and could not be found. Jackson immediately sent him word to detail twenty men to each wagon. The astonished colonel soon found horses sufficient to draw the wagons.

The enemy, however, did not make a stand, and either fled, or came in voluntarily to tender their submission. The latter part of April, General Pinckney arrived at Fort Jackson, and assumed the command, and General Jackson returned to Tennessee, greeted with acclamations, and covered with honors. In a few months peace was restored with all the Southern tribes, and the machinations of England in that quarter completely frustrated.

There is nothing in the history of our country more remarkable than this campaign, and nothing illustrates the genius of this nation more than it and the man who carried it triumphantly through. Rising from a sick couch, he called the young men of every profession to rally to the defence of their country. Placing himself at the head of the brave but undisciplined bands that gathered at his bidding, he boldly plunged into the untrodden wilderness. Unskilled in the art of war, never having witnessed a battle since he was a boy, he did not hesitate to assume the command of an army without discipline, and without knowledge of the toils and difficulties before it. Yet with it he crossed broad rivers, climbed pathless mountains, and penetrated

JACKSON'S CHARACTER.

43

almost impassable swamps filled with crafty savages. More subtle and more tireless than his foes, he thwarted all their schemes. With famine on one side and an army in open mutiny on the other, he scorned to yield to discouragement, and would not be forced by the apparently insurmountable obstacles that opposed his progress, from his purpose. By his constancy and more than Roman fortitude, compelling adversity at length to relent, and quelling his rebellious troops by the terror of his presence and his indomitable will, he at last, with a smile of triumph, saw his columns winding over the consecrated grounds of the savages. Soon his battleshout was heard rising over the crackling of burning villages. Kings, prophets, and chieftains fell before him; and crushing towns, villages, and fortresses under his feet, he at last, with one terrible blow, paralyzed the nation for ever.

Indian warfare, though exhibiting none of the grand movements of a well-appointed battle, often calls out equally striking qualities, and requires more promptness and self-possession, and greater mental resources in a commander. Especially with such an army as Jackson had under him, the task he accomplished was Herculean, and reveals a character of vast strength and executiveness. That single man, standing up alone in the heart of the wilderness, and boldly facing his famine-struck and rebellious army,

presents a scene partaking far more of the moral sublime than Cromwell seizing a rebel from the very midst of his murmuring band.

His gloomy isolation for a whole winter, with only a few devoted followers, reveals a fixedness of purpose and grandeur of character that no circumstances can affect. Inferior to the contagion of fear, unaffected by general discouragement, equal in himself to every emergency, he moves before us in this campaign the embodiment of the noblest qualities that distinguish the American race.

Jackson, with his undisciplined, mutinous, and starving army in the southern wilderness, does not seem to belong to the same race as Hull, Dearborn, Wilkinson and Izard on the northern frontier. Contrast the difficulties that surrounded him with those that embarrassed them, and how pitiful do their apologies and excuses sound. Had he been in Dearborn's place, the first campaign would have placed Canada in our possession.

CHAPTER II.

Cruise of Cominodore Porter in the Essex-Arrival at Valparaiso-Capture of British whalers and letters of marque-Essex Junior-Marquesas IslandsDescription of the natives-Madison Island-War with the Happahs-Invades the Typee territory-Tedious march-Beautiful prospect-Fights the natives and burns down their towns-Sails for Valparaiso-Blockaded by two English ships-Attempts to escape-Is attacked by both vessels-His gallant defenceHis surrender Returns home on parole-Insolence of an English OfficerPorter escapes in an open boat and lands on Long Island-Enthusiastic reception in New York.

AN expedition similar in its unity to that of Jackson's, and hence requiring a connected narrative, was carried forward by Captain Porter during the year 1813 in the Pacific Ocean. When Commodore Bainbridge sailed from Boston with the Constitution and Hornet, Porter, then lying in the Delaware with the Essex, was ordered to join him at

Oct. 26, 1812.

Port Praya in St. Jago, or at Fernando Noronha. The capture of the Java by the Constitution, and of the Peacock by the Hornet, caused a change in the plans of Bainbridge, and Captain Porter, not finding him or the Hornet at either of the two places mentioned, or off Frio, a rendezvous

afterwards designated by the Commodore, he was left to cruise where he thought best. While searching for these vessels, he captured an English Dec. 12. government packet with $55 000 in specie on

board, and sent her home.

At length, after revolving various schemes in his mind, he took the bold resolution to go Jan. 1813. alone into the Pacific, where we had not a depôt of any kind, or a place in which a disabled vessel could be refitted, while all the neutral ports were under the influence of our enemy, and make a dash at the British fishermen. The vessels employed in these fisheries he knew were invariably supplied with naval stores, etc., and he resolved to live on them. This original and daring cruise was no sooner decided upon than he turned his prow southward, and was soon wrapt in the storms

March 5;

Jan. 28: that sweep Cape Horn. Again and again beaten back, as if to deter him from his hazardous course, he still held on, and at length, after a most tempestuous and toilsome passage, took the breezes of the Pacific and stretched northward. His provisions getting short, and being in want of some new rigging, he determined to run into Valparaiso. On his arrival at that port he found, to his astonishment and delight, that Chili had declared herself free of Spain, and his reception was kind and courteous. Here he learned, also, that