Vickipedia

PRIVY-CHAMBER, GENTLEMEN OF THE, officers of the royal household of England, instituted by King Henry VII., to attend on the king and queen at court, and in their progresses, diversions, &c. For a number of years past, no services have been required of these officers, and no salary or fee is attached to the office. There are also four Gentlemen Ushers of the Privy-chamber, who are in regular attendance on the sovereign, waiting in the Presence-chamber, and attending on the royal person; they have the honor of conducting her Majesty, in the absence of the higher officers.

SMITHSO’NIAN INSTITUTE, at Washington, District of Columbia, U. S., was organized by act of Congress in 1846, in accordance with the will of James Smithson, who bequeathed the reversion of an estate amounting to 515,169 dollars to the United States of America, to be devoted to ‘the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.’ He was an Englishman, a natural son of Hugh, third Duke of Northumberland, and Mrs. Elizabeth Macie, a niece of Charles, Duke of Somerset. He devoted his life to scientific pursuits, especially to chemistry, and died at Genoa in 1829. The Institute is governed by regents appointed by the Federal government, and has erected a spacious edifice, with museum, library, cabinets of natural history, and lecture-rooms, which occupies a prominent situation at Washington, the capital of the United States. It receives copies of all copyright books, and exchanges with other countries, and its museum is enriched with the gatherings of national exploring expeditions. A portion of its funds is devoted to scientific researches, and the publication of works too expensive for private enterprise. There are departments of Astronomy, Ethnology, Meteorology, and Terrestrial Magnetism. See James Smithson and his Bequest, by Rhees (1881). Among the publications issued are the quarto volumes of the Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, distributed gratis to libraries; Annual Reports, and Miscellaneous Collections. The courses of public lectures by eminent scientific men are among the attractions of the American capital.

PRIVY-COUNCIL (COMMITTEE OF) ON EDUCATION. Till within the last forty years, primary education in England was left in the hands of individuals and societies. The only societies of importance which endeavored to overtake the enormous educational destitution which prevailed, were the British and Foreign School Society, founded under the patronage of George III.; and the National Society, of more recent date- The first-mentioned Society endeavored to get rid of all religious difficulties by avoiding the use of catechisms in the school, and confining themselves to the use of the Bible alone. The Church party, however, felt that in accepting for the children of the country a religious training so vague, they were untrue to their principles, and would probably fail to secure for the young any efficient religious instruction at all. Accordingly, the National Society was set on foot as a specially Church Institution. The object of both these societies was, by means of contributions collected from benevolent persons, to aid in the foundation and maintenance of elementary schools throughout England and Wales.

The prevailing destitution was, however, too widespread to be met by voluntary associations, and it consequently became necessary that the State should take some share in the education of the people. Parliamentary grants of small amount were made, which were distributed by the Treasury under regulations issued .u 1833, the chief of which was as follows : ‘ That no application be entertained by the Treasury unless a sum be raised by private contribution equal, at least, to one-half of the total estimated expenditure.’ These grants were for the purpose of erecting school-buildings. In 1839, after considerable opposition, it was resolved to increase the parliamentary grant, and to appoint a Committee of Her Majesty’s Privy-council to administer it.

On the 3d June 1839, an order of Council laid down, that the grants of previous years not yet appropriated, as well as the grant for the current year, should be expended for the erection of schools, and that �10,000 voted for Normal Schools in 1835 should be given in equal proportions to the British and Foreign and the National Societies. The Privy-council Committee did not at first contemplate aiding any schools but those in connection with the two Societies which we have just named; but in September of 1839, they resolved to aid other schools, where special circumstances prevented their affiliation to the Societies. In the course of a year or two it came practically to this, that all schools were aided in which the Bible was daily read from the authorized version.

The various religious denominations, under the influence, partly, of the strong pecuniary inducement held out by the Committee of Council, now began to exert themselves to erect schools, and to claim state aid. The Committee of Council, seeing the large probable increase in the number of schools requiring to be maintained partially out of the state funds, had their attention specially ‘ directed to the principles of their administration, and the conditions on which alone aid was to be granted. The first measure of importance was the appointment of inspectors of schools. These were appointed by Her Majesty; but the Church of England was permitted to exercise a veto on those nominated for the inspection of Church schools, and the dissenting education committees were allowed a similar privilege with reference to those nominated for dissenting schools. No school was to be admitted to government aid in any form which did not declare its willingness to submit to inspection. The next measure of importance was the determining of the conditions on which aid should be given, first, for the erection, and secondly, for the maintenance of schools.- Grants for the former purpose were given in proportion to the number of children to be educated and the amount of money raised by private contribution.

In 1846, the first step seems to have been made towards making grants for the maintenance of schools. It was resolved to apprentice promising boys and girls, the young persons (who were to be at least thirteen years of age on appointment) giving assistance in the school-work, and receiving separate instruction for one hour and a half daily from the principal teacher.

They were paid salaries rising from �10 by annual increments of �2, 10$. to �20. The teacher received a small extra payment for giving this instruction. The subjects were defined in a broadsheet prepared by the Department, and embraced Euclid, algebra, and the common subjects taught in schools. The apprenticeship was intended to be five years in length; but, in cases of exceptional ability, the period was considerably shortened. These young people were called ‘pupil-teachers.’

In contemplation of the close of the apprenticeship of pupil-teachers, it was further resolved to grant them a scholarship or bursary, to enable them to pursue their studies at one of the numerous male and female normal schools which had come into existence; and at the conclusion of their training, to allow a grant of money to the normal school to which they had resorted. �The Queen’s Scholarship, as the bursary was called, was fixed at �25 for a first class, and �20 for a second, was tenable for two years; and the grants to the normal school at �20, �25. and �30, according as they had trained the student for one, two, or three years� two-thirds of these sums being allowed in the case of female students. It was further necessary to contemplate the completion | of the normal-school training, and to endeavor to secure for the public service the well-trained teachers who had been educated at the public expense. Accordingly, it was resolved to grant to teachers sums ranging from �15 to�30 per annum (and two-thirds of these sums in the case of females), provided the school-buildings in which they taught, and the character of their teaching, were satisfactory to Her Majesty’s inspectors.

A condition, afterwards added, was, that the teacher should receive from local sources, including school-fees, not less than twice the amount paid by government, of which one-half should be from voluntary subscriptions. The amount which the teacher might claim, besides being payable only on the conditions stated above, was made partially dependent on the grade of certificate obtained at the normal school. Certificates are also granted on conditions specified in the Code which is issued annually by the Department.

What is known as ‘ The New Code’ was introduced by Mr. Robert Lowe in 1862. It has undergone alterations every year;

FILTER, FILTRATION. When solid matter is suspended in a liquid in which it is insoluble, it may be separated by various means. Under the article FlNlNG, various methods of causing such suspended matter to collect together and sink to the bottom or float on the surface, and thereby clearing the liquid, are described. The process of filtration consists in passing the liquid through some porous substance, the interstices of which are too small to admit of the passage of the solid particles, the principle of the action being the same as that of a sieve; but as the particles of fluids are immeasurably small, the pores must be extremely minute.

One of the simplest forms of filter is that commonly used in chemical laboratories for separating precipitates, &c. A square or circular piece of blotting-paper is folded in four, the corner where the four folds meet is placed downwards in a funnel, and one side is partly opened, so that the paper forms a lining to the funnel. The liquid passes through the pores of the paper, and the solid matter rests upon it. The chief advantages of this filter are its simplicity, and the ease with which the solid matter be removed and examined.

A simple water-filter for domestic purposes is sometimes made by stuffing a piece of sponge in the bottom of a funnel or the hole of a flower-pot, and then placing above this a layer of pebbles, then a layer of coarse sand, and above this a layer of pounded charcoal three or four inches in depth. Another layer of pebbles should be placed above the charcoal, to prevent it from being stirred up when the water is poured in. It is obvious that such a filter will require occasional cleaning, as the suspended impurities are left behind on the charcoal, &c. This is best done by renewing the charcoal, &c., and taking out the sponge and washing it. By a small addition to this, a cottage-filter may be made, which, for practical use, is quite equal to the most expensive filters of corresponding size. It consists of two flower-pots, one above the other; the lower one is fitted with the sponge and filtering layers above described, and the upper one with a sponge only. The upper pot should be the largest, and if the lower one is strong, the upper one may stand in it, or a piece of wood with a hole to receive the upper pot may rest upon the rim of the lower one. The two pots thus arranged are placed upon a three-legged stool with a hole in it, through which the projecting part of the lower sponge passes, and the water drops into a jug placed below. The upper pot serves as a reservoir, and its sponge stops the coarser impurities, and thus the filtering layers of the lower one may be used for two or three years without being renewed, if the upper sponge be occasionally cleaned. Care must be taken to wedge the upper sponge tightly enough, to prevent the water passing from the upper pot more rapidly than it can filter through the lower one.

A great variety of filters are made on a similar principle to the above, but constructed of ornamental earthenware or porcelain vessels of suitable shape. It would occupy too much space to enter upon the merits of the filters of different makers, especially as there is really very little difference between them in point of efficiency, and nearly all the domestic filters that are offered for sale are well adapted for their required purpose. In purchasing a filter, the buyer must not be satisfied with merely seeing that the water which has passed through it is rendered perfectly transparent�this is so easily done by a new and clean filter�but he should see that the filter is so constructed as to admit of being readily cleansed, for the residual matter must lodge somewhere, and must be somehow removed.

When large quantities of water have to be filtered, this becomes a serious difficulty, and many ingenious modes of overcoming it have been devised. In most of these, water is made to ascend through the filtering medium, in order that the impurities collected on it may fall back into the impure water. Leloge’s ascending filter consists of four compartments, one above the other; the upper part, containing the impure water, is equal in capacity to the other three. This communicates by a tube with the lower one, which is of small height. The top of this is formed by a piece of porous filtering-stone, through which alone the water can pass into the third compartment, which is filled with charcoal, and covered with another plate of porous stone. The fourth compartment immediately above the third, receives the filtered water, which has been forced through the lower stone, the charcoal, and the upper stone. A tap is affixed to this, to draw off the filtered water, and a plug to the second or lower compartment, to remove the sediment.

In the diagram-showing this filter in section, the figures 1, 2, 3, and 4 indicate the corresponding compartments. At f, the top of the tube by which the first and second compartments communicate, a sponge may be placed to stop some of the grosser impurities.

Since 1831, when this filter was contrived, a number of ascending filters have been patented, many of them being merely trifling mollifications of this. Bird’s Siphon Filter is a cylindrical pewter vessel containing the filtering media, and to it is attached a long toil of flexible pewter pipe. When used, the cylinder is immersed in the water-butt or cistern; and the pipe uncoiled and bent over the edge of the cistern, and brought down considerably below the level of the water. It is then started by applying the mouth to the lower end, and sucking it till the water begins to flow, after which it continues to do so, and keeps up a large supply of clear water. This, of course, is an ascending filter, and the upward pressure is proportionate to the difference between the height of the water in the cistern and that of the lower end of the exit tube. See SIPHON. Sterling’s filtering tanks are slate cisterns divided into compartments, the water entering the first, then passing through a coarse filter to a second, and from there through a finer filter to the main receptacle, where the filtered water is stored and drawn off for use.

A common water-butt or cistern may be made to filter the water it receives by the following means : Divide the cistern or butt into two compartments, an upper and a lower, by means of a water-tight partition or false bottom; then take a wooden box or small barrel, and perforate it closely with holes; fit a tube into it, reaching to about the middle of the inside, and projecting outside a little distance; fill the box or barrel with powdered charcoal, tightly rammed, and cover it with a bag of felt: then fit the projecting part of the tube into the middle of the false bottom.

It is evident that the water can only pass from the upper to the lower compartment by going through the felt, the charcoal, and the tube, and thus, if the upper part receives the supply, and the water for use is drawn from the lower part, the whole will be filtered. It is easily cleaned by removing the felt and washing it.

Various means of compressing carbon, into solid porous masses have been patented, and filters are made in which the water passes through blocks of this compressed carbon. Most of these are well adapted for the purpose, but their asserted superiority over filters composed of layers of sand and charcoal is doubtful. A very elegant and convenient portable filter for soldiers, travelers, and others who may require to drink from turbid ponds and rivers, was constructed of Ransom’s filtering stone, and is also made of

the compressed carbon. A small cylinder of the stone or carbon is connected with a flexible India-rubber tube in such a manner that the cylinder may be immersed in a river, the mouth applied to a mouth-piece at the other end of the tube, and the water drawn through the filtering cylinder.

The filtration of water on a large scale will be treated of under WATER-SUPPLY.

Some very interesting experiments were made by Mr. H. M. Witt, to ascertain whether soluble matter, such as common salt, is in any degree removed from water by filtration. Theoretically, it has been assumed that this is impossible, since the filter only acts mechanically in stopping suspended particles; but the results of Mr. Witt’s experiments show that from five to fifteen per cent, of the soluble salts were separated by sand-filters such as above described. This is a curious and interesting subject, well worthy of further investigation. Another most important matter, on which a series of accurate experiments is required, is to ascertain to what extent soluble organic matter may be decomposed by filtration, especially by charcoal filters, and to ascertain how long charcoal and other porous matter retains its property of acting on organic, matter in watery solution. The power of dry charcoal in decomposing organic matter in a gaseous state is well established (see below), and it is also well known that fresh charcoal acts powerfully upon organic matter in solutions, but the extent to which this power is retained in the charcoal of a filter in continuous action has not been satisfactorily ascertained. This is of the highest importance, as it sometimes happens that water of brilliant transparency, and most pleasant to drink, on account of the carbonic acid it contains, is charged with such an amount of poisonous organic matter as to render its use as a daily beverage very dangerous. Charcoal obtained from burning bones is still more efficacious than charcoal from wood. A filter of animal charcoal will render London porter colorless. Loam and clay have similar properties. Professor Way found that putrid mine and sewer-water, when passed through clay, dropped from the filter colorless and inoffensive.

When a liquid contains mucilaginous or other matter having viscous properties, there is considerable difficulty in filtering it. as the pores of the medium become filled up and made water-tight. Special filters are therefore required for syrups, oils, &c. Such liquids as ale, beer, &c., would be exceedingly difficult to filter, and therefore they are clarified by the processes described under fining. Oil is usually passed through long bags made of twilled cotton cloth (Canton flannel). These are commonly 4 to 8 feet long, and 12 to 15 inches in diameter, and are enclosed in coarse canvas bags, 8 or 10 inches in diameter, and thus the inner filtering-bag is corrugated or creased, and a large surface in proportion to its size is thus presented. Syrups are filtered on a small scale by confectioners, &c., by passing them through conical flannel bags, and on a large scale in the creased tag -filter just described. Thick syrups have to be diluted or clarified with white of egg, to collect the sediment into masses, and then they may be filtered through a coarse cloth strainer. Vegetable juices generally require to be treated in this manner.

The simple laboratory filter has to be modified when strong acid or alkaline solutions, or substances which are decomposed by organic matter, require filtration. Pure silicious sand, a plug of asbestos, pounded glass, or clean charcoal, are used for this purpose. B�ttger recommends gun-cotton as a filter for such purposes. He has used it for concentrated nitric acid, fuming sulphuric acid, chromic acid, permanganate of potash, and concentrated solutions of potash and aqua regia. He says that properly prepared gun-cotton is only attacked at ordinary temperatures by acetic ether.

Filtering paper for laboratory purposes requires to be freed from inorganic impurities that are soluble in acids, &c.; this is effected by washing the paper with hydrochloric acid, or, when thick, with nitric and hydrochloric acid, and removing the acid by washing thoroughly with distilled water.

When a considerable quantity of liquid has to pass through a filter, it is sometimes desirable that it should be made to feed itself. In the laboratory, this is done by inverting a flask filled with the liquid over the filtering funnel, the mouth of the flask just touching the surface of the liquid when at the desired height in the funnel. As soon as it sinks below this, air enters the flask, and some liquid falls into the funnel. On a large scale, self-acting filters are fed by the common contrivance of a ball-cock and supply-pipe.

Air-Filters�The extraordinary powers of charcoal in disinfecting the gaseous products evolved from decomposing animal and vegetable matter, have been made available by Dr. Stenhouse in constructing an apparatus for purifying air that is made to pass through it. A suitable cage, containing charcoal in small fragments, is fitted to the opening from which the deleterious gases issue, and is found to render them perfectly inodorous, and probably innocuous. The first application of this was made in 1854, when a charcoal air-filter was fitted up in the justice-room of the Mansion House, London, the window of which opens above a large urinal, the smell of which was very offensive in the room.

The filter at once destroyed the nuisance, and the charcoal has ^Keen found to last many years without the need of renewal. 103 of such filters have been applied to the outlets of the sewers of one district of the city of London, and no bad smell is observable where they are placed, and no obstruction offered to the ventilation of the sewers. They have been applied with like results in two or three county towns. The subject is fully treated by Dr. Stenhouse in a letter to the lord mayor, published by Churchill (London). Charcoal respirators are small air-filters of the same kind applied to the mouth. See RESPIRATOR.

RAPIN DE THOYRAS, PAUL DE, a French historian of England, was descended from a Protestant Savoyard family, which settled in France in the 16th c., and was born at Castres, in Languedoc, March 25, 1661. He studied at the Protestant college of Saumur, and passed as advocate in 1679, but had no liking for the profession; and when the Edict of Nantes (1685) forced him to leave France, he sought employment first in England (where he was unsuccessful), and afterwards in Holland, where he enlisted in a corps of volunteers at Utrecht, formed by his cousin-germain, Daniel de Rapin. With his company, he followed the Prince of Orange to England in 1688, was made ensign in the following year, and distinguished himself by his bravery at the siege of Carrickfergus, the battle of the Boyne, and the siege of Limerick, where he was shot through the shoulder by a musket-bail. In 1693, he was appointed tutor to the Earl of Portland’s son, with whom lie traveled in Holland, Germany, and Italy, after which he took up his residence at the Hague; but in 1707, withdrew with his family to Wesel, in the duchy of Cleves, where lie devoted the remaining 17 years of his life to the composition of his great work. The severity of his labors is believed to have shortened his days. He died May 16, 1725. R.’s Histoire d’Angleterre was published at the Hague in 8 vols., the year before his death. It was undoubtedly, as Voltaire has said, the best work on English history that had until then appeared : full, minute, careful in citing authorities, clear, rapid and accurate in narration, methodical in the arrangement of its materials, comparatively impartial in spirit, and yet betraying on the part of the author an honorable reverence for law and liberty. B. begins with the invasion of Britain by the Romans, and ends with the death of Charles I. The work was continued to the death of William III. by David Durant (Hague, 2 vols., 1734). The best edition of the Histoire in its augmented form is by Lefebvre de Saint-Marc (Hague, 16 vols., 1749 et seq.). The original was translated into English by the Rev. Nicholas Tindal, M.A. (Lond. 15 vols., 1725�1731), and subsequently by John Kelly, barrister (in 2 vols. fol.).

PRIVY-COUNCIL (consilium regis privatum), an assembly of advisers on matters of state appointed by the sovereign. The Privy-council of England existed at a very early period in the history of the country. It was in its beginning a small permanent committee, or minor council, selected by the king out of the great council, or parliament; and in its powers were included� what still forms one of its functions�the right to inquire into all offences against the state, and to commit offenders for trial before the proper courts of law. It also frequently assumed the cognizance of questions of private right, a practice against which the statute 16 Charles I. c. 10 was directed, enacting that neither king nor council should have any jurisdiction in matters regarding the estates and liberties of the subject, which should be tried in the ordinary tribunals of the country. The Council in early times consisted of the Chancellor, the Treasurer, the Justices of either bench, the Escheaters, the Serjeants, some of the principal Clerks of the Chancery, and other members nominated by the king, who were generally bishops, earls, and barons. The Star-chamber and Court of Bequests were both committees of Privy-council. The number of members, which had originally been 12, was gradually increased; and when the large number had become inconvenient, the sovereign sought the advice of a select body of the more influential among them.

Charles II. limited the number of councillors to 30, 15 of whom comprised the chief officers of state and the ex officio members, to whom were added 10 peers and 5 commoners named by the sovereign; and it was intended that the Council, thus remodelled, should practically resume its original duties, and have the control of every part of the executive administration. The Court of Privy-council has, however, long ceased to discharge the function of advising the crown on the general affairs of government and state policy, a select number of the body, under the denomination of the Cabinet Council, forming the recognized executive council of the crown. See MINISTRY. The list of privy-councillors now includes the members of the royal family, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishop of London, the great officers of state, the Lord Chancellor and judges of the Courts of Equity, the Chief Justices of the Courts of Common Law, the Ecclesiastical and Admiralty Judges, and the Judge Advocate, several of the Puisne Judges, the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Ambassadors, some of the Ministers Plenipotentiary and Governors of Colonies, the Commander-in-chief, the Master-general of the Ordnance, the First Lord of the Admiralty, and generally also a Junior Lord of the Admiralty, as well as necessarily all the members of the Cabinet. The Vice-president of the Board of Trade, the Paymaster of the Forces, and the President of the Poor-law Board, are also generally members of the Privy-council; and sometimes other persons who have filled responsible offices under the crown. It is now understood that no members attend the deliberations of Council except those who are especially summoned. In ordinary cases, only the ministers, the great officers of the Household, and the Archbishop of Canterbury are summoned; but on some extraordinary occasions, summonses ore sent to the whole Council�this was last done to receive her Majesty’s communication of her intended marriage. Meetings of Council are usually held at intervals of three or four weeks at her Majesty’s residence; and the attendance of six privy-councillors at least, with one of the clerks of Council, is considered necessary to constitute a council.

A privy-councillor must be a natural-born subject of Great Britain. The office is conferred by the sovereign’s nomination, without any patent or grant, and complete by taking the oath of office. The duties of a privy-councillor, as defined by this oath, are�to the best of his discretion, duly and impartially to advise the king; to keep secret his council; to avoid corruption; to strengthen the king’s council in all that by them is thought good for the king and his land; to withstand those who attempt the contrary, and to do all that a true councillor ought to do to his sovereign lord. The office of privy-councillor formerly fell by the demise of the crown; but by 6 Anne, c. 7, the Privy-council continues to exist for six months longer, unless sooner determined by the successor. Immediately on the decease of the sovereign, the Privy-council now assembles and proclaims his successor, the Lord Chancellor affixing the Great Seal to the proclamation. The members of the Privy-council are then re-sworn as council of the successor, and take the oath of allegiance, after which a privy-council is held, and the sovereign makes a declaration of his designs for the good government of the realm, and subscribes the requisite oaths.

The king in Council, or a committee of the Lords of Council, have been empowered by various statutes to issue orders which are to have the force of law, parliament thus delegating its authority to regulate such matters as may be more conveniently regulated by Order in Council. In cases of extreme public emergency, at a time when parliament was not sitting, Orders in Council have sometimes been issued in contravention of the existing law, and the indemnification of parliament has afterward been sought. See ORDERS IN COUNCIL. The sovereign, with the advice of the Privy-council, is also empowered to issue proclamations, which, however, must be in accordance with, and in furtherance of, the law of the land. See PROCLAMATION.

Almost every act of importance done by the sovereign in person is performed in Council�such as declarations of, or public engagements by, the sovereign, and consent to marriages by members of the royal family. Among the functions of the Privy-council are also the appointment of sheriffs in England and Wales, and the issuing of orders for the laying on or removing of quarantine, or for granting reprisals, or for embargoes. The sovereign ‘in Council has still more ample authority in all that relates to the colonies, including the making and enforcing of laws in such colonies as have no representative assemblies; and approving or disallowing the legislative acts of such as do possess them.

A large part of the business of the Privy-council is transacted by committees, to which petitions and other matters are submitted by the queen in Council. Among the permanent committees of Privy-council are the Board of Council for Trade and Foreign Plantations (see TRADE, BOARD OF); the Committee of Council for Education, appointed in 1839, to distribute the sum voted annually for educational purposes; and the Judicial Committee of Privy-council. This last-named committee consists of the Lord President, Lord Chancellor, Lords Justices, Lords of Appeal, and other great judicial officers, as well as privy-councillors who have held such offices, with any two other privy-councillors who may be named by the sovereign. It was established by 3 and 4 Will. IV. c. 41, for the purpose of deciding certain questions of right of privilege, particularly with regard to the colonies, and hearing certain appeals. Among these were appeals from the Courts of Equity, colonial appeals, and the causes reviewed by the Court of Delegates. The powers of the Privy-council were enlarged by 6 and 7 Vict. c. 68. Part of its jurisdiction was, however, abolished by the Judicature Act of 1873 and subsequent years. This act still left, for a time, the Privy-council the Court of Appeal for the British colonies and dominions abroad, though it was provided that appeals thence should ultimately be referable to the newly constituted Court of Appeal (see appeal).

To the latter court were transferred appeals from the Court of Admiralty and in Orders in Lunacy. But the Privy-council is still the great court of appeal in ecclesiastical matters. The acts of committees of the Privy-council are designated Acts of the Lords in Council, in contradistinction from Orders in Council, made by the sovereign, who is personally present, by advice of the Privy-council. The crown may refer to a Committee of Council any petition or claim of right for which the ordinary tribunals afford no remedy. The Lords of Council constitute a Court of Record for the investigation of offences against the state, the offenders being committed for trial before the ordinary tribunals. Certain state investigations, not of a criminal kind, have also been held to fall within their jurisdiction, such as the inquiry into the insanity of George III., the claim of Queen Caroline to the crown as consort of George IV., and questions regarding alleged illegal marriages of the royal family.

The Privy-council is styled collectively ‘ Her Majesty’s most Honorable Privy-council.’ Privy-councillors are entitled to the designation ‘Right Honorable’ prefixed to their name, and take precedence next after Knights of the Garter. The personal security of a member of Privy-council was formerly guarded by certain statutes, visiting with fine a blow struck in his house or presence, and making it felony to conspire against him or assault him in the execution of his office; but these immunities were done away with by 9 Geo. IV. 31.

The Lord President of the Council is the fourth great officer of state, and is appointed by letters-patent under the Great Seal. The office is very ancient, and was revived, by Charles II. in favor of the Earl of Shaftesbury.

Scotland possessed a Privy-council, which was merged in that of England by 6 Anne, c. 6. There is a Privy-council for Ireland, which at present consists of 58 members, who are sworn pursuant to a sign-manual warrant directed to the Lord Lieutenant.

FICTION OF LAW has been defined to be ‘ a supposition of law that a thing is true, which is either certainly not true, or at least is as probably false as true.’�Erskine, lust. iv. 2, 38. Fictions have existed in all legal systems. They must be regarded as a species of legal fraud, which has been tolerated as enabling individuals who, by the strict letter of the law, would have been excluded from obtaining redress of evils, to procure that remedy by a pious fraud. There are two general maxims which regulate the application of fictions�viz., that no fiction shall be allowed to operate a wrong, and that no fiction shall be admitted which in the nature of things is impossible. The Roman form of judicial procedure abounded with fictions, by which alone, in many cases, a party aggrieved could enforce his right. Thus, an heir, unjustly disinherited, by the querela inofficiosi testamenti, feigned that his father had been mad. A stranger in Rome, who had been robbed, could not obtain restitution without the fictio civitatis, whereby he feigned himself a citizen. Many of the fictions existing in Rome have found a counterpart in modem systems; thus, the fictio long� manus , whereby lands at a distance were feigned to be delivered, resembles an English feoffment at law. In like manner, the fictio traditionis symbolic� of keys of a warehouse to give possession of the articles contained therein, and of a deed in confirmation of the covenants contained therein. The fictio unitatis personarum was the original of the Scottish fiction, that the heir is eadem persona cum defuncto. But in no system of laws have fictions been so liberally adopted as in that of England. It is by means of fictions alone that the original limited jurisdiction of the courts of Queen’s Bench and Exchequer has been extended to ordinary suits. In the latter court, every plaintiff assumed that he was a debtor to the crown, and was debarred from discharging his obligation by the failure of the defendant to satisfy his demand; in the former, it was assumed that the defendant had been arrested for some supposed trespass which he had never in fact committed.

The fictitious characters of John Doe and Richard Roe long contributed to make the action of ejectment famous. And though these fictions have disappeared before the ruthless hand of modern legislation, yet to this day, in an action at the instance of a father for the seduction of his daughter, damages can only be awarded on the assumption that she was his servant, and that he has suffered pecuniary loss by deprivation of her services. In Chancery, again, the whole doctrine of uses and trusts is based upon a fiction. Perhaps the best explanation of the introduction of fictions into legal systems is to be found in Dr. Colquhoun’s Summary of the Roman Civil Law, 2027. It involves, he says, ‘ less difficulty to adhere to known and admitted forms, and gradually to accommodate them to the changed state of society, than to upset all the incidents connected with them by a sudden change, which must ever tend to unsettle the law and practice of the courts. All nations have therefore found it more desirable to let the one glide into the other, than to adopt any abrupt measure which might disturb the practice and effect of former decisions. In the law of Scotland, fictions of law are not of frequent occurrence. For the benefit of creditors, the principle that the hen-is eadem persona cum defuncto is admitted; and in an action of ‘ Reduction-improbation ‘ of a deed, it is assumed that the document was false, whether the fact be so or not. But in general the legal system of Scotland has shown a facility of adapting itself to the circumstances of the case, and that without producing the alarming results which presented themselves to the imagination of Dr. Colquhoun.

UNITED STATES OP AMERICA, a federated republic, composed of 88 independent states, eight organized and two other territories, and a federal district, occupies the central portion of the continent of North America, from hit. 24° 30′ to 49° 24′ N., long. 68° 50′ to 124° 45′ W., exclusive of Alaska. Its greatest length, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, is 2760 miles; greatest breadth, from Minnesota to Texas, 1600; northern or British frontier, 3540 miles; Mexican. 1550 miles; ocean coast, including the larger indentations. 12,609 miles, of which 6861 are on the Atlantic, 3461 on the Gulf of Mexico, and 2281 on the Pacific. The area of the U. S., as revised at the census of 1880. is 3.602,990 sq. in. The vastness of this territory will be best recognized by remembering that the total area of Europe is but little greater, being estimated at 3,826,000 sq. in. Texas, one of the states, is itself considerably greater in extent than the Austro-Hungarian Empire; and there are four other states or territories, each larger than the United Kingdom.

In 1783, the U. S. had an area of only 827,844 sq. in.; by the purchase of Louisiana from France in 1803, it acquired 1,171,931; by the cession of Florida by Spain in 1819, 59,270; by the annexation of Texas in 1845, 376,000; by the Oregon Treaty with Great Britain in 1846, 280,425; by the Mexican treaties, 677,260; and by the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867, 577,390 sq. m.

The 38 states composing the Federal Republic, each having its constitution, legislature, executive, and judiciary, and represented in the Federal Congress by two senators, and from 1 to above 30 representatives, according to its population, may be arranged in six groups, as in the accompanying table.

The eight organized territories are governed by the Federal Congress, with governors and judiciary appointed by the President of the U.S., but have a local legislature, and send a delegate without a vote to Congress. There is also the Indian Territory, a reserve for Indian tribes removed from the east of the Mississippi River; and unorganized region west of this, called Public Lands; the district of Columbia (60 sq. m.), ceded by Maryland, including Washington, the Federal capital, governed by Congress; and Alaska, under military rule. All these states and territories are described separately.

The original thirteen states are those which are marked in the table as having been admitted between 1787 and 1790. At the outbreak of the Civil War, there were fifteen slave-holding states; in the table they are the south-eastern and southern states, together with Nos. 10, 11, 12, and 27 (11 being then part of 13). In 1881 the preliminary steps were taken for having the southern half of Dakota delineated as a new territory, with the name of Pembina.

Physical Character.—Though occupying the central portion of a continent, more than two-thirds of the frontiers of the U. S. are shores of lakes and oceans, with numerous bays and sounds, rivers, and lakes. The principal lakes, besides those divided with British America, are Lake Champlain, Lake Michigan, Great Salt Lake, Pyramid Lake, Mono Lake. Lake Tulare. and many beautiful clusters of smaller lakes in Maine, New York, Minnesota, &c.

The rivers of the U. S. may be classed in four divisions : 1. The Mississippi and its branches (q. v.); 2. The rivers emptying into the Atlantic or its bays and sounds—the St. Croix, Penobscot, Kennebec, Merrimac, Connecticut, Hudson, Delaware, Susquehanna, Potomac, James, Roanoke, Neuse, Cape Fear, Pedee, Santee. Savannah, Altamaha, St. Johns, &c.; 3. Those, besides the Mississippi, emptying into the Gulf of Mexico—the Chattahoochee, Alabama, Tombigbee, Pearl, Sabine, Trinity, Brazos, Colorado, Nueces, and Rio Grande; 4. Those emptying into the Pacific—the Oregon or Columbia, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Colorado, &c. Besides these, there are many small rivers emptying into the great lakes, and finding their outlet through the St. Lawrence; and the rivers which empty into the salt lakes of the great interior basin of Utah.

The chief mountains of America are those of the Alleghanies and the Rocky Mountains; for the extraordinary scenery of the west, see YELLOWSTONE; also COLORADO and YOSEMITE.— The geology of the U. S. will be found under the titles AMERICA, APPALACHIANS, ROCKY MOUNTAINS, and the several states.— The soil is of every variety, from the sterile deserts of the great western plains and Utah, to the inexhaustible fertility of the bottom-lands of the Mississippi Valley, where heavy crops of maize have grown for fifty successive years without manuring. The St. Lawrence basin is an elevated calcareous plain, fertile and well wooded. The Atlantic slope from Maine to New Jersey, east of the Hudson, is hilly, and best adapted for grazing; more southerly, the coast-belt is low, sandy, in places swampy, with pine-barrens, the inland region fertile, and among the best in the country. The Mississippi valley is generally level, and prairie-land of unsurpassed fertility, with a rich mould, in places 25 feet deep. North-west, the country rises to a high and sterile region, extending from 200 to 400 miles from the base of the Rocky Mountains. The Texas slope has rich bottom-lands on the coast, a fine rolling fertile country, rising to a high plateau, dry and sterile, except in the river-bottoms. The Pacific slope is generally sterile, except the great valleys between the mountain-ranges, and bordering the rivers, which are of great fertility.

Utah, with the exception of a few fertile spots, is a desolate untimbered region of salt lakes and land saturated with alkaline substances. The country east of the Mississippi, except the prairies of Illinois and Indiana, was, at its settlement, heavily wooded, and there are still vast forests of valuable timber—beech, birch, maple, oak, pine, hemlock, spruce, walnut, hickory, ash, elm, &c-; and in the south, live oak, water oak, magnolia, palmetto, tulip-tree, cypress, cotton-wood, cane, &c. West of the 97th meridian stretches a vast region of almost treeless prairies; forests again occur in the Rocky Mountains, and California, Oregon, and Washington Territory have the largest timber in the world. The flora and fauna will be found under the head NORTH AMERICA (Botany. Zoology), and the several states.

Population.—The growth of the population will be best seen from the table, which shows the rapid increase of the inhabitants of the Republic at various censuses from 1800 to that of 1880. How far this is due to foreign immigration is shown by some appended figures. It is to be noted that the census figures for the various states do not include in their totals, the tribal or wild Indians within their limits. These are estimated apart, but the civilized or settled Indians are reckoned along with their neighbors of European stock. A separate column shows the number of the colored persons.

At the census of 1880 there were 64 cities in the U. S. with between 20,000 and 50,000 inhabitants; 15 between 50.000 and 100.000; 10 between 100.000 and 200,000; 3 between 200.000 and 300,000; 3 between 300,000 and 400.000; 2 between 400,000 and 500,000; 1 (Philadelphia) over 800,000; and 1 (New York) with upwards of 1,200,000. It was found that of the 18 most populous cities of the U. S., 6 had increased since 1870 by from 20 to 30 per cent. 4 from 30 to 50, 4 from 50 to 71, and 1 (Milwaukee) 92 per cent.

No country has been peopled by such a variety of races. New England was settled by English Puritans, and a few Scottish and Welsh; New York, by Dutch; Pennsylvania, by Quakers and Germans; Maryland, by English Roman Catholics; Delaware and New Jersey, by Dutch and Swedes; Virginia, by English cavaliers; the Carolinas, in part by French Huguenots; Louisiana, by French; Florida, Texas, and California, by Spanish; Utah, by Mormons, chiefly from England, Wales, and Denmark. Immigration from Ireland, Germany, England, Scotland, France, Switzerland, Sweden has been large and progressive. Of the total of 50.155.783 reckoned in the census, 25.518,820 were males, and 24,636,963 females; 43,475,840 were native born, and 6,679,943 were whites, foreign born, 105,465 were Chinese, 148 Japanese, and 66,407 were civilized Indians. The table shows separately the tribal Indians, and the occupants of the Indian territory. Of the whites foreign born, 2,772,169 were natives of the United Kingdom; 1,966,742 were Germans; 717,084 British Americans; 194,327 Norwegians; 181,729 Swedes; 106,971 French. It is said that the Irish and the Germans, with their descendants

constitute one-third of the entire population; about 10,000.000 being set down as of Irish descent, and 6.000,000 of German stock. From 1820 to 1880, the immigrants from Great Britain and Ireland numbered over 4,700,000. The current of immigration which goes to swell the grand total is very large, but fluctuates from year to year. Between 1870 and 1880 it varied from 138.000 in 1877, to 457.000 in 1880; in 1881 it reached the enormous aggregate of 669,431.

Climate.—For a particular account of the climate of the U. S., we refer to the articles RAIN and TERRESTRIAL TEMPERATURE. It is remarkable for wide transitions of cold and heat, rain and drought, except in the peninsula of Florida, where the temperature varies but 12° F., and Western Oregon and Washington Territory, where the climate is like that of England. With few exceptions, the summers are hot, both north and south, the thermometer rising at times to 110° F., and along the northern range of states sinking to—20°, and even sometimes as low as— 40°. The whole Atlantic coast has a winter temperature 10° lower than that of Western Europe in the same latitude. Thus, at New York, in the latitude of Madrid, the Hudson River is frozen, and the harbor at times filled with floating ice.

The causes modifying the climates of the different portions of the states chiefly arise out of the physical features; of which the Rocky Mountains, the Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic, and the lake system in the north are the most prominent. On the west, from the shores of the Pacific to the Cascade Mountains, one of the most important ranges of mountains in America, the climate resembles that of Great Britain more closely than that of any other country in the world, being mild and humid, with frequent showers at all seasons. But the great valley lying between the Cascade and the Kooky Mountains is almost entirely a rainless district, because the westerly winds are drained of their moisture in crossing the Cascade Mountains before arriving there. In winter, it is covered with snow, but in summer is dry and arid. Owing, however, to the copious streams poured down from the melting snow, it presents abundant facilities for irrigation, so that its capabilities and resources are great, if they were properly developed. The country east of the Rocky Mountains depends for its rain on the Gulf of Mexico; and the rainfall there is distributed most in the low plains, and least on the plateaux and mountains. Hence over this extensive district southerly winds are warm and moist, and westerly and northerly dry and cold.

The result is rapid alternations of temperature, such as are never experienced in Western Europe, the temperature having frequently a range in the course of a day of 50° or 60°. In the New England states, the northerly and easterly winds are cold moist, and chilly, accompanied with frequent fogs; otherwise the climate resembles that of Great Britain. The climate of the states surrounding the great lakes in the north is mild and moist in summer as compared with the other northern states; but in winter, when the lakes are frozen over, a degree of cold is experienced greater, absolutely and relatively, then anywhere else in the states. This excessive cold is caused by the country being exposed in the north to the full sweep of the polar current from the north; but more particularly to its low-lying situation, thus forming, as it were, a vast basin into which is poured from all sides the cold, and therefore heavy, currents of air chilled by terrestrial radiation during the winter season.—The health of the U. S. varies with climate, elevation, &c. Swamps and river-bottoms in some regions, especially the more fertile, are malarious. The rice-swamps of Georgia and Sooth Carolina are fatal to whites, but not to negroes. In vast tracts of new country, even the rolling and hilly, the disturbance of the soil causes intermittent fevers. Diseases of the lungs prevail in the northern and middle states, bilious fevers in the southern; in the western, intermittent and remittent bilious.

In 1850, the average mortality was 1 in 72, varying rather widely in different regions, modified not only by climate, but by the presence of large towns, and by immigration and emigration. In 1870, the lowest rates of mortality were 0′69 per cent, in Oregon, 0′80 in Minnesota, and 0′81 in Iowa; the highest were 1-77 per cent, in Massachusetts (with numerous manufacturing towns), and 2 in Louisiana (with yellow fever). Of the larger cities in 1880, Charleston had a death-rate of 32 per 1000, New York, 26; Baltimore, Brooklyn, and New Orleans, 24; Boston, 23; Washington, 22; Cincinnati, Cleveland, Chicago, and Philadelphia, 20; San Francisco and St. Louis, 19. Probably no portion of the world is more salubrious than Vermont, the eastern slope of the Alleghanies, California, and Oregon.

Mineralogy.—The U. S. are rich in mineral productions. Coal is found in every state except Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New Jersey, Delaware, South Carolina, Louisiana, Mississippi, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Nevada. The area of the coal-measures is estimated at 300,000 sq. miles. The whole extent of the coal area in the U. S. has been divided into four principal coal-fields or tracts—viz., the Great Central Alleghanian or Appalachian coalfield, extending from Alabama, through Eastern Tennessee and Kentucky, Western Virginia, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and reappearing in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. This field has been computed to cover within the U. S. an area of 50,000 to 60,000 sq. m., of which about 40,000 sq. m. are considered workable area.

The second coal-field occupies the greater part of Illinois and Indiana, and in extent is nearly equal to the first. A third field covers a large portion of Missouri; and the fourth, of Michigan. The Chesterfield bituminous coal-field, a small district near Richmond, contains the oldest collieries in America. The petroleum springs form a source of great wealth. Beds of rich marl are found in several of the eastern states, and in many, nitrates and carbonates of soda, and potassia, gypsum, and marble of great variety, and some of rare beauty. Iron is found everywhere, from the pure metal in mountain masses, to bog-ore; and in many places in close proximity to coal. Lead exists in rich deposits in Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, and Iowa. Copper is found in several states, and in great quantities of ores of 71 to 90 per cent, on the borders of Lake Superior. Zinc exists in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and tin in Maine and California. There are rich silver mines in Colorado, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Gold is found in small quantities in some of the Atlantic coast states; in great quantities in California, Oregon, Colorado, Nevada, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, and Montana. There are also found platinum and mercury in California, osmium and iridium in Oregon, cobalt in North Carolina and Missouri, and nickel in Connecticut and Pennsylvania. The value of the produce of American mines increased by 90 per cent, in the period 1870—1880, and amounted in the latter year to 72 millions sterling. Over 91 millions of tons of iron ore were raised in 1880 (more than twice as much as in 1870); 20,300 tons of copper ore; 66 millions of tons of coal; and 860 millions of gallons of petroleum (20 times as much as in 1870). A value of $34,700,000 of gold was obtained in 1881, and $43,000,000 of silver.

Agriculture.—Agriculture holds the first place in the national industry. In 1871, the acreage of hay was 10.009.052; maize, 34,091,137; wheat, 19,943.893; oats, 8,365.800. The average size of farms, nearly all held by their cultivators in fee-simple, was 153 acres. In 1880, the acreage of maize was 52.965.000 acres, and of wheat, 36,000,000. The cereal crops of 1879 and 1880 were the largest ever known. The production of wheat in 1879 was 448,-000,000 bushels, in 1880 it was 480,000.000; and of maize, 1,577,000 were produced in 1880. The advance in production between 1870 and 1880 was unprecedented, amounting to about 100 per cent., taking all kinds of grain produce; whereas, in 1860 to 1870, it was but 12 per cent. The production of cotton advanced from 1540 million lbs. in 1870 to 2773 millions in 1880. More than two-thirds of the world’s cotton crop is grown in the states. Till 1859 the U. S. used occasionally to import wheat from Europe; now they produce one-fourth of the world’s crop, and have a yearly surplus of 150.000,000 bushels. Between 1870 and 1880 the horses in the U. S. increased from 8,690.000 to 12.550,000; cows from 28,000,000 to 33,600.000; sheep from 28.500,000 to 38,000,000; hogs from 25.200,000 to 35.000,000. The shipments of cattle and meat from the U.S., which have enormously increased of late, exceeded, in 1880, the value of $25.000_:000. The wine produce has steadily increased to about 20,800.000 gallons. Other important agricultural products are sugar, rice, tobacco, and vast quantities of fruits, varying in the various sections of the Republic. It has been estimated that the animal income of the U.S. from agricultural industries is about $3.000.000.000. as compared with $1,900,000,000 for France, and $1,325,000,000 for the United Kingdom.

Fisheries.—The fisheries of the U. S. employ from 800.000 to 1,000,000 persons, and give an annual yield of $27,300.000 (the yield of the British fisheries alone exceeding this aggregate ) Pisciculture is diligently and most scientifically practised and with the best results.

Manufactures.—The manufactures of the U. S. increased about 30 per cent, in the period 1870 to 1880. In the making of flour, the states are foremost in the world, the annual product being nearly 4i billion dollars. In regard to textile manufactures’, they come next after England, and make about one-sixth of the entire produce of the world. Between 1870 and 1880 the consumpt of cotton rose from 530 million lbs. to 911 millions, and of wool from 204 to 258 millions. In 1880, the combined produce of cotton and woollen manufactures in the U. S. was valued at $420,000,000. The total silk manufactures are valued at $34,000,-000. The progress of iron and steel is marvelous; iron having risen in the past decade from 1,580,000 to 4,290,000 tons a year, and steel from 40,000 to 800.000 tons (both these quantities being-surpassed by Great Britain). The Americans now make one-fifth of the iron, and one-fourth of the steel of the world. The flour trade employs 3,000,000 workmen, and textile manufactures 3.500,000. The chief manufacturing states are Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.

Commerce.—The total value of imports into the U. S. rose from $462.380,000 in 1870 to $760.990.000 in 1880; that of exports of American produce, from $420,500,000 to $841.501,000 (the coin and bullion imported in 1880, $93,000,000, exceeding that exported, $85,240,000). The imports from Great Britain and Ireland were nearly $175,000,000 in 1870, and a little over $154,000,-000 in 1880; the exports thither were only $305.000,000 in the former year, and $535,000,000 in the latter. The chief imports into the United States are cotton goods; iron, wrought and un-wrought; linen and woollen manufactures. The chief exports are wheat and flour, cotton, tobacco, pork and hams, butter and cheese. More than one half of the exports of the U. S. go to the United Kingdom, the rest mainly to Canada, France, and Germany. Port entries of the U. S. doubled between 1870 and 1880 (16,193,000 tons entered in 1879); and the value of the carrying trade by land and sea has advanced greatly, though the shipping on the high seas has declined from $43,000″000 to $40.500,000.

Railways, &c.—The U. S. possesses an enormous extent of navigable rivers, canals, and railways. The Mississippi and its branches afford 20,000 miles of steamboat navigation. Canals unite the waters of the Hudson River with Lakes Champlain, Ontario, and Erie in New York, the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers in Pennsylvania, the Ohio with Lake Erie in Ohio and Indiana, and the Mississippi with Lake Michigan in Illinois. Other canals make with these an extent of 3500 miles. Railways extend from the lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific. There were in operation in 1880, 85,000 miles of railway. Railways have doubled in ten years. New main lines of communication are the Southern Pacific (from Galveston by Topeka and Santa Fe), and the Northern Pacific, from St. Paul to the west.

Education and Religion-—The benevolent, literary, and scientific institutions of the U. S. are generally state institutions, accounts of which will be found under the heads of the respective states. The exceptions are the Smithsonian Institute (q. v.), American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Academy of Sciences, and military and naval academies and hospitals.—In the U. S. are about 350 colleges (including UNIVERSITIES, q. v.), 120 theological seminaries, 100 medical schools, 40 law schools, great numbers of academies or high schools, and female seminaries. Free common schools are established in nearly all the states, sufficient for universal education, supported by taxes, school funds, and, in all the new states, the reservation of one or two sections of land, of 648 acres each, in every township. In 1880, there were near 4000 public libraries, with near 18,000,000 volumes (including in the total the district school libraries). Literary societies abound, and courses of lectures are largely provided. The press is very active. In 1871, there were 6056 periodical publications (637 daily); in 1881, there were above 8000 (1000 daily).

Religion is free from any interference of either the Federal or state governments, and all denominations exist in entire freedom upon the voluntary principle. The numbers of the principal religious denominations were as follows in 1880 :

Constitution, Government, &e.—The government of the U. S. is one of limited and specific powers; strictly defined by a written constitution, framed by a convention of the states in 1787, which went into operation after being ratified by the thirteen original states in 1789, by which instrument the several states, having their independent republican governments, conferred upon a Federal Congress, executive, or President, and judiciary, such powers as were necessary to ‘ form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, and secure the blessings of liberty.’ The legislative powers granted to the Federal government are vested in a Congress of the U. S.. consisting of a Senate of two senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof; and a House of Representatives, consisting of one or more members from each state, elected by all male citizens over 21 years of age; so that the states, large and small, have each 2 votes in the senate, and from 1 to above 30 in the House of Representatives, which consists, after 1883, of 325 members, or 1 to 154.325 of population (In 1873, 293 members). The senator must be 30 years old, and is chosen for 6 years; the representative 25 years old, and for two years. Senators and representatives, by an act of Congress passed in 1874, are paid $5000 per annum, with traveling expenses. The Senate is presided over by the vice-president; and is a high court for trial of cases of impeachment.

It also confirms the appointments of the President, and ratifies treaties made with foreign powers. Revenue bills originate in the House of Representatives. Bills passed by both Houses, within the limits of their constitutional powers, become laws, on receiving the sanction of the President; or, if returned with his veto, may be passed over it by two-thirds of both Houses.

By the constitution, the states granted to Congress power, ‘ to lay and collect taxes, duties, imports, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States;’ to borrow money; to regulate commerce; to establish uniform naturalization and bankruptcy laws; to coin money, and fix the standards of weights and measures, and punish counterfeiting; to establish post-offices and post-roads; to secure patents and copyrights; punish piracies; declare war; raise armies and navy; to call out the militia, reserving to the states to appoint their officers; and to govern the district of Columbia, and all places purchased for forts, arsenals, &c., with the consent of the state legislatures. All powers not expressly granted are reserved to the states or the people; but the states, though sovereign and independent under the constitution, with all powers of local legislation, eminent domain (i. e.,. absolute possession of the soil), and power of life and death, with which neither President nor Congress can interfere, cannot make treaties, coin money, levy duties on imports, or exercise the powers granted to Congress.

The executive of the Federal government is a President, chosen by an electoral college, equal in number to the senators and representatives, elected by the people of the states. He must be a native of the U. S., 35 years old, and is elected for a term of four years, and may be re-elected without limit. His salary is $50.000 a year. The Vice-president, who, in case of the death of the President, succeeds him, is President of the Senate. If he should die after becoming President, his successor would be chosen by Congress. The President, by and with the consent of the Senate, appoints a cabinet, consisting of the Secretaries of State and Foreign Affairs, Treasury, War, Navy, Interior, the Postmaster-general, and Attorney-general. These officers have salaries of $8000 a year, have no seats in Congress, and are solely responsible to the President, who also appoints directly, or through his subordinates, the officers of the army and navy—of which he is commander-in-chief—the justices of the Federal judiciary, revenue-officers, postmasters, &c.—in all about 100,000.

The judiciary consists of a supreme court, with one chief-justice and seven assistant-justices, appointed by the President for life, and district judges in each district. The supreme court has jurisdiction in all cases arising under the constitution, laws, and treaties of the U. S.; causes affecting ambassadors and consuls, of admiralty and jurisdiction; controversies to which the U. S. is a party, or between a state and the citizens of another state, citizens of different states, citizens and foreign states. It has original jurisdiction in state cases, or those affecting ambassadors or consuls— in others, appellate. A person may be tried for treason, both against the federal government, and against the state of which he is a citizen. The President can reprieve or pardon a person condemned by a Federal court; but has no power to interfere with the judgments of state tribunals. Besides the supreme court, there are U. S. district courts, with judges, district attorneys, and marshals, in districts comprising part or whole of the several states. The citizens of each state are entitled to all privileges and immunities of the several states. Criminals escaping from one state to another are given up for trial on demand of the executive; and the constitution declared, before the rebellion, that ‘ no person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.’ The constitution may be amended by a convention called at the request of two-thirds of the states; or amendments may be proposed by a vote of two-thirds of Congress, and ratified by three-fourths of the states; but ‘ no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.’

The President, either directly or through the Secretary of State and Foreign Affairs, appoints ministers, consuls, and consular agents to foreign countries. The envoys-extraordinary and ministers-plenipotentiary receive from $17.500 to $10,000 of salary; ministers resident have $7500 to $4000.

Army and Navy.—The army of the U. S., under the command of the President, consisted, in 1790, of 1260 men. In 1861, its numbers were 14,000, and those who took part with the Confederates, or were disbanded in the Confederate States, reduced the number to about 5000. April 15, 1861, 75,000 volunteers were called out; May 4, 64,000; July and December 1861, 500,000; July 1, 1862, 300,000; August 4, 1862. 300,000; summer of 1863, 300,000; February 1, 1864, 500,000. The total number called out from 1861 till the end of the war in 1865, was 2,670,874. This vast army was procured by volunteering, by enlistment in the regular army, and by drafts or conscriptions; but the greater part by bounties of 300 to 1000 dollars to each volunteer. Large numbers of recruits were also found among newly arrived immigrants; and the negro troops recruited in the seceded or slave states, ill October 1863, numbered 38,707, and increased in numbers to the end of the war. In 1871, the regular army was reduced to the legal standard of 30,000 enlisted men, and it was subsequently enacted that from 1875 there should be no more than 25,000 men enlisted at any one time. The militia of the U. S. is under the state governments, but is not organized. There are numerous arsenals and manufactories of arms at Springfield (q.v.). Massachusetts; Pittsburg- (q. v.), Pennsylvania, &c. The Military Academy at West Point educates cadets, nominated from each state by members of Congress, and appointed by the President, who receive commissions as officers in the army.

The navy of the U. S. in 1880 consisted of about 60 cruising-ships. 20 monitors, and 2 torpedo-boats. The iron-clad turret-steamers (see TURRET-SHIP) called monitors, constitute a powerful portion of the American navy. A Naval Academy has been established at Annapolis, Maryland, for the education of naval cadets.

The Post-office Department, organized before the “Revolution of 1775 by Benjamin Franklin, had in 1880 over 44,500 offices, and forwarded 868,493,500 letters; 276,450,000 post-cards; 695,000,000 newspapers; 53,472,000 magazines; books, &c., 300,855.000; articles of merchandise, 22,645,000. There were, in the same year, 11,317 telegraph offices, with 107,103 miles of lines, which forwarded 30,486.000 messages.

Revenue, Expenditure, &c.—The following table gives the expenditures (excepting interest on debt), and the debt of the U. S., for 20 different years :

Of late years the surplus revenue has come to be so great that it has been an embarrassment; the debt has been swiftly reduced; and it has been a problem whether to reduce internal duties (on tobacco, spirits, &c.), or customs, but the prohibition system is maintained. The expenditure of 1881—1882 (chief items, legislation, executive, civil list, army, navy, post office, pensions), was $216,694.384, and left near $150.000,000 of surplus; 1880—1881, the surplus was $100,000,000.

The revenue of the U. S. up to the War of Secession. 1861, was drawn almost wholly from the sale of public lands and duties on imports. In 1850, the revenue from customs was $39.668.686; from lands, &c., $3,707,112—total, $43,375,798. In 1850 the revenue from customs was $53.187,511; lands, &c., $2.877.691— total, $56,064,606. The cost of the war compelled the government to add to these resources a system of internal revenue or direct taxation, consisting of stamps, licenses, excise, income-tax, &c., by which the revenues were increased in 1865 to $309,510.-932. The revenue for the year 1879-80 amounted to $333,526,610 (£66,705,000), the principal items being customs, $186,000,000. and internal revenue, $124,000.000. The expenditure was $267,642,955 (£53.528,600). The total debt in 1880 amounted to £422,-407,182; from 1865 to 1880, the nation had paid off the immense sum of £170.000,000. In the fiscal year 1879-80. the debt was reduced by £13,176,000. In 1865, owing to the Civil War, the debt per head was about £16; but in 1880 it had been reduced to about £8, 8s. per head.

The currency of the U. S. is a mixed one of gold, silver, and copper, and bank-notes. Specie was for many years the only money recognized by the Federal government; paper money being issued by chartered banks. The war of 1861—1865 compelled the government to issue paper-money, and to establish national banks, in 1871, for its circulation. The capital of state banks in 1880 was $456,000,000, and of private banks upwards of $190,000,-000, In 1878 a law was passed making silver equally a legal tender with gold, though silver was then 11 per cent, less in value. Specie payments were resumed by the government in 1879.

The specie currency of the U. S. consists of the gold dollar (value in exchange about 4s. sterling); the half-eagle, $5; the eagle, $10; the double eagle, $20; silver-dollar, half-dollar, quarter; dime, 10 cents; half-dime; nickle cent, or 100th part of a dollar. The coinage of 1880 was—gold $56,157,735; silver, $27,942,437; copper, $269,971; from the establishment of the mint to June 30,1880, $1,133,103,322.

History.—The territories now occupied by the U. S. of America, though they were probably visited on their north-eastern coast by Norse navigators about the year 1000, continued the sole possession of numerous tribes of Indians (who had succeeded earlier and extinct races), until the discovery of America by Columbus, 1492. In 1498, an English expedition, under the command of Sebastian Cabot, explored the eastern coast of America from Labrador to Virginia, perhaps to Florida.

In 1513, Juan Ponce de Leon landed near St. Augustine in Florida, and explored a portion of that region in a romantic search for the Fountain of Youth. In 1520, some Spanish vessels from St. Domingo were driven upon the coast of Carolina. In 1521. by the conquests of Cortes and his followers, Mexico, including Texas, New Mexico, and California, became a province of Spain. In 1539—1542, Ferdinand de Soto led a Spanish expedition from the coast of Florida across Alabama, and discovered the Mississippi River. In 1584—1585, Sir Walter Raleigh sent two expeditions to the coast of North Carolina, and attempted to form settlements on Roanoke Island. A Spanish settlement was made at St- Augustine, Florida, 1565. Jamestown, Virginia, was settled in 1607; New York, then called the New Netherlands, 1613; Plymouth. Massachusetts, 1620. A large part of the country on the great lakes and on the Mississippi was explored by La Salle in 1682; and settlements were made by the French at Kaskaskia and Arkansas Post, 1685; Mobile and Vincennes, 1702. The early history of the various colonies which now constitute the U. S. will be found under the heads of the different states and territories. The first effort at a union of colonies was in 1643, when the settlements in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Connecticut formed a confederacy for mutual defence against the French, Dutch, and Indians, under the title of ‘ the United Colonies of New England.’

They experienced the benefits of united action in 1754, when an English grant of lands to the Ohio Company brought on the French and Indian war—the French claiming, at that period, as the first explorers, Northern New England, half of New York, and the entire Mississippi Valley. George Washington was sent on his first expedition, to remonstrate with the French authorities; ‘ and the colonies being advised to unite for genera,] defence, apian for a general government of all the English colonies was drawn up by Benjamin’ Franklin; but it was rejected by both the colonies and the crown—by the colonies, who wished to preserve their separate independence, and by the crown from a jealousy of their united strength. The colonists, however, took an active part in the war. Under Major Washington, they joined General Brad-dock in his unfortunate expedition against Fort Du Quesne, now Pittsburg; they aided in the reduction of Louisburg, Ticonderoga, Crown Point, and Niagara; and rejoiced in the conquest of Quebec, by which the vast northern regions of America became the possessions of Great Britain.

The principles of a democratic or representative government were brought to America by the earliest colonists. The colonies themselves were founded by private adventure, with very little aid from government. The Plymouth colony was for 18 years a strict democracy, and afterwards a republic under a charter from the crown. A representative and popular government was established in Virginia in 1620. It was not until the Protectorate and the reign of Charles II. that the colonies were considered as portions of the empire, to be governed by parliament, when navigation acts were passed to give English ships a monopoly of commerce. when the produce of the colonies was required to be sent to England, and duties were levied on commodities sent from one colony to another. Protests were made against these assumptions; Virginia asserted her right of self-government; and it was not until the English revolution of 1688 that settled and uniform relations with the different colonies were established.

In 1713, by the treaty of Utrecht. England, which, since the reign of Elizabeth, had imported slaves from Africa into her American and West Indian colonies, obtained a monopoly of the slave-trade, engaging to furnish Spanish America, in 33 years, with 144,000 negroes. A great slave-trading company was formed in England, one-quarter of the stock being taken by Queen Anne, and one-quarter by the king of Spain, these two sovereigns becoming the greatest slave-dealers in Christendom. By this monopoly, slavery was extended in, and to some extent forced upon all the American colonies.

At this period, there was a general feeling of loyalty towards the mother country. The sons of the more wealthy colonists, especially in the south, were educated in England; English literature pervaded the colonies; the British throne was the fountain of honor; the colonies, though distinct, and differing in origin and character—Puritan in the East, Dutch Reformed in New York, Quaker in Pennsylvania, Catholic in Maryland, and Church of England in Virginia—were yet united by language, common ties, fears, and interests.

In 1761, the enforcement of the Navigation Act against illegal traders, by general search-warrants, caused a strong excitement against the government, especially in Boston. The Admiralty enforced the law; many vessels were seized; and the colonial trade with the West Indies was annihilated. In 1765, the passing of an act of parliament for collecting a colonial revenue by stamps caused general indignation, and led to riots. Patrick Henry, in the Virginia Assembly, denied the right of parliament to tax America, and eloquently asserted the dogma, ‘ no taxation without representation.’ The first impulse was to unite against a common danger; and the first colonial congress of 28 delegates, representing 9 colonies, made a statement of grievances and a declaration of rights. The stamps were destroyed or reshipped to England, and popular societies were formed in the chief towns, called ‘ Sons of Liberty.’ In 1766, the Stamp Act was repealed, to the general joy of the colonists; but the principle of colonial taxation was not abandoned; and in 1767, duties were levied on glass, paper, printers’ colors, and tea. This renewed attempt produced, in 1768, riots in Boston, and Governor Gage was furnished with a military force of 700 to preserve order and enforce the laws. In 1773, the duties were repealed, excepting 3rf. a pound on tea. It was now a question of principle, and from north to south it was determined that this tax should not be paid. Some cargoes were stored in damp warehouses and spoiled; some sent back; in Boston, a mob, disguised as Indians, threw it into the harbor. To punish this outrage, parliament passed the Boston Port Bill, 1774, by which the chief town in New England was no longer a port of entry, and its trade transferred to Salem. The people were reduced to great distress, but received the sympathy of all the colonies, and liberal contributions of wheat from Virginia, and rice from Charleston, South Carolina.

It was now determined to enforce the government of the crown and parliament over the colonies; and a fleet, containing several ships of the line, and 10,000 troops, was sent to America; while the colonists, still asserting their loyalty, and with little or no thought of separation from the mother country, prepared to resist what they considered the unconstitutional assumptions of the government. Volunteers were drilling in every direction, and depots of provisions and military stores were being gathered. A small force being sent from Boston to seize one of these depots at Concord, Massachusetts, led to what is called the battle of Lexington, and the beginning of the war of the Revolution, April 19, 1775. The British troops were attacked on their return by the provincials, and compelled to a hasty retreat. The news of this event summoned 20,000 men to the vicinity of Boston. The royal forts and arsenals of the colonies were taken possession of, with their arms and munitions. Crown Point and Ticonderoga, the principal northern fortifications, were surprised, and their artillery and stores appropriated. A Congress of the colonies assembled at Philadelphia, which resolved to raise and equip an army of 20.000 men, and appointed George Washington commander-in-chief. June 17, Bunker Hill, in Charleston, near Boston, where 1500 Americans had hastily intrenched themselves, was taken by assault by the British troops, but with so heavy a loss (1054) that the defeat had for the provincials the moral effect of a victory. After a winter of great privations, the British were compelled to evacuate Boston, carrying away in their fleet to Halifax 1500 loyal families.

The British government now put forth a strong effort to reduce the colonies to submission. An army of 55,000, including 17,000 German mercenaries (’Hessians’ ), was sent, under the command of Sir William Howe, to put down this ‘wicked rebellion.’ The provincial Congress, declaring that the royal authority had ceased, recommended to the several colonies to adopt ’such governments as might best conduce to the safety and happiness of the people; ‘ and the thirteen colonies soon adopted constitutions as independent and sovereign states. On the 7th of June 1776, Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, offered a resolution in Congress, declaring that ‘the united colonies are, and ought to be. free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown; and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is. and ought to be, totally dissolved.’ This resolution, after an earnest debate, was adopted by the votes of 9 out of 13 colonies. A committee, consisting of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston, was instructed to prepare a declaration in accordance with the above resolution; and the celebrated Declaration of Independence, written by Mr. Jefferson, based upon the equality of men and the universal right of self government, and asserting that ‘ all government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed,’ on the 4th of July 1776, received the assent of the delegates of the colonies, which thus dissolved their allegiance to the British crown, and declared themselves free and independent states, under the general title of the thirteen United States of America—New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia—occupying a narrow line of the Atlantic coast between Canada and Florida, east of the Alleghanies, with a population of about 2,500,000.

After the evacuation of Boston, General Washington, with tin remains of his army, thinned by the hardships of winter, hastened to New York. On the 3d of July, General Howe, being joined by his brother, Admiral Lord Howe, and Sir Henry Clinton, fount himself at the head of 35,000 men; defeated the Americans or Long Island, August 27. 1776, compelled the evacuation of New York, and secured the possession of its spacious harbor, and the river Hudson. General Washington, with inferior and undisciplined forces, retreated across New Jersey, closely followed by the English, hoping to save Philadelphia. Newark, New Brunswick, Princeton, the chief towns in New Jersey, were taken, ant the British awaited the freezing of the Delaware to occupy Philadelphia. On Christmas night. General Washington, by crossing in boats among floating ice, made a successful night-attack upon a Hessian force at Trenton, and gave new courage to the desponding Americans, who recruited the army, and harassed the enemy with a winter campaign.

In the meantime, Silas Deane and Benjamin Franklin had been sent to France to solicit recognition and aid. The recognition was delayed, but important aid was privately given in money and supplies, and European volunteers—the Marquis tie Lafayette, Baron Steuben, Baron de Kalb, Kosciusko, and Pulaski, rendering the most important services. Efforts were made to induce the British colonies of Canada and Nova Scotia to unite in the struggle for independence, and an expedition was sent against Montreal and Quebec, led by Generals Montgomery and Arnold. The Canadians refused their aid; Montgomery was killed, Arnold wounded, and the remains of the expedition returned after terrible sufferings. In 1777, after several severe actions in New Jersey, generally disastrous to the Americans, the British took possession of Philadelphia; and Washington, with the remnants of his army, went into winter-quarters at Valley Forge, where they suffered from cold, hunger, and nakedness.

While Washington was unsuccessfully contending against disciplined and overwhelming forces in New Jersey, General Burgoyne was leading an army of 7000 British and German troops, with a large force of Canadians and Indians, from Canada into Northern New York, to form a junction with the British on the Hudson, and separate New England from the rest of the rebel confederacy. His march was delayed by felled trees and destroyed roads; his foraging expeditions were defeated; and after two sharp actions at Stillwater and Saratoga, with but three days’ rations left, he was compelled to capitulate, October 17; and England, in the midst of victories, heard with dismay of the loss of an entire army. The Americans gained 5000 muskets, and a large train of artillery. Feeling the need of more unity of action, articles of confederation, proposed by Franklin in 1775, were adopted in 1777, which constituted a league of friendship between the states, but not a government which had any powers of coercion.

In 1778, Lord Carlisle was sent to America by the British government with offers of conciliation; it was too late. France at the same time recognized American independence, and sent a large fleet and supplies of clothing, arms, and munitions of war to their aid; and General Clinton, who had superseded General Howe, finding his supplies at Philadelphia threatened, retreated to New York, defeating the Americans at Monmouth.

The repeated victories of the British armies, the aid afforded by great numbers of Americans who still adhered to the royal cause, and furnished during the war not less than 20,000 troops, and the alliance of large tribes of Indians, who committed cruel ravages in the frontier settlements, did little towards subjugating the country. Portions of the sea-coast of New England and Virginia were laid waste; but the king’s troops were worn out with long marches and tedious campaigns, and even weakened by victories. Spain, and then Holland, joined in the war against England, and aided the Americans. Paul Jones, with ships fitted out in French harbors, fought desperate battles under the American flag on the English coast. But the king and parliament were determined to maintain the honor of the crown and the integrity of the empire. In 1780, 85,000 seamen were raised, and 35,000 additional troops sent to America, and a strong effort was made to subjugate the Carolinas, where the war became of a bitter partisan character, and was conducted with spirit by Sumpter. Marion, and other Southern chieftains. Lord Cornwallis, with a large army, marched from Charleston, through North Carolina, pursuing, and sometimes defeating the American General Gates. Worn out with his success, he arrived in Virginia, where he was confronted by General Lafayette. In the meantime, Admiral de Varney had arrived upon the coast with a powerful French fleet, and 6000 soldiers of the elite of the French army, under Count de Rochambeau.

Cornwallis was obliged to fortify himself at Yorktown, blockaded by the fleet of Count de Grasse, and besieged by the allied army of French and Americans, waiting for Sir Henry Clinton to send him relief from New York. October 19, 1781, he was compelled to surrender his army of 7000 men—an event which produced such a change of feeling in England as to cause the resignation of the ministry, and the despatch of General Sir Guy Carleton to New York with offers of terms of peace. The preliminaries were signed at Paris, November 30, 1782; and on September 3, 1783, peace was concluded between England and France, Holland, and America. The independence of each of the several states was acknowledged, with a liberal settlement of territorial boundaries. In April, a cessation of hostilities had been proclaimed, and the American army disbanded] New York, which had been held by the English through the whole war, was evacuated November 25; on December 4, General Washington took leave of his companions in arms, and. December 23, resigned into the hands of Congress his commission as commander.

From the retreat of Lexington, April 19, 1775, to the surrender of Yorktown, October 19, 1781, in 24 engagements, including the surrender of two armies, the British losses in the field were not less than 25,000 men, while those of the Americans were about 8000.

The states were free, but exhausted, with a foreign debt of $8,000,000, a domestic debt of $30,000,000, an army unpaid and discontented, a paper-currency utterly worthless, and a bankrupt treasury. The states were called upon to pay their shares of the necessary expenditures, but they were also in debt, and there was no power to compel them to pay, or to raise money by taxation. In these difficulties, and the failure of the articles of confederation, a convention was surnamed by Congress in 1787, to revise these articles. The task was so difficult, that the Convention resolved to propose an entirely new constitution, granting fuller powers to a Federal Congress and executive, and one which should act upon the people individually as well as upon the states. The constitution was therefore framed, whose provisions have already been stated, and which is still the basis of the government; and though strongly opposed by many, who believed that the extensive powers granted by it to Congress and the executive would be dangerous to the liberties of the people, it, was, in 1787—1788, adopted, in some cases by small majorities, in 11 state conventions, and finally by the whole 13 states, chiefly through the exertions and writings of James Madison, John Jay, and Alexander Hamilton.

Virginia ratified the constitution with the declaration, that she was at liberty to withdraw from the union whenever its powers were used for oppression; and New York, after Hamilton had declared that no state could ever be coerced by an armed force. The country was at this period divided into two parties : the Federalists, who were in favor of a strong centralized government, and the Anti-federalists, who held to the sovereignty and rights of the independent states. George Washington and John Adams, standing at the head of the Federalist Party, were elected President and Vice-president of the United States. The President took the oath to support the constitution in front of the City Hall in New York; and the government was organized with Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State; Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury; General Knox, Secretary of War; and John Jay, Chief Justice of the supreme court. Congress assumed the war-debts of the several states, and Chartered the bank of the United States, though its constitutional right to do so was strenuously denied by the Republican or States’ Rights party. Washington was re-elected to the presidency in 1792; but party-spirit increased, excited by the events of the French Revolution. Citizen Genet, who represented the French Republic in America, fitted out privateers against England, and his recall was demanded by the President. The Federalists took the side of England in the great European contest, while the Republicans sympathized with the Revolution. There grew up also difficulties between the English and American governments. The Americans accused the English of carrying off large numbers of negroes and other property at the close of the war; while the English accused the Americans of sequestrating the property of loyalists, which they had engaged by treaty to restore to them. These controversies were happily settled by Mr. Jay.

In 1796, Washington, worn and irritated by partisan conflicts and criticisms, refused a third election, and issued his farewell address to the people of the U. S., warning them against the dangers of party-spirit and disunion, and giving them advice worthy of one who was said to be ‘first in war, first in pence, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.’ John Adams was elected President; and Thomas Jefferson, the second choice of the people for the presidency, became, according to the rule at first adopted, Vice-president. In 1798. the commercial regulations of France, and the assertion of the right to search and capture American vessels, nearly led to a war between the two republics. In 1799, the nation, without distinction of party, mourned the death of Washington; and, in the following year, the seat of government was removed to the city he had planned for a capital, and which bears his name. The partiality of Mr. Adams for England, the establishment of a Federal army, and the passing of the Alien and

Sedition Laws, by which foreigners could be summarily banished, and abuse of the government, by speech or the press, punished, caused great political excitement, and such an increase of the Republican, or, as it was afterwards called, the Democratic party, that the President failed of a re-election in 1801; and there being no election by the people, the House of Representatives, after thirty-five ballotings, chose Thomas Jefferson, the Republican candidate, with Aaron Burr for Vice-president; and the offices of the country were transferred to the victorious party.

Internal duties, which a few years before had led to an insurrection in Pennsylvania, called the Whisky Insurrection, were abolished, and the Alien and Sedition Laws repealed. Tennessee, Kentucky, Vermont, and Ohio had now been organized as states, and admitted into the Union. In 1803, the area of the country was more than doubled by the purchase of Louisiana—the whole region between the Mississippi and Rocky Mountains—from France for $15,000.000. The infant navy waged a successful war with Tripoli. In 1805, Mr. Jefferson was elected for a second term; but Mr. Burr, having lost the confidence of his party, engaged in a conspiracy to seize upon the Mississippi Valley, and found a new empire, with its capital at New Orleans. He was tried for treason, but not convicted. The commerce of America was highly prosperous, her ships enjoying much of the carrying-trade of Europe; but, in May 1806, England declared a blockade from Brest to the Elbe, and Bonaparte, in November, decreed the blockade of the coasts of the United Kingdom. American vessels were captured by both parties, and were searched by British ships for British subjects; and those suspected of having been born on British soil, were, in accordance with the doctrine, once a subject always a subject, impressed into the naval service. Even American men-of-war were not excepted from this process. The British frigate Leopard meeting the American frigate Chesapeake, demanded four of her men, and on refusal, fired into her, and the surprised Chesapeake struck her flag. British ships were hereupon forbidden U. S. harbors.

Mr. Jefferson, following the example of Washington, declined a third election; and, in 1809. James Madison became President. The French decrees, prejudicial to neutral commerce, were revoked in 1810; but the English continued, a source of loss and irritation, while hundreds of American citizens were in forced service in British vessels. The feeling was increased by a night-encounter between the American frigate President and the British sloop-of-war Little Belt, May 16, 1811. In April 1812, an embargo was again declared by Congress, preparatory to a declaration of war against Great Britain, July i9. for which Congress voted to raise 25,000 enlisted soldiers, 50,000 volunteers, and 100,000 militia. General Hull, with 2.000 men at Detroit, invaded Canada; but on being met by a small force of British and Indians, under General Brock, recrossed the river, and made a shameful surrender; and was sentenced to death for his cowardice, but pardoned by the President. A second invasion of Canada was made near Niagara Falls by General Van Renssalaer. One thousand American” militia stormed the heights of Queenstown, and the British general, Brock, was killed; but reinforcements arriving opportunely, the heights were retaken, and nearly all the Americans were killed or driven into the Niagara, while the American general was in vain imploring a large body of militia on the opposite bank to cross over to the support of their brethren in arms. They refused, upon the ground, that the government had no constitutional right to send the militia across the frontier. The Federal party, opposed to the war, defended this doctrine, and General Van Renssalaer resigned in disgust. American disasters on the land were, however, compensated by victories at sea.

August 19, the U. S. frigate Constitution captured the British frigate Guerriere; October 18, the Wasp took the Frolic; October 25, the frigate United States captured the Macedonian; December 29, the Constitution took the Java. The Americans in most cases had the larger ships and heavier ordnance; but the immense disparity in losses showed also superior seamanship and gunnery. American privateers took 300 British vessels and 3000 prisoners. In 1813. General Proctor crossed the Detroit river with a considerable force of British and Indians, and defeated General Winchester, with the usual results of savage warfare. In April, an American army of 1700 men captured York (now Toronto), and about the same time another American force of 800 men was defeated with great loss by the Indians under Tecumseh; but the remainder of this campaign was wholly favorable to the Americans. The attempt of the British general, Prevost, on Sackett’s Harbor was repulsed; the squadron on Lake Erie, consisting of 6 vessels, 63 guns, was captured by Commodore Perry at the head of an American flotilla of 9 vessels, 54 guns; and this latter success enabled General Harrison to invade Canada, where he defeated General Proctor in the battle of the Thames, in which the great Indian warrior-chief Tecumseh was killed.

In 1813. another invasion of Canada was attempted; and York (now Toronto) was taken by General Dearborn; and an unsuccessful attempt was made to take Montreal. Villages were burned on both sides. The British also destroyed American shipping in Delaware Bay. At the same period, General Jackson defeated die Creek Indians in Alabama and Georgia, who had been excited to make war upon the frontier settlements.

In 1814, Generals Scott and Ripley crossed the Niagara, and sharp actions, with no decisive results, were fought at Chippewa and Lundy’s Lane, close by the great Cataract. General Wilkinson also invaded Canada on the Sorell River, but was easily repulsed. A British invasion, by Lake Champlain, by General Sir George Provost, with 14,000 men and a flotilla on the lake, was no more successful. On the 6th of September, the flotilla was defeated and captured in the harbor of Plattsburg, while the army was repulsed on shore, and retreated with heavy loss. In August, a British fleet ascended Chesapeake Bay, took Washington with but slight resistance, and burned the government buildings. A subsequent attack on Baltimore was unsuccessful. New York. New London, and Boston were blockaded, and a large expedition was sent against Mobile and New Orleans.

On the 8th of January 1815, General Packenham advanced with 12,000 men against the latter city, which was defended by General Jackson, at the head of 6000 militia, chiefly from Tennessee and Kentucky, aided by a small force of artillery, recruited from the Barataria pirates. The Americans were sheltered by a breast-work, and the British assault was met with so deadly afire of riflemen, that it was repulsed, with the loss of General Packenham and several officers, with 700 killed and 1000 wounded; while the entire American loss is stated to have only amounted to 71. This ill-planned and unfortunate action was fought more than a month after peace had been concluded between England and America, and was followed by two naval actions in February and March. Though during this contest fortune at first favored the Americans on the high seas, she changed sides completely from June 1813, as if to counterbalance the disasters of the British on land. June 1, the Chesapeake was taken by the Shannon; June 3, the Growler and Eagle were captured by British gun-boats; the Argus was taken by the Pelican, August 14; the Essex by the Phœbe and Cherub, March 29, 1814; the President by the Endymion, January 15, 1815; tile only counterbalancing success being the sinking of the British sloop Avon by the Wasp. September 8, 1814. In December 1814, the Federalists of New England held a convention at Hartford in opposition to the war and the administration, and threatened a secession of the New England states. See HARTFORD CONVENTION. In 1815, Commodore Decatur, who had taken a distinguished part in the recent war, commanded an expedition against the Algerians—whose corsairs had preyed on American commerce in the Mediterranean—and dictated terms to Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli.

The Democratic-Republican party having- brought the war to a satisfactory conclusion, the Federalists disappeared; and in 1817, James Monroe was elected to the presidency, almost without opposition, in what was termed ‘ the era of good feeling.’ A rapid emigration from Europe and from the Atlantic states to the richer lands of the West, had in ten years added six new states to the Union. Difficulties arose with the warlike southern Indian tribes, whose hunting-grounds were invaded; and General Jackson, sent against the Seminoles, summoned to his aid the Tennessee volunteers who had served under him against the Creeks and at New Orleans, defeated them, pursued them into Florida, took Pensacola, and banished the Spanish authorities and troops. He was, however, supported in these high-handed measures by the President; and in 1819, Florida was ceded by Spain to the United States. In 1820, Alabama and Maine, a slave and a free state, were added to the Union; and the question of the admission of Missouri arose in Congress—the question of its admission with or without slavery. At the period of the Revolution, slavery existed in all the states except Massachusetts; but it had gradually been abolished in the northern and middle states, except Delaware, and excluded from the new states between the Ohio and Mississippi by the terms on which the territory had been surrendered by Virginia to the Union. Under the constitution, slaves were not counted in full as a represented population; but by a compromise, three-fifths of their numbers were added to the whites. The slave states were almost exclusively agricultural, with free-trade interests. The free states were encouraging manufactures by protection. The two sections had already entered upon a struggle to maintain the balance of power against each other.

After an excited contest, Missouri was admitted, with a compromise resolution, that in future no slave state should be erected north of the parallel of 36° 30′ N. lat.—the northern boundary of Arkansas. During the second term of Mr. Monroe, in 1824, General Lafayette visited America, and was everywhere received with great enthusiasm. In the presidential election of 1824, there were four candidates—John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, Henry Clay, and William H. Crawford. There being no choice by the people, the House of Representatives chose Mr. Adams; John C. Calhoun being elected Vice-president. Party and sectional feeling became stronger- Mr. Adams and Mr. Clay, who had heretofore acted with the party of Jefferson and Madison, were henceforth identified with what was called the National Republican, and later, the Whig, and finally, in union with the Anti-slavery party, the Republican party. In 1826, two of the founders of the republic, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, died on the 4th of July, the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence —an event which made a profound impression. The four years of Mr. Adams, during which there were violent contests on protection and the powers of the Federal government to carry out public works within the states, ended with an excited election contest, which resulted in the triumph of the Democratic part}’, and the election of Andrew Jackson, with John C. Calhoun as Vice-president.

The bold, decisive, and impetuous character of General Jackson was shown in a general removal of those who held office, down to small postmasters and tide-waiters, under the late administration, and the appointment of his own partisans. An act for the re-chartering of the U. S. Bank was met by a veto of the President, who declared it unconstitutional and dangerous. In 1832. an Indian war, called the Black Hawk War, broke out in Wisconsin; but the passing of a high protective tariff act by Congress caused a more serious trouble. The state of South Carolina declared the act unconstitutional, and therefore null and void, threatening to withdraw from the Union if an attempt were made to collect the duties oil foreign importations. The President prepared to execute the laws by force; Mr. Calhoun resigned his office of Vice-president, and asserted the doctrine of state-rights, including the right of secession, in the Senate. A collision seemed imminent, when the affair was settled by a compromise bill, introduced by Henry Clay, providing for a gradual reduction of duties, until 1843, when they should not exceed 20 per cent, ad valorem.

The popularity of General Jackson caused his re-election by an overwhelming majority against Henry Clay, the leader of the Bank, Protection, and Internal Improvement party; and he entered upon his second term with Martin Van Buren of New York as Vice President. The removal of the government deposits from the U. S. Bank to certain state banks, led to the failure of the bank, and after some years, to the adoption of Mr. Van Buren’s plan of an independent treasury. The Cherokee Indians in Georgia, who had attained to a certain degree of civilization, appealed to the President for protection against the seizure of their lands by the state; but they were told that he had no power to oppose the exercise of the sovereignty of any state over all who may be within its limits;’ and the Indians were obliged to remove to the territory set apart for them west of the Mississippi. In 1835, the Seminole war broke out in Florida; and a tribe of Indians, insignificant in numbers, under the crafty leadership of Osceola (q. v.), kept up hostilities for years, at a cost to the U. S of several thousands of men and some fifty millions of dollars. In 1837, Martin Van Buren succeeded General Jackson in the presidency. His term of four years was a stormy one, from the great financial crisis of 1837, which followed a period of currency-expansion and wild speculation. All the banks suspended payment, and the great commercial cities threatened insurrection.

Mr. Van Buren was firm in adhering- to his principle of collecting the revenues of the government in specie, and separating the government from all connection with the banks. His firmness in acting against the strong sympathies of the northern and western states with the Canadian insurrection of 1837—1838, also damaged his popularity; and in 1840, the election of General Harrison, with John Tyler for Vice-president, was one of unexampled excitement, characterized by immense popular gatherings, political songs, the use of symbols, and the participation of botli sexes to a degree hitherto unknown in America. The Whigs triumphed in nearly every state; General Harrison was inaugurated March 4, 1841; and the rush to Washington for offices was as great as the election had been exciting and remarkable. Worn down with the campaign and the office-seekers, General Harrison died in a month after his inauguration, and was succeeded by John Tyler, who, having been a. Democrat, was no sooner in power than he seems to have reverted to his former political principles. He vetoed a hi 11 for the establishment of a national bank and other measures of the party by which he had been elected. His cabinet resigned, with the exception of Daniel Webster, Secretary of State, and others, Democratic or neutral, were appointed in their place. During Mr. Tyler’s administration, the north-eastern boundary question, which nearly occasioned a war with England, was settled by Mr. Webster and Lord Ashburton; a difficulty amounting almost to a. rebellion, was settled in Rhode Island; but the most important question agitated was that of the annexation of Texas. This annexation was advocated by the South, as a large addition to southern and slave territory; and, for the same reason, opposed by the Whig and anti-slavery parties of the North. Besides, the independence of Texas, though acknowledged by the U. S., England, and France, had not been acknowledged by Mexico, audits annexation would be a casus belli with that power. The recent admissions of Iowa and Florida into the Union had kept the balance of power even between North and South, but Texas would be an advantage to the South. But the gain of territory, and a contempt for Mexico, overcame these objections, and in 1845, Texas was formally annexed to the U. S.; and James K. Polk of Tennessee succeeded Mr. Tyler in the presidency.

M. Almonte, the Mexican minister at Washington, protested against the annexation of Texas, as an act of warlike aggression; and to guard against a threatened invasion of Texas, General Zachary Taylor was ordered, with the U. S. troops of his military district, to its southern frontier. The Mexicans crossed the Rio Grande, and commenced hostilities, April 36, 1845. General Taylor moved promptly forward, and won the victories of Palo Alto, Resaca de la Palma, Monterey, Saltillo, and finally, against great odds—20,000 to 4759—the hard-fought battle of Buena Vista, a victory that excited great enthusiasm. In the meantime, General Wool had been sent on an expedition to Chihuahua, in Northern Mexico; General Kearney to New Mexico; and Captain Fremont and Commander Stockton took possession of California. March 9, 1847, General Scott landed at Vera Cruz, which he took on the 29th, after a siege and bombardment by land and water. Marching into the interior with a force of about 9000 men, he found General Santa Anna intrenched on the Heights of Cerro Gordo with 15,006 men. On April 18, every position was taken by storm, with 3000 prisoners, 43 cannon, 5000 stand of arms, &c. Waiting at Puebla for reinforcements until August, General Scott advanced with 11,000 men towards Mexico, near which General Santa Anna awaited him with large forces and in strong positions. On the 19th and 20th of August were fought the battles of Contreras and Churubusco, in which 9000 Americans vanquished an army of over 30,000 Mexicans in strongly fortified positions.

After a brief armistice, hostilities recommenced on the 7th September; and after a series of sanguinary actions, the American army, reduced to about 8000, entered the city of Mexico, which ended the war. By the treaty of Guadalupe, the U. S. obtained the cession of New Mexico and Upper California, the U. S. paying Mexico $15,000,000, and assuming the payment of the claims of American citizens against Mexico. The opposition to the annexation of Texas, and to the war and the acquisition of the newly-acquired territory, became now complicated and intensified by sectional feelings and the opposition to slavery. The Northern party demanded that slavery should never be introduced into territories where it had not existed; the South claimed the right of her people to emigrate into the new territories, carrying with them their domestic institutions. During the debates on the acquisition of the Mexican territories, Mr. Wilmot of Pennsylvania introduced an amendment, called the ‘ Wilmot Proviso,’ providing that there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the acquired territory. This was voted down, but became a party principle. In 1849, General Taylor, the ‘ Rough and Ready’ victor of Buena Vista, became President, with Millard Fillmore as Vice-president. The Free-soil party* [footnote: *The Free-soil party opposed the extension of slavery by the admission of new slave states, while recognizing its legal and constitutional existence where already established.] had nominated Martin Van Buren, with Charles Francis Adams for Vice-president; the Democratic candidate being General Lewis Cass.

The Liberty party in 1840 had cast 7609 votes; in 1844, it had 62,300; Mr. Van Buren in 1848 received 291,263, so rapid was the growth of a party soon destined to control the policy of the government. September 1, 1849, California, rapidly peopled by the discovery of gold, adopted a constitution which prohibited slavery. Violent struggles and debates in Congress followed with threats of secession, and protests against interference with slavery. The more zealous abolitionists of the North denounced the constitution for its support of slavery, and its requirement of the return of fugitive slaves to their owners, and threatened separation. The South denounced the violation of the constitution by interference with slavery—a domestic institution of the states—the carrying off of negroes secretly by organized societies, and what was termed the ‘Underground Railway,” and the passage of personal liberty bills in several states, which defeated the Fugitive Slave Law, and the requirements and guarantees of the constitution. Mr. Clay introduced a compromise into Congress, admitting California as a free state, and introducing a new and more stringent law for the rendition of fugitive slaves. President Taylor, more used to the rough life of a frontier soldier than the cares of state, died July 9, 1850, and was succeeded by Mr. Fillmore.

The election of Franklin Pierce in 1852, against General Scott, was a triumph of the Democratic, States’ Rights, and Southern party. Jefferson Davis, a senator from Mississippi, a son-in-law of General Taylor, and who had served under him in Mexico, was appointed Secretary of War. New elements were added to tution of slavery. The struggles of Kansas, approaching a civil war between the Free-soil and Pro-slavery parties in that rapidly growing territory, resulted in the exclusion of slavery. A brutal assault upon Mr. Sunnier, senator from Massachusetts, by a Southerner, named Preston Brooks, in consequence of a violent speech on Southern men and institutions, increased the excitement of both sections. The formation of an Anti-foreign and No-popery party, called the ‘Know-nothing’ party, acting chiefly through secret societies, was a singular but not very important episode in American politics, though it may have influenced the succeeding election.

In 1856, the Republicans, composed of the Northern, Free-soil, and Abolition parties, nominated John C. Fremont for the presidency; while the Democratic and States’ Rights party nominated James Buchanan. Ex-president Fillmore received the Know-nothing nomination. The popular vote was—for Buchanan, 1,838,169; Fremont, 1,341,264; Fillmore, 874,534. Mr. Buchanan was inaugurated March 4. 1857, with John C. Breckenridge, afterwards a general of the Confederate army, as Vice-president. A difficulty with the Mormons, which caused the President to send a military force to Utah, was settled without bloodshed. The efforts of the government to execute the Fugitive Slave Law kept up an irritated feeling. There were savage fights between the northern and southern parties in Kansas, and on the western borders of Missouri. Resolute and well-armed settlers were sent out by New England emigration societies. In October 1859, John Brown, known in Kansas as ‘ Ossawattamie Brown,’ who. with his sons, had been engaged in the struggles in Kansas, planned and led an expedition for freeing the negroes in Virginia. He made his attempt at Harper’s Ferry, on the Potomac, where, after a vain attempt to induce the negroes to join him, he and his small party took possession of one of the government workshops, where he was taken prisoner by a party of U. S. soldiers, and handed over to the authorities of Virginia, tried and executed, December 2. His body was taken to his home in New York for burial, and he was regarded by the Abolition party as a martyr.

In 1860, the Democratic party, which, except at short intervals, had controlled the Federal government from the election of Jefferson in 1800. became hopelessly divided. The Southern delegates withdrew from the convention at Charleston, and two Democratic candidates were nominated, Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, and John C. Breckenridge of Kentucky; while the Republicans, or united Whig and Abolition party, nominated Abraham Lincoln of Illinois; and the Native or American party nominated John Bell of Tennessee. The Republican convention adopted a moderate and even conservative ‘ platform ‘ of principles, denounced the John Brown raid, and put forward as a principle, ‘ the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the states, and especially the right of each state to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively.’ Still, the country was sectionally divided, and all who had labored to limit and destroy the Southern institution of slavery were acting with the Republican party.

At the election of November 1860, Mr. Lincoln received every Northern vote in the electoral college, excepting the three of New Jersey, which were given to Mr. Douglas, 180 votes; while Mr. Breckenridge received the 72 electoral votes of the South. The North and South were arrayed against each other, and the South was beaten. Of the popular vote, Mr. Lincoln received 1,857,610; Mr. Douglas, 1,365,976; Mr. Breckenridge, 847,951; Mr. Bell, 590,631. Thus, while Mr. Lincoln gained an overwhelming majority of the electoral votes given by each state, the combined Democratic votes exceeded his by 356,317, and the whole popular vote against him exceeded his own by 946,948. A small majority, or even plurality, in the .Northern states was sufficient to elect him.

The South lost no time in acting upon what her statesmen had declared would be the signal of their withdrawal from the Union. On the 10th of November, as soon as the result was known, the legislature of South Carolina ordered a state convention, which assembled December 17, and on the 20th unanimously declared that ‘ the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other states, under the name of the United States, is hereby dissolved;’ giving as a reason that 14 of these states had for years refused to fulfill their constitutional obligations. The example of South Carolina was followed by Mississippi, January 8, 1861; Florida, 10th; Alabama, 11th; Georgia., 19th; which were followed by Louisiana and Texas; and in 1861, by North Carolina. Virginia, Tennessee, and Arkansas, Kentucky and Missouri were divided, and had representatives in the governments and armies of both sections.

On the 4th of February 1861, delegates from the seven then seceded states met at Montgomery, Alabama, and formed a provisional government, under the title of the Confederate States of America. A constitution was adopted similar to that of the U.S.. and the government fully organized, February 18, 1861; President, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi; Vice-president, Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia; and, May 24, established at Richmond, Virginia. The secession movement appears to have been nearly unanimous in the more Southern states, and to have been carried in all by decided majorities. As state after state withdrew from the Union, its senators and representatives in Congress at Washington resigned their seats; and nearly all the officers of the army and navy of Southern birth, believing that their first and final allegiance was due to their states, and that the action of each state carried with it all its citizens, also resigned their commissions, and tendered their swords to their respective states, and to the Confederacy they had formed.

President Buchanan, doubting his constitutional power to compel the seceding states to return to the Union, made a feeble and ineffectual attempt to relieve the garrison of Fort Sumter, in Charleston harbor, closely besieged by the forces of South Carolina. Commissioners were sent to Washington to negotiate for the settlement of the claims of the Federal government, and great efforts were mode to effect compromises of the difficulties, but without result.

On the 4th of March 1861, President Lincoln was inaugurated at Washington. In his address, he said: ‘I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe that I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.’ On the 7th of April, a naval expedition set sail from New York for the relief of Fore Sumter; and its arrival off Charleston Harbor was the signal for the commencement of a bombardment of the fort by the Confederate batteries of General Beauregard. The surrender of the fort, April 11, was followed by a sudden outburst of excited feeling in the North. The government called out 75,000 volunteers, large numbers of whom were in a few days marching to the defence of Washington. April 18, the Confederates seized the U. S. arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, and took or destroyed a large quantity of arms and machinery. On the 20th, the navy-yard, near Norfolk, Va., was destroyed by the U. S. officers, and five large men-of-war burned or sunk, to prevent their falling into the hands of the Confederates. Opposed to the Federal volunteers assembled at Washington, the Confederates took up a position at Bull Bun, a few miles distant from the Potomac, under General Beauregard. where they were attacked by General M’Dowell. A severe action resulted in the repulse and complete panic of the Federals, who hastily retreated to Washington. Congress saw that it must act in earnest, and that the rebellion was not to be put down in 90 days by 75,000 volunteers. It voted to call out 500,000 men.

The Confederate States had a population of 5.582,122 free inhabitants, and 3,519,902 slaves; total, 9,102.024; and though the negroes were not called into the field except as laborers, they were not less useful in supplying the armies, by carrying on the agricultural labor of the country. The Confederates had also the strong sympathy and aid of the four slaveholding border states, prevented by their position from seceding—Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri.

Holding their position in Virginia, the Confederates erected fortifications on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers, and on important points of the Mississippi, from Columbus, in Kentucky, to its mouth. They also made a strong effort to secure the state of Missouri, as well as to defend the seaports through which they must receive their most important supplies from abroad. The Federal government, on its side, blockaded the whole line of coast from Virginia to Texas, and sent large forces to secure the doubtful states. Gun-boats were rapidly built for the rivers of the west, and vessels purchased and constructed for the navy. In December 1861, the Federals had 640,000 men in the field; and the Confederates had 210,000, and bad called for 400,000 volunteers.

The first important operation of 186,2 was the taking the defences of the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers (February 6), which led to the occupation of Nashville, the capital of Tennessee, henceforth held by the. Federals—Andrew Johnson, formerly governor and senator, having been appointed military governor. Roanoke Island was also captured, on the coast of North Carolina. In March, General M’Clellan, who had succeeded the aged Lieutenant-general Scott as commander-in-chief, commenced a movement on Richmond, the seat of the Confederate government, now defended by General Lee. On the 8th of March, the Confederate iron-clad Virginia, constructed from the U. S. steamer Merrimac, which had been sunk at Norfolk, and raised by the Confederates, attacked the Federal fleet in Hampton Roads, and in 40 minutes sunk the Cumberland, and set on fire and captured the Congress (frigates); while the other vessels took refuge in shoal water or in flight. The next day, the Monitor, a war vessel of entirely novel construction, low and flat, with a revolving turret, invented by Captain Ericcson, engaged the Virginia. The battle lasted two hours without result.

On the 6th of April, a sanguinary but indecisive battle was fought near Corinth, Alabama, the Federals being protected by gun-boats. Soon after, Admiral Farragut, with a fleet of 45 vessels, carried the forts at the mouth of the Mississippi river, and

took New Orleans; while the armies and gun-boats captured the fortifications on the upper part of the river as low as Memphis, Tennessee. In the meantime, General M’Clellan had besieged and taken Yorktown, and fought his way up the peninsula of the James River, until within five miles of Richmond, when he was beaten in a series of sanguinary battles, and driven, with a loss, in six days, of 15,000 men, to the shelter of his gun-boats; while Generals Banks and Pope, sent to co-operate with him in the Shenandoah Valley, were defeated and driven back by General ‘ Stonewall ‘ Jackson. On the 1st of July, the President called for 300,000, and August 4, 300,000 more men for the Federal army. Congress abolished slavery in the district of Columbia, prohibited it in the territories, and passed a resolution to compensate the masters in any state that would abolish slavery. They also authorized the President to employ negroes in the army, and to confiscate the slaves of rebels. In August, the Federals were a second time defeated at Bull Run, and General Lee crossed the Potomac into Maryland, creating great alarm in Washington, and even in Philadelphia. General M’Clellan made a rapid march, and met him at Sharpsburg or Antietam. A drawn battle resulted in the retreat of General Lee, covering an immense train of provisions, horses, cattle, &c., which was probably the object of his expedition.

A Confederate invasion of Kentucky, about the same time, was attended with similar results. Another advance on Richmond was led by General Burnside, who had superseded General M’Clellan; but he was confronted by General Lee at Fredericks-burg, and defeated in. one of the most sanguinary battles of the war. President Lincoln issued a proclamation declaring the freedom of all the slaves in the rebel states, which it was expected might cause them to rise against their masters; but it was without result. While the army of the Potomac was vainly endeavoring to advance on Richmond, the army of Tennessee, under General Rosencranz, with its base at Nashville, was trying to sever the Atlantic from the Gulf States, and cut off the railways that supplied the Confederate armies in Virginia. At Murfreesborough Tennessee, the Confederate General Bragg attacked General Rosencranz with the usual result of heavy looses on both sides, but no decided victory.

Early in May 1868, General Hooker, who had succeeded General Burnside in the command of the army of the Potomac, crossed the Rappahannock, and was defeated by General Lee at Chancellorsville with great slaughter; but this victory was dearly bought by the loss of General Jackson, mortally wounded in mistake by his own soldiers. General Lee now took the offensive, and invaded Pennsylvania, advancing as far as Harrisburg; but being met by General Meade, the new commander of the army of the Potomac. he attacked him in a strong position at Gettysburg without success, and was compelled to recross the Potomac. In the meantime, the two principal fortresses of the Mississippi, Vicksburg and Port Hudson, attacked by land and water, after a long siege, were starved into capitulation, and the entire river was open to Federal gun-boats.

Charleston, blockaded since the beginning of the war, was now strongly besieged—its outworks, Forts Gregg and Wagner, taken, Fort Sumter battered in pieces, but still held as an earthwork, and shells thrown a distance of five miles into the inhabited part of the city. In September, General Rosencranz had taken the strong position of Chattanooga, and penetrated into the north-west corner of Georgia, where he was disastrously defeated by General Bragg at the battle of Chickamauga. At this period, there were great peace-meetings in the North, terrible riots in New York against the conscription and the negroes; while the banks having suspended specie payments, the paper-money of both Federals and Confederates was largely depreciated. The Confederates were, however, cut off from all foreign aid, except what came to them through the blockade, and their own resources, both of men and material, were becoming exhausted. The railways were worn, many destroyed or occupied by the Federals, and it became difficult to transport supplies and feed armies. The Federals had command of the sea, and access to all the markets of Europe.

At the commencement of 1864, the Federals held, including the garrisons on the Mississippi, nearly 100,000 prisoners of war. The Southerners also had about 40.000 Federal prisoners, whom they could feed with difficulty, and who suffered great hardships. General Ulysses S. Grant, who had been successful at Vicksburg. was appointed commander-in-chief of the Federal armies, and commenced a vigorous campaign over an immense area—in Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Louisiana, and Arkansas, with the determination ‘ to hammer continuously against the armed forces of the enemy and his resources, until by mere attrition he should be forced to submit.’ Of the Confederates, General Lee defended Petersburg and Richmond; General J. E Johnston opposed the army of Tennessee at Dalton, Georgia; General Forrest was in Mississippi; General Taylor and Kirby Smith commanded in Louisiana and Arkansas. In February. General Sherman marched from Vicksburg, making a destructive raid across Northern Mississippi to Alabama. In March, the Federals bad 1,000.000 of men raised and provided for. The entire Confederate forces probably numbered 250,000. The army of the Potomac, commanded by General Meade. under the personal superintendence of General Grant, covered Washington, and advanced toward Richmond. General Butler advanced from Fortress Monroe up the James River; General Sigel marched up the Shenandoah. Sherman united the armies of Tennessee, Cumberland, and Ohio, at Chattanooga, where he had nearly 100,000 men and 250 guns. General Banks had 61.000 men in Louisiana. In March, General Banks moved up the lied River, toward Shrieveport, but was defeated on the 24th, and driven back to New Orleans. In May, the campaign of Virginia commenced, and the army of the Potomac fought a series of battles at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court-house, Jericho’s Ford, North Anna, and Cold Harbor, with terrible losses. After each repulse, the Federals took up a new position further south, with a new base, until they had made half the circuit of the Confederate capital. General Breckenridge defeated Sigel in the Shenandoah valley, and once more threatened Washington. General Sheridan, with a strong cavalry force, drove back the Confederates, and laid waste the valley. In September, General Sherman advancing with a superior force, captured Atlanta. General Hood, superseding Johnston in the command of the Confederates, was out-generaled and beaten. While lie marched west to cut off General Sherman’s base, and attack Nashville, where he was defeated, Sherman burned Atlanta, destroyed the railway, and marched boldly through Georgia to Savannah. The Confederates made strong efforts and won victories, but with no permanent result.

In 1865, the Federals made a new draft for 500,000 men. Expeditions were organized against Mobile. Wilmington, the most important Confederate port, was taken by a naval and military expedition. Savannah and Charleston, approached in the rear by Sherman, were evacuated. Cavalry raids cut off the railways and canal that supplied the Confederate army in Petersburg and Richmond. Finally, on March 29, 1865, a series of assaults was made upon the Confederate works, during ten days of almost continual fighting, until the Confederates were worn down with fatigue. Richmond and Petersburg were evacuated April 2; and on the 9th, after several conflicts, General Lee surrendered at Appomatox Court-house, his army numbering 28,000. At this period, it is said that there was not lead enough remaining in the Confederate States to fight a single battle. On the 12th, Mobile surrendered with 3000 prisoners and 300 guns. Then General Johnston, in North Carolina, surrendered a few days after to General Sherman; and the Trails-Mississippi Confederate army followed his example.

The war was scarcely ended, when 800,000 men were paid off. During the war, the number of men called for by the Federal government was 2,759,049; the number actually furnished was 2,653,062. Of colored troops there were 186,097. The state of New York, with a pop. of less than 4,000,000, sent 223,836 volunteers. There was an annual waste of one-third, half of which was by wounds in battle. The Federal losses during the war were estimated at 316,000. In 1864, the Confederate army consisted of 30,000 artillery, 128,000 cavalry, 400,951 infantry; the entire available force enrolled did not exceed 600,000. The Confederate losses are said to have amounted to 300,000.

Mr. Lincoln was in 1865 triumphantly re-elected to the presidency, with Andrew Johnson as Vice-president. On April 14, while the North was rejoicing over the capture of Richmond and the surrender of the Confederate armies, the President was assassinated at a theater in Washington, by John Wilkes Booth, an actor; while an accomplice attacked and nearly killed Mr. Seward, Secretary of State. The assassin was pursued and killed, and several of his accomplices tried and executed. Andrew Johnson became President. Jefferson Davis and the members of the Confederate government were supposed to be privy to the assassination of President Lincoln, and large rewards were offered for their apprehension. Mr. Davis was captured in Georgia, and placed in Fortress Monroe, but was released without trial in May 1867. An amendment to the constitution, for ever abolishing slavery in the states and territories of the union, was declared ratified by two-thirds of the states, December 18. 1865. The vast change in the organization of the republic made by this new fundamental law was completed by the 14th and 15th amendments, passed in 1868 and 1870, which gave to the former slaves all the rights and privileges of citizenship. The seceded states were readmitted to the Union on condition of their adhesion to the constitution as thus amended. In 1867, the United States acquired by purchase the whole of Russian America (see ALASKA).

In 1872, the Alabama (q. v.) Court of Arbitration gave its decree in favor of the United States, while the San Juan boundary dispute with Great Britain was settled on the same side by the Emperor of Germany. The outrages of a secret organization known as the Ku-Klux Klan, in the Southern States, necessitated the passing of an act in 1871, giving cognizance of such offences to the U. S. Courts. In 1875, great excitement was created in the States by the discovery of grave malversations on the part of citizens holding high rank in the public service. The year 1876, memorable in the annals of the Republic as the hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, was celebrated by a great Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia. The presidential election of the same year was of more than usual interest. General Ulysses S. Grant (q. v.), chosen President in 1869, had been re-elected in 1873. When the result of the keenly-contested election towards the close of 1876 was made known, it seemed as if fortune had favored the Democratic party. But many of the returns from the various States were disputed; and for several months the intensest excitement prevailed. At last a special tribunal, selected from the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the Judges of the Supreme Court, was appointed to examine the election returns. The result was that Mr. Hayes, the Republican candidate, was declared to have been elected President, and inaugurated March 4, 1877. His Democratic rival was Mr. Tilden.

A period of great commercial depression, not peculiar to America, reached a height in 1877, and was accompanied by alarming difficulties between labor and capital. In 1878, a measure was passed, in spite of the President’s veto, making silver a legal tender equally with gold, though the former was then 11 per cent, less in value. A marvelous recovery in trade rendered comparatively easy in 1879 the resumption of specie payments, which had been strenuously opposed by the Democrats. An extraordinary movement took place amongst the negroes of the Southern States in 1879; a regular ‘ negro exodus ‘ northward and westward created some anxiety. Antipathy to the Chinese immigrants in the Pacific states raised a violent agitation, which threatened a new constitution to California; but the excitement declined in 1879. Bad harvests in Europe increased the already enormous exportation of grain from the U. S. The wheat crop and exportation in 1880 were unparalleled, but the crop of 1881 was, owing to unfavorable weather, much diminished. In 1879, there was, for the first time since the Civil War, a Democratic majority in both Houses of Congress; and a term of office seemed to the Democrats at last to be at hand. But the presidential elections in 1880 gave a large majority for the Republican General Garfield, though the ‘ Solid South ‘ voted for General Hancock, the Democratic candidate.

An item of special interest in the contest was the promotion of General Grant’s claim to a third term of office; but the ex-president’s candidature was withdrawn before the end of the struggle. President Garfield, who was an outspoken advocate of civil service reform, was installed in March 1881. To the horror of his fellow-citizens and of all the civilized communities in the world, he was struck down on 3d July by the hand of an assassin; but not till 19th September did lie succumb to the effects of the fatal shot. Thereupon the vice-president. General Chester Allan Arthur, succeeded to the supreme office, assuming the presidentship on 23d September.

MAPS:
United States, Eastern Part
United States, Western Part

FI’LLIBUSTERS, another name for the piratical adventurers whose origin and history are treated of under BUCANEERS (q. v.). Recently it has become familiar to English ears as the designation of certain lawless adventurers belonging to the United States, who have attempted violently to possess themselves of various countries in North America. The plea urged by these persons has generally been, that such countries were a prey to anarchy and oppression, and could only attain to prosperity by annexation to the United States, and the introduction of ‘ democratic ‘ institutions—amongst which, strange to say, slavery stands prominent. The most notorious of these flllibusters was the late William Walker, whose expedition against Nicaragua in 1855 was so far successful that he kept his ground in that country for nearly two years. At last, he was driven out by a combination of the various states of Central America. He was subsequently captured and shot, September 12, 1860, at Truxillo, in Central America, in the course of another piratical expedition.