilized people.

Following European precedent, Was.h.i.+ngton had made, in 1795, a ransom-treaty with this nest of pirates, to carry out which cost us a fat million. The captives had meantime increased to one hundred and fifteen, though the crews of the Maria and the Dauphin had wasted away to ten men. Nearly a million more went to the other North-African freebooters. The policy of ransoming was, indeed, cheaper than force.

Count d'Estaing used to say that bombarding a pirate town was like breaking windows with guineas. The old Dey of Algiers, learning the expense of Du Quesne's expedition to batter his capital, declared that he himself would have burnt it for half the sum.

Yet it makes one's blood hot to-day to read how our fathers paid tribute to those thieves. The Dey had, in so many words, called us his slaves, and had actually terrorized Captain Bainbridge, of the man-of-war George Was.h.i.+ngton, into carrying despatches for him to Constantinople, flying the Algerine pirate flag conspicuously at the fore. After anchoring--this was some requital--Bainbridge was permitted to hoist the Stars and Stripes, the first time that n.o.ble emblem ever kissed the breeze of the Golden Horn.

[1803]

Jefferson loathed such submission, and vowed that it should cease.

Commodore Dale was ordered to the Mediterranean with a squadron to protect our s.h.i.+ps there from further outrage. One of his vessels, the Experiment, soon captured a Tripoli cruiser of fourteen guns, the earliest stroke of any civilized power for many years by way of showing a bold front to these pestilent corsairs.

This was on August 6, 1801. In 1803 Preble was placed in command of the Mediterranean fleet, with some lighter s.h.i.+ps to go farther up those shallow harbors. Bainbridge had the misfortune while in pursuit of a Tripoli frigate to run his s.h.i.+p, the Philadelphia, on a rock, and to be taken prisoner with all his crew. The sailors were made slaves.

Lieutenant Decatur penetrated the Tripoli harbor under cover of night, and burned the Philadelphia to the water's edge. Tripoli was bombarded, and many of its vessels taken or sunk. Commodore Barron, who had succeeded Preble, co-operated with a land attack which some of the Pasha's disaffected subjects, led by the American General Eaton, made upon Tripoli. The city was captured, April 27th, and the pirate prince forced to a treaty. Even now, however, we paid $60,000 in ransom money.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hand-to-fighting with swords and pistols.]

Lieutenant Decatur on the Turkish Vessel during the Bombardment of Tripoli.

CHAPTER X.

THE WAR OF 1812

[1807]

Although paying, so long as Jay's treaty was in force, for certain invasions of our commerce, Great Britain had never adopted a just att.i.tude toward neutral trade. She persisted in loosely defining contraband and blockade, and in denouncing as unlawful all commerce which was opened to us as neutrals merely by war or carried on by us between France and French colonies through our own ports.

The far more flagrant abuse of impressment, the forcible seizure of American citizens for service in the British navy, became intolerably prevalent during Jefferson's administration. Not content with reclaiming deserters or a.s.serting the eternity of British citizens.h.i.+p, Great Britain, through her naval authorities, was compelling thousands of men of unquestioned American birth to help fight her battles. Castlereagh himself admitted that there had been sixteen hundred bona fide cases of this sort by January 1, 1811. And in her mode of a.s.serting and exercising even her just claims she ignored international law, as well as the dignity and sovereignty of the United States. The odious right of search she most shamefully abused. The narrow seas about England were a.s.sumed to be British waters, and acts performed in American harbors admissible only on the open ocean. When pressed by us for apology or redress, the British Government showed no serious willingness to treat, but a brazen resolve to utilize our weak and too trustful policy of peace.

One instance of this shall suffice. Commodore Barron, in command of the United States war vessel Chesapeake, was attacked by the Leopard, a British two-decker of fifty guns, outside the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, to recover three sailors, falsely alleged to be British-born, on board.