have timber enough for all the navies of the world; our forests and pastures, produce it faster than it can be used; and science has taught us to make as much again as we used to, of what we have. In addition to these great stores, the providence of a late secretary of the navy, with the assistance of Congress, has secured an abundance of the best of live oak, by reserving for the use of the governiment, an immense forest of this growth in Florida. This cost the nation but little more than the sagacious efforts of a man of political forecast; the worth of a statesman is seldom known until he passes away; and those who do the most good, often share the fate that the ignorant and time-serving deserve, or a worse one. We can never want for sailors, as long as our cod and whale fishery are pursued, and our foreign commerce is protected.

Our mariners have amounted to one hundred and eight thousand, and over; a fourth part of these can, on an emergency, be spared for the navy, and these, with a small proportion of fresh recruits, would instantly make up a most formidable force for naval operations. The iron and hemp, or its substitute cotton, can easily be found here, and will be supplied as fast as wanted. The only materiel we were ever charged to be wanting in, was scientifick navigators, not hardy seaman, and these we are every day schooling for our requisitions. The two hundred and fifty lieutenants, and the four hundred and sixteen midshipmen, will supply the place of those who in the course of nature pass away, and the list of our veteran naval officers is rapidly diminishing. Those who come up will not naturally be greater men than their predecessors; but it will not be denied that their advantages for obtaining knowledge will be much greater. Bravery remains as it has been-and how could it be exceeded ?-nautical science is advancing with us as in other countries. There is not a discovery in agriculture, the arts, or in manufacturing, that has not a bearing upon our navy, directly or indirectly. The cost of building, supporting, and educating a navy, is now nearly reduced to a standing certainty. The people can at once make calculations for themselves; there is no mystery about the matter; for they can at a glance estimate the expenses of this branch of power. One man from every hundred persons, in our community, and two days labour every year for those persons in our country capable of labour, will support a navy far superiour to whatever the most ambitious statesman will ever ask of the country. And to whom is this paid? All, to ourselves: millions for defence, but not a cent for tribute, was the maxim of our infancy as a nation. This will be perpetual; but a wiser one will be, never to ask, or seek for that power, that will make other nations tributary to us, except, through the medium of a liberal reciprocity in

commerce. That nation is hated, however much it may be feared, who domineers over another from the mere consciousness of power; and that nation despised, that succumbs, while it can maintain its existence and independence by any sacrifices whatever. We must not be too impatient for greatness; we are indeed apt to be so, for we have witnessed what no other nation has before seen, a people grow as rapidly into wealth and power as an enterprising individual ever did. Other nations have waited for centuries, for what we have experienced in the course of half a human life, a fourfold increase. The growth of the navy of our mother country, has been slow, compared with ours,* but in truth no comparison exists. They made their navy for self-existence, and for an extension of power; ours grew out of a spirit of independence, and will we trust be maintained for the same glorious principle. But if all the ships we now own, were sunk in the ocean, and every navy officer with them, gallant, skilful, and intelligent as they are, the American navy would not be destroyed. The navy exists in the hearts and wills of the people; and in the event of its destruction, it would be recreated as certain as the existence of the nation; all prejudices against a navy have been overcome and destroyed forever; and this is sufficient. The permanence of our navy depends on publick opinion, and this is made up irrevocably. The decree of this republick is gone forth; and none but the God of battles can reverse it, and that decree is, the United States must and shall be a naval power, and her flag shall be respected in every quarter of the globe. This decree rests on no contingency, no change of party, no particular administration of government; it is incorporated with our habits, it is a good share of our feelings, and it is, also, a part of our fame. A mighty, a growing people, whose impulses are "thought-executing fires," and whose settled determination is fate, have lifted their voice, and it must be obeyed.

POSTSCRIPT.

ONE word at parting with my readers, by way of explanation and farewell. It has been said by those who are jealous of our rising greatness, that we dwell on the future, and endeavour to show what we shall be in a century or two to come; forgetting the present and the past;-they will not, I trust, charge me with taking this course; for mine certainly has been a different one. The past, almost exclusively, has occupied my attention in these pages, offered to my

* See Appendix, Note E.

countrymen. Among the poets, I have mentioned only two living ones, except by some slight allusion to those who are around me, when it could not fairly be avoided, and these two I have named belong to another age. Among the orators, I remember only one of the living of whom I have given an account, and the same remark would apply to him; and if I have slightly trespassed on this rule, in regard to writers of history and matters of taste, it was only to direct the youthful mind to such works as I thought proper sources of information. Among the painters, I have noticed but one among the living, and for doing this I will not ask forgiveness until the reader has considered that subject; not now; but what a galaxy of distinguished painters, who are in active life, and "buying golden opinions of all sorts of men," are now before me, my countrymen, and some of them my personal friends, that I might have named, and found it delightful to have exhibited, to borrow a phrase from the art itself, in the best lights I was master of. The engravers too, who, with us, have lately sprung up, but whose works are of a high order of genius, would have filled many a page, if justice had been done them, but have scarcely been mentioned in gross; although for them too I was prepared to say something in particular. On our living orators, and I have, perhaps, heard as many of them speak as any one of their admirers, volumes might be written; all these things, and many more, which make up our national mental affluence, I have passed over at present, in order to say, as much as I had leisure to say, of the past-that past which should be dear to us all, not merely because it is the past, but because it was filled up with many great men, and some good things. I have said that I cherished the hope of seeing my book, in some not far distant day, in the hands of school children, in a cheap and proper edition for their use. If my book has errours --and what book is without them?-and particularly one that in this way treats of historical events-What better place can there be to correct these errours, than under the eye of a shrewd instructor, who detects them.

It may be said that all school books should be written with the utmost simplicity, and no words, but such as are strictly household, should be found in them. This may hold good for books intended for very young children; but most certainly, the upper classes of our common schools are capable of understanding any historical subject, in whatever style it may be written. The study of etymology should keep pace with other studies; and words, for whose definitions we resort to the dictionary in the school-room, are remembered with more certainty and accuracy, (for the truth of this remark, I appeal to the experience of every scholar,) than those we occasionally make ourselves acquainted with in a later period of life.

A habit of correct spelling is never learnt, unless it be a matter of memory from elementary instruction; and it is in some measure true as to the signification of words. It is a great errour in education to underrate the capacities of youth. It is not many years ago that algebra was thought to be too severe a study for minds not arrived at a good degree of maturity; and now males and females at fourteen, are often well versed in the science.

I cannot quit this subject, without insisting most strenuously on the propriety of introducing the history of our country, in every proper shape and form, into our publick schools. It may be sometimes in a condensed form, at others, in an extended one; and so often diversified that facts and principles should be lastingly impressed on the minds of the rising generations. It is essentially wrong to commence the history of our own country after we have finished that of other countries; we may then with profit and pride review our history, but it should be read first of all. Would not a mother think the instructor beside himself, who would advise her to teach her child the ancient, or foreign languages, before he began to lisp his vernacular? And is it not equally wrong for him to study the geography and history of all the rest of the world, before he begins to think of his own? An intelligent Englishman once remarked to the writer, that he was astonished to find so many persons in the United States, so well acquainted with British history; and yet, so entirely unable to give an extended, or a minute account of their own. I find but few, (said he) that are not quite at home in our history up to the Saxon heptarchy, but I can get but little out of them respecting your affairs, no further back than the revolution; and this, (he added) I have considered as pretty good evidence that in every thing but political feeling, which is most truly sufficiently opposed to us, you are colonies still; and is not the inference a fair one? When your children and full grown scholars know more of our king and nobility, and our speeches in parliament, than they do about your own politicians, savans and literati? The answer to this was, if we know much of you, we know more of distant countries and ancient history, and would not your reasoning make us colonies of Egypt, Greece, or Rome, as well as of England? If the inference was wrong, the satire was not the less biting, for the facts on which it was founded were nevertheless fairly stated. This errour, however, is not one that originated with us, we have it by direct inheritance; our fathers brought it with them, and it has continued with us ever since. Many a learned Englishman, both now and in former times, could give a better description of every inch of classical ground, than he could of the mountains of Scotland and Wales, and tell you more about the caverns at Delphos than of the

mines of Cornwall, or turn more readily to a page of Strabo than of Guthrie: but it is of little consequence from whence this errour in education arose, if it is only acknowledged to be one; for then it will not take long to correct it. It is not to narrow the circle of information that I strive to induce my countrymen to make our own affairs the centre of that circle; do this, and then extend them as far as you please; to embrace all countries, and ages, and all forms of human knowledge. A youth bred at home, becomes familiar with all in his village, and the country around; his heart and memory never forget a single circumstance of his boyhood; his fishing, skating, and even his truant frolicks, all become endeared to him in after life from the charm of retrospection. His early associations are forever fresh; the farther he is off, the dearer his early associations; his heart, untravelled, fondly turns to the scenes of his childhood; and he contemplates them when he wishes to forget other scenes and many unpleasant events; but had he been educated abroad from his infancy, passed the bloom of his youth in Greece and Italy, had then travelled into Asia, and had in manhood come back to the abodes of his forefathers, would not the gable ends, the Lutheran windows, and the low rooms of the paternal mansion, seem tasteless and almost vulgar? What aunt would he think of? What cousin or her blooming children would he inquire for? He would hardly ask how long his grandfather had been dead, or if the parish church stood in the same place it did when he went away? And I ask if the same process, on a larger scale, is not going on in the mind of the youth, as it regards our country and her history, if he be permitted to begin his education by looking to remote antiquity for instruction and pleasure, and if not there, to those countries whose institutions are of early date, and whose fame is the growth of a thousand years? What to the boy are the tame and common place things of life after he has become familiar with the romance of early history, if his heart had not been previously secured by the sweet affections of the domestick circle? Rivet his soul to them first, and, true as the needle to the pole, his yearnings will be for home, even in the palaces of the Cæsars; and while viewing the dome of St. Peters, on a grand festival, he will think of the village church, where he commingled the love of his dear mother with reverence for his God; and perhaps there the beatings of his heart, as a susceptible and an enamoured being, were first made known to himself. Secure the morning vow of the votary for his country, and every prayer, and vigil, and oath, and sacrifice, will be hers during his life.