enemy from New Orleans. For nearly a week they worked like ants on an ant-hill, making their defenses high and strong-piling up bales of cotton, with trees, earth, and whatever else would serve

Almost daily for a week there was skirmishing between the lines. But on the morning of the 8th of January the grand attack came.

It was led by Sir Edward Pakenham in person, and the attacking party was composed of the very flower of the British army. They marched on, furnished with scaling ladders, with which they meant to scale the formidable redoubt which Jackson's army had erected between them and New Orleans. But the Tennessee and Kentucky sharp-shooters picked off a man every time they fired, and before their unfailing rifles the British ranks grew thinner and thinner. Pakenham, invincible in Spain, was killed while he was cheering on his storming party, and fell back dead in the arms of one of his officers. The redoubt could not be taken even by the troops of Wellington, and leaving over 2,000 men killed and wounded on the field, the British withdrew to their boats, re-embarked, and went to rejoin the fleet." Jackson had lost only a handful of his men. His whole loss in the siege had been only a little more than three hundred. Thus ended the battle of New Orleans, the last bloodshed in the War of 1812.

The angel of peace was already close at hand. On the 11th of February a vessel brought the glad news into New York harbor. A day and a half later it was known in Boston. Couriers, sent with all the speed that horses could travel, carried the good tidings from State to State, from village to village, and peace was celebrated by bonfires and bell-ringing all over the land.

The remaining events of Madison's administration I can tell you in a few words. We were no sooner at peace with England, than Algiers, one of the pirate fraternity of states, made war with America. Decatur, the hero of so many adventures, commanded the

fleet sent to bring the Dey of Algiers to terms. It did not take him long to settle the matter. In a week after he appeared with his fleet in the Mediterranean, the frightened dey sent to beg for a treaty. Decatur made him give up all the Americans he had taken for slaves, pay for the ships he had captured, and promise to ask for no more "presents" from American consuls. The dey paid a good round sum, gave up his American prisoners, and some Danes, whom Decatur took as part payment for his debt, and promised to behave in the future.

Then the country made a great treaty with the Indians, and buried a hatchet in token of continual peace. Indiana, one of the new Territories, which had been growing fast in spite of war, was made a State, and Madison's eight years having expired, James Monroe, his successor, also a Republican and a follower of Jefferson, took his seat in the president's chair on the 4th of March, 1817.

More Pirates.

CHAPTER XV.

MONROE AND ADAMS.

- War with Indians. Lafayette's Visit. Five New States. - Monroe Doctrine. Another President from Massachusetts. - Death of Two Patriots. - Massachusetts and Virginia. - A Democratic President.

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JAMES MONROE was the fifth president of the United States, and the fourth who was born in Virginia. He had begun his career as a lieutenant in the Revolutionary War, and was wounded at the battle of Trenton. From the time of Washington's administration he had served his country in several offices at home and abroad. When he was nominated there was very little opposition, and he made his inaugural address in Washington to the largest number of people who had ever gathered in the capital to see the newly made president take his seat.

Mr. Monroe was president for eight years, as Washington, Madison, and Jefferson had been. His administration was a quiet one, and few important events happened.

There were troublesome pirates-not the Barbary pirates this time but some water-thieves who infested the ports of the West Indies and waylaid our ships there. Brave Oliver Perry, hero of Lake Erie, went down to scatter them, but was taken with yellow fever and died there. So we were obliged to subdue the pirates without help from him.

The Florida Indians, known as Seminoles, also broke out in insurrection. We can but feel a great deal of sympathy with the Indian tribes, when we consider how much reason they had to dread

Jannes Mouvor

the growth of the white man's power. But our sympathy is destroyed almost as soon as it arises by the accounts we read of their barbarous warfare and the cruel treatment of the white people who fell into their hands. Massacres of women and children by these relentless foes began to reach the ears of government, and General Andrew Jackson was sent to subdue them.

Jackson was living quietly at his home, "The Hermitage," in Tennessee, when the order came for him to proceed against the Seminoles. He raised two regiments of sharp-shooters in his native State, and marching to Florida, made quick work of the matter. Jackson never deliberated long upon what he thought a military necessity. If he caught a man, white or Indian, who was stirring up sedition against the government, he hung him. Those he did not hang, he shot. In that way he disposed of all offenders rapidly, and soon made it more quiet in the Indian country. Soon after this, in the year 1821, Spain gave Florida up to the United States, in pay

ment of a claim we held against her. Thus the Territory of Florida, with its old Spanish settlements, and the town of St. Augustine, the most ancient on the continent, became our property. General Jackson was made governor of the newly acquired dominions, and went to live there for a time away from his Hermitage in Tennessee.

One of the pleasantest things that happened in Monroe's administration was the visit of Lafayette to America in the year 1824. This noble Frenchman, only a youth of nineteen when he came tɔ serve in our armies, was now a veteran of sixty-seven. He had fought for liberty in France, as well as for liberty in America, and now visited us to see the result of the experiment of self-government in our nation. His journey through this country was that of a man whom the whole people delighted to honor. Every town and city turned out in gala dress, its maidens in white, its children crowned with flowers, scattering flowers before the nation's guest.

Verdant arches were held aloft that he might ride beneath them; fire-works blazed in his honor; huzzas rent the air. All over the land, wherever he went, the hearts of the people met him in a hearty burst of welcome. Never was welcome more sincere or honors more worthily bestowed. If America had forgotten Lafayette she would have been an ungrateful country who proved herself unworthy the aid her noble champion had given.

One of Lafayette's journeys was made to the tomb of Washington, the commander-in-chief he had revered, the friend he had loved like a son.

On his return to France the United States fitted up a ship to bear him home. It was named the Brandywine, in remembrance of the battle where he had received a wound in fighting for the liberty of America. Thus we bade farewell to Lafayette, whose conduct to America, from first to last, was that of the most disinterested friendship-a friendship rarely found in the annals of history.

While Monroe was president, five new States were admitted. They were Mississippi, Illinois, Alabama, Maine, and Missouri. These show how the country was growing. We had now a Union of twenty-four States. There was a great dispute about the coming in of Missouri, which I will tell you more about hereafter. It was finally settled, and she became a State in the year 1821.

When Monroe had served eight years the country all the time prosperous and peaceful-he gave the chair of state to his successor, John Quincy Adams, and retired to his home in Virginia. The

great feature of his policy is called the "Monroe Doctrine," of which you may have heard. The Monroe doctrine was the theory that the United States should keep out of all the wars and disputes arising in Europe, and that the quarrels of the Old World should never be allowed to affect affairs in the New World. A very sensible doctrine this was too, and one that has served us well. Now we have a second president from Massachusetts.

years.

A son of old John Adams, whom we have seen also in the seat this new president comes forward to occupy. This son has received all the advantages of education and travel which his father's position had given him, and is a dignified gentleman, of rather stiff manners, but of excellent judgment and pure patriotism.

It was in 1825 that he took his seat in the capitol as chief of the nation, with Mr. John C. Calhoun as vice-president. Like Monroe, he had a quiet, undisturbed rule for four country grew constantly in

In these times of peace the manufactures and commerce, while all the time the line of emigrant wagons kept bearing westward the pioneer, who with his axe and plow was making the wilderness blossom with wheat and corn, the true riches of the country.

In 1826, while the nation was celebrating its great anniversary, the 4th of July, two of its historic men passed away from earth. These two men were Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, both of whom had contributed so much to give this birth-day to America. Jefferson died at his home in Monticello. Just as the morning of the 4th was ushered in, he opened his eyes (he had been lying a long time speechless), and murmured, "This is the Fourth of July." At the same hour John Adams was lying on his death-bed in