connection of foreign commerce. The shepherd and his faithful dog are not more necessary to guard the flocks that browse and gambol on the neighboring mountain. He considered. the prosperity of foreign commerce indissolubly allied to marine power. Neglect to provide the one and you must abandon the other. Suppose the expected war with England is commenced, you enter and subjugate Canada, and she still refuses to do you justice; what other possible mode will remain to operate on the enemy, but upon that element where alone you can then come in contact with him? And if you do not prepare to protect there your own commerce, and to assail his, will he not sweep from the ocean every vessel bearing your flag, and destroy even the coasting trade? But, from the arguments of gentlemen, it would seem to be questioned if foreign commerce is worth the kind of protection insisted upon. What is this foreign commerce that has suddenly become so inconsiderable? It has, with very trifling aid from other sources, defrayed the expenses of government ever since the adoption of the present Constitution; maintained an expensive and successful war with the Indians; a war with the Barbary powers; a quasi war with France; sustained the charges of suppressing two insurrections, and extinguishing upward of forty-six millions of the public debt. In revenue it has, since the year 1789, yielded one hundred and ninety-one millions of dollars. During the first four years after the commencement of the present government the revenue averaged only about two millions annually; during a subsequent period of four years it rose to an average of fifteen millions, annually, or became equivalent to a capital of two hundred and fifty millions of dollars, at an interest of six per centum per annum. And if our commerce is re-established, it will, in the course of time, net a sum for which we are scarcely furnished with figures in arithmetic. Taking the average of the last nine years (comprehending of course the season of the embargo), our exports average upward of thirtyseven millions of dollars, which is equivalent to a capital of more than six hundred millions of dollars, at six per centum interest; all of which must be lost in the event of a destruction of foreign commerce. In the abandonment of that commerce is also involved the sacrifice of our brave tars, who have engaged in the pursuit from which they derive subsistence and support, under the confidence that government would afford them that just protection which is due to all. They will be driven into foreign employment, for it is vain to expect that they will renounce their habits of life. The spirit of commercial enterprise, so strongly depicted by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Mitchell) is diffused throughout the country. It is a passion as unconquerable as any with which nature has endowed us. You may attempt, indeed, to regulate, but you can not destroy it. It exhibits itself as well on the waters of the western country as on the waters and shores of the Atlantic. Mr. Clay had heard of a vessel, built at Pittsburg, having crossed the Atlantic and entered a European port (he believed that of Leghorn). The master of the vessel laid his papers

before the proper custom-house officer, which of course stated the place of her departure. The officer boldly denied the existence of any such American port as Pittsburg, and threatened a seizure of the vessel as being furnished with forged papers. The affrighted master procured a map of the United States, and, pointing out the Gulf of Mexico, took the officer to the mouth of the Mississippi, traced the course of the Mississippi more than a thousand miles, to the mouth of the Ohio, and conducting him still a thousand miles higher, to the junction of the Alleghany and Monongahela—there, he exclaimed, stands Pittsburg, the port from which I sailed! The custom-house officer, prior to the production of this evidence, would have as soon believed that the vessel had performed a voyage from the moon. In delivering the sentiments he had expressed, Mr. Clay considered himself as conforming to a sacred constitutional duty. When the power to provide a navy was confided to Congress, it must have been the intention of the Convention to submit only to the discretion of that body the period when that power should be exercised. That period had, in his opinion, arrived, at least for making a respectable beginning. And while he thus discharged what he conceived to be his duty, he derived great pleasure from the reflection that he was supporting a measure calculated to impart additional strength to our happy Union. Diversified as are the interests of its various parts, how admirably do they harmonize and blend together! We have only to make a proper use of the bounties spread before us to render us prosperous and powerful. Such a navy as he had contended for, will form a new bond of connection between the States, concentrating their hopes, their interests, and their affections.

ON THE NEW ARMY BILL.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JANUARY 8, 1813.

[THE war has commenced, and is now nearly eight months in progress. Our little navy, even against immense odds, by skillful maneuvering, and hard fighting, has covered itself with glory. But with few exceptions, enumerated by Mr. Clay in the following speech, the army has met with a series of mortifying disasters. Our attempts to take Canada have proved a failure. The army has been defeated and demoralized, and the country overshadowed with gloom. The administration is assailed with reproach by the opposition. The Hartford Convention has been in session, and disunion is threatened.

Under these circumstances, Congress assembled in December, 1812. On the 30th of August, General Harrison wrote to Mr. Clay, "In my opinion, your presence on the frontier of this State (Ohio) would be productive of great advantages. I can assure you, that your advice and assistance in determining the course of operations for the army (to the command of which I have been designated by your recommendation) will be highly useful. You are not only pledged in some manner for my conduct, but for the success of the war. For God's sake, then, come on to Piqua as quickly as possible, and let us endeavor to throw off from the administration that weight of reproach which the late disasters will heap upon them." Mr. Clay, however, could not go, his presence being required at Washington. This call of General Harrison, and the reasons assigned for it, would seem to justify Mr. Madison in the offer he made to Mr. Clay at this time, to give him the command of the army. But Mr. Clay could not be spared from his leadership in the House of Representatives. It is known, that Mr. Clay not only counseled war before it commenced, but that he had to screw up the courage of Mr. Madison and his Cabinet, while they hesitated. He, too, blew the same trumpet on the floor of Congress. On him, therefore, rested, in no slight degree, the responsibility of the war.

After the disasters on the frontier, and in Canada, there was no choice left but an increase of the army; and soon after the meeting of Congress, a bill was brought in to raise twenty additional regiments. It was during the pending of this bill that the following speech was delivered; and, as will be seen, Mr. Clay's chief attention was directed to the opponents of the war, who had embraced the opportunity of these misfortunes to fall upon the administration with the utmost virulence. It devolved on Mr. Clay to answer them. If we consider the position of the country, and the position of Mr. Clay himself, it can hardly be denied that he displayed on this occasion the greatest vigor of his character. He had two single aims, one to silence the opposition, and the other to reanimate the country for a vigorous prosecution of the war to an honorable peace. Canada was the vulnerable point of the enemy, and Canada must be takenthough it never was taken. With the exception of the defense of New Orleans, by General Jackson, on the 8th of January, 1815, our naval victories on the lakes and on the ocean, were the most brilliant achievements of the war.]

MR. CLAY (in Committee of the Whole) said he was gratified yesterday by the recommitment of this bill to a committee of the whole House, from two considerations: one, since it afforded him a slight relaxation from a most fatiguing situation; and the other, because it furnished him with an opportunity of presenting to the committee his sentiments upon the important topics which had been mingled in the debate. He regretted, however, that the necessity under which the chairman had been placed, of putting the question, precluded the opportunity he had wished to enjoy, of rendering more acceptable to the committee any thing he might have to offer on the interesting points on which it was his duty to touch. Unprepared, however, as he was to speak on this day, of which he was the more sensible from the ill state of his health, he would solicit the attention of the committee for a few moments.

I was a little astonished, I confess, said Mr. Clay, when I found this bill permitted to pass silently through the Committee of the Whole, and not selected until the moment when the question was to be put for its third reading, as the subject on which gentlemen in the opposition chose to lay before the House their views of the interesting attitude in which the nation stands. It did appear to me that the loan bill, which will soon come before us, would have afforded a much more proper occasion, it being more essential, as providing the ways and means for the prosecution of the war. But the gentlemen had the right of selection, and having exercised it, no matter how improperly, I am gratified, whatever I may think of the

character of some part of the debate, at the latitude in which, for once, they have been indulged. I claim only, in return, of gentlemen on the other side of the House, and of the committee, a like indulgence in expressing my sentiments with the same unrestrained freedom. Perhaps, in the course of the remarks which I feel myself called upon to make, gentlemen may apprehend that they assume too harsh an aspect; but I have only now to say that I shall speak of parties, 'measures, and things, as they strike my moral sense, protesting against the imputation of any intention on my part to wound the feelings of any gentleman.

Considering the situation in which this country is now placed—a state of actual war with one of the most powerful nations on the earth—it may not be useless to take a view of the past, and of the various parties which have at different times appeared in this country, and to attend to the manner by which we have been driven from a peaceful posture to our present warlike attitude. Such an inquiry may assist in guiding us to that result, an honorable peace, which must be the sincere desire of every friend to America. The course of that opposition, by which the administration of the government had been unremittingly impeded for the last twelve years, was singular, and, I believe, unexampled in the history of any country. It has been alike the duty and the interest of the administration to preserve peace. It was their duty, because it is necessary to the growth of an infant people, to their genius, and to their habits. It was their interest, because a change of the condition of the nation brings along with it a danger of the loss of the affections of the people. The administration has not been forgetful of these solemn obligations. No art has been left unessayed, no experiment, promising a favorable result, left untried to maintain the peaceful relations of the country. When, some six or seven years ago, the affairs of the nation assumed a threatening aspect, a partial nonimportation was adopted. As they grew more alarming, an embargo was imposed. It would have accomplished its purpose, but it was sacrificed upon the altar of conciliation. Vain and fruitless attempt to propitiate ! Then came along non-intercourse; and a general non-importation followed in the train. In the mean time, any indications of a return to the public law and the path of justice, on the part of either belligerent, are seized upon with avidity by the administration. The arrangement with Mr. Erskine is concluded. It is first applauded, and then censured by the opposition. No matter with what unfeigned sincerity, with what real effort, the administration cultivates peace, the opposition insists that it alone is culpable for every breach that is made between the two countries. Because the president thought proper, in accepting the proffered reparation for the attack on a national vessel, to intimate that it would have better comported with the justice of the king (and who does not think so?) to punish the offending officer, the opposition, entering into the royal feelings, sees, in that imaginary insult, abundant cause for rejecting Mr. Erskine's arrangement. On another occasion, you can not have forgotten