sional intermission, provoking every bad passion of his sol. diery, is the excuse for plunder, lust, and cruelty. These atrocities exasperate the sufferers to revenge; and every weapon which anger can supply, and every device which ingenious hatred can conceive, is used to inflict vengeance on the detested foe.

But there is yet a more horrible war than this. As there is no anger so deadly as the anger of a friend, there is no war so ferocious as that which is waged between men of the same blood, and formerly connected by the closest ties of affection. The pen of the historian confesses its inability to describe, the fervid fancy of the poet cannot realize, the horrors of a civil war. The invasion of Canada involves the miseries of both these species of war. You carry fire and sword among a people who are "united against you to a man;" amongst a people who are happy in themselves, and satisfied with their condition; view you not as coming to emancipate them from thraldom, but to reduce them to a foreign yoke. A people long and intimately connected with the bordering inhabitants of our country by commercial intercourse, by the ties of hospitality, and by the bonds of affinity and blood-a people, as to every social and individual relation, long identified with your own. It must be that such a war will rouse the spirit of sanguinary ferocity, that will overleap every holy barrier of nature and venerable usage of civilization. Already has "the bayonet of the brother been actually opposed to the breast of the brother." Merciful heaven! that those who have been rocked in the same cradle by the same maternal hand--who have imbibed the first genial nourishment of infant existence from the same blessed source, should be forced to contend in impious strife for the destruction of that being derived from their common parents. Every feeling of our nature cries aloud against it.

Before we enter, Mr. Chairman, upon this career of coldblooded massacre, it behooves us, by every obligation which we owe to God, to our fellow-men, and to ourselves, to be certain that the right is with us, or that the duty is imperative. Think for a moment, sir, on the consequences. True courage shuts not its eyes upon danger or its result. It views them steadily and calmly. Already this Canadian war has a character sufficiently cruel. Your part of it may, perhaps,

be ably sustained-your way through the Canadas may be traced afar off by the smoke of their burning villages-your path may be marked by the blood of their furious peasantryyou may render your course audible by the frantic shrieks of their women and children. But your own sacred soil will also be the scene of this drama of fiends. Your exposed and defenceless sea-board, the sea-board of the South, will invite a terrible.v vengeance. An intestine foe, too, may be roused to assassination and brutality. Yes, sir, a foe that will be found every where, in our fields, in our kitchens, and in our chambers; a foe, ignorant, degraded by habits of servitude, uncurbed by moral restraints; a foe, whom no recollections of former kindness will soften, and whom the remembrance of severity will goad to frenzy; a foe, from whom nor age, nor infancy, nor beauty, will find reverence or pity. such a foe may be added to fill up the measure of our calamities.

Yes,

Reflect, then, well, I conjure you, before reflection is too late; let not passion or prejudice dictate the decision; if erroneous, its reversal may be decreed by a nation's miseries, and by the world's abhorrence.

CLXVII. AN APPEAL TO ARMS SOMETIMES NECESSARY.

Extract from the Speech of Governeur Morris, on the free Navigation of the Mississippi, delivered in the Senate of the United States, February 25, 1803.

Mr. President,-THERE can be no doubt but that, under existing circumstances, we are now actually at war, and have no choice but manly resistance or vile submission; that the possession of the country west of the Mississippi is dangerous to other nations, but fatal to us; that it forms a natural and necessary part of our empire; that it is joined to us by the hand of the Almighty, and that we have no hope of obtaining it by treaty. Sir, I wish for peace. I wish the negotiation may succeed, and therefore I strongly urge you to adopt these resolutions. But though you should adopt them, they alone will not insure success. I have no hesitation in saying, that you ought to have taken possession of New-Or

leans and the Floridas, the instant your treaty was violated. You ought to do it now. Your rights are invaded, confidence in negotiation is vain: there is, therefore, no alternative but force. You are exposed to imminent present danger : you have the prospect of great future advantage; you are justified by the clearest principles of right: you are urged by the strongest motives of policy; you are commanded by every sentiment of national dignity. Look at the conduct of America in her infant years. When there was no actual invasion of right, but only a claim to invade, she resisted the claim; she spurned the insult. Did we then hesitate? Did we then wait for foreign alliance? No-animated with the spirit, warmed with the soul of freedom, we threw our oaths of allegiance in the face of our sovereign, and committed our fortunes and our fate to the God of battles. We then were subjects. We had not then attained to the dignity of an independent repub. lic. We then had no rank among the nations of the earth. But we had the spirit that deserved that elevated station. now that we have gained it, shall we fall from our honor?

And

Sir, I have now performed, to the best of my power, the great duty which I owed to my country. I have given that advice which in my soul I believe to be the best. But I have little hope that it will be adopted. I fear that by feeble counsels we shall be exposed to a long and bloody war. This fear is, perhaps, ill founded, and if so, I shall thank God that I was mistaken. I know that in the order of his Providence, the wisest ends frequently result from the most foolish measures. It is our duty to submit ourselves to his high dispensations. I know that war, with all its misery, is not wholly without advantage. It calls forth the energies of character, it favors the manly virtues, it gives elevation to sentiment, it produces national union, generates patriotic love, and infuses a just sense of national honor. If then we are doomed to war, let us meet it as we ought, and when the hour of trial comes, let it find us a band of brothers.

Sir, I have done; and I pray that this day's debate may eventuate in the prosperity, the freedom, the peace, the power, and the glory of our country.

CLXVIII. ORLANDO, OLIVER, &c.

From the Comedy of "As You Like It," by Shakspeare. Act 1Scene 1.

[ORLANDO enters alone.]

Orl. As I remember, my father bequeathed me, by will, a poor thousand crowns, and charged my brother to breed me well. Instead of this, he keeps me here rustically at home, or, to speak more properly, stays me here at home unkept, for can that be called keeping, for one of my birth, that differs not from the stalling of an ox? I will no longer endure it. Enter OLIVER.

Oli. Now, sir, what make you here ?*

Orl. Nothing: I am not taught to make any thing.
Oli. What mar you then, sir?

Orl. Marry, sir, I am helping you to mar that which God made, a poor unworthy brother of yours, with idleness.

Oli. Marry, sir, be better employed, and be naught awhile. Orl. Shall I keep your hogs, and eat husks with them? What prodigal portion have I spent, that I should come to such penury?

Oli. Know you where you are, sir?

Orl. O, sir, very well: here in your orchard.

Oli. Know you before whom, sir?

Orl. Ay, better than he I am before knows me. I know you are my eldest brother, and, in the gentle condition of blood, you should so know me. The courtesy of nations† allows you my better, in that you are the first-born; but the same tradition takes not away my blood, were there twenty brothers betwixt us : I have as much of my father in me as you.

Oli. What, boy! [going to strike him.]

Orl. Come, come, elder brother, you are too young in this. [Seizing him by the throat.]

*What art thou doing here?

+ That is, the law of primogeniture, by which the eldest son succeeds to the estate of the father.

Oli. Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?

Orl. I am no villain:* I am the youngest son of Sir Rowland de Bois; he was my father, and he is thrice a villain, that says, such a father begot villains. Wert thou not my brother, I would not take this hand from thy throat, till this other had pulled out thy tongue for saying so.

Oli. Let me go, I say.

Orl. I will not, till I please: you shall hear me. My father charged you in his will to give me good education: you have trained me like a peasant, obscuring and hiding from me all gentleman-like qualities: the spirit of my father grows strong in me, and I will no longer endure it; therefore, allow me such exercises as may become a gentleman, or give me the poor allotting my father left me by testament; with that I will go buy my fortunes.

Oli. And what wilt thou do? beg, when that is spent? Well, sir, get you in: I will not long be troubled with you: you shall have some part of your will: I pray you, leave me. Orl. I will no further offend you than becomes me for my good. [Exit ORLANDO.]

Oli. Is it even so? begin you to grow upon me? I will physic you rankness, and yet give you no thousand crowns neither. Hola, Dennis!

Enter DENNIS.

Den. Calls your worship?

Oli. Was not Charles, the duke's wrestler, here, to speak with me?

Den. So please you, he is here at the door, and importunes access to you.

Oli. Call him in. [Exit DENNIS.] 'Twill be a good way, and to-morrow the wrestling is.

Enter CHARLES.

Cha. Good morrow to your worship?

Oli. Good monsieur Charles!-what's the new news at the new court?

Cha. There's no news at the court, sir, but the old news:

* Villain is here used in a double sense; by Oliver, for a worthless fellow; and by Orlando, for a man of base extraction.