he took leave of New York, and hastened to that peaceful retreat, and those rural employments, his taste for which neither military glory, nor political power, could ever diminish.

After a short indulgence in these favourite scenes, it became necessary to repair to Philadelphia, in order to meet the national legislature.

The pacific overtures made by Washington to the Indians of the Wabash and the Miamis, failed of success. Long experience had taught the president, that, on the failure of negotiations with the Indians, policy, economy, and even humanity, required the employment of a sufficient force to carry offensive war into their country, and lay waste their settlements. The accomplishment of this was no easy matter.

The Indian nations were numerous, accustomed to war, and not without discipline. They were said to be furnished with arms and ammunitions from the British posts held within the United States, in violation of the treaty of peace. Generals Harmar and St. Clair were successively defeated by the Indians; and four or five years elapsed before they were subdued.

Their subjugation was accomplished by general Wayne, in 1794. On the eighth of August, general Wayne reached the confluence of the Au Glaize and the Miami of the lakes, without opposition. The richest and most extensive settlements of the western Indians, were at this place. Here, he halted a few days, for the purpose of throwing up some works of defence and protection for magazines. In the vicinity of this post, was collected the whole strength of the enemy, amounting to little less than two thousand men. The continental legion was not much inferior in number to the Indians; and a reinforcement of about eleven hundred mounted militia from Kentucky, commanded by general Scott, gave a decided majority of strength to the army of Wayne.--That the Indians had determined to give him battle, was well understood, and that its issue would be favourable to the American army, the discipline of his legion, the ardour of all his troops, and the superiority of his numbers, authorized him confidently to expect. Yet, in pursuance of that policy by which the United States had been uniformly actuated, he determined to make one more effort for the attainment of peace

without bloodshed; and messengers were despatched to the several hostile tribes assembled in his front; but an evasive answer having been returned to his pacific overture, general Wayne was uncertain whether the Indians had decided for peace or war.

On the fifteenth of August, the American army advanced, by slow and cautious marches, down the Miami, with its right covered by that river; and on the eighteenth arrived at the rapids.

The Indians were advantageously posted behind a thick wood, and behind a British fort.

On the morning of the twentieth, the American army advanced in columns; the legion, with its right flank covered by the Miami. One brigade of mounted volunteers, commanded by general Todd, was on the left; the other, under general Barbee, was in the rear. A select battalion, commanded by major Price, moved in front of the legion, sufficiently in advance to give timely notice for the troops to form, in case of action.

After marching about five miles, major Price received so heavy a fire from a concealed enemy, that he was compelled

to retreat.

The Indians had chosen their ground with judgment. They had advanced into the thick wood in front of the British works, which extends several miles west from the Miami, and had taken a position rendered almost inaccessible to horse, by a quantity of fallen timber, which appeared to have been blown up in a tornado. They were formed in three lines, within supporting distance of each other; and, according to their custom, with a very extended front. Their line stretched to the west, at right angles with the river, about two miles; and their immediate effort was to turn the left flank of the American army.

On the discharge of the first rifle, the legion was formed into two lines; and the front was ordered to advance with trailed arms, and rouse the enemy from their covert, at the point of the bayonet; then, and not until then, to deliver a fire, and to press the fugitives too closely to allow them time to load after discharging their pieces. Soon perceiving the strength of the enemy in front, and that they were endeavour. ing to turn the American left, the general ordered the second

line to support the first. The legion cavalry, led by captain Campbell, was directed to penetrate between the Indians and the river, where the wood was less thick and entangled, in order to charge their left flank; and general Scott, at the head of the mounted volunteers, was directed to make a considerable circuit, and to turn their right flank.

These orders were executed with spirit and promptitude; but such was the impetuosity of the charge made by the first line of infantry; so entirely were the enemy broken by it; and so rapid was the pursuit; that only a small part of the second line, and of the mounted volunteers, could get into the action. In the course of one hour, the enemy were driven more than two miles, through thick woods; when the pursuit terminated within gun-shot of the British fort.

General Wayne remained three days on the banks of the Miami, in front of the field of battle; during which time, the houses and cornfields, above and below the fort, some of them within pistol-shot of it, were reduced to ashes; and on the twenty-eighth, the army returned to Au Glaize, by easy marches, destroying on its route all the villages and corn within fifty miles of the river.

In this decisive battle, the loss of the Americans, in killed and wounded, amounted to one hundred and seven. Soon after that event, a peace was negotiated by general Wayne, between these Indians and the United States.

In the progress of this last Indian war, repeated overtures of peace were made to the North Western Indians, but rejected. About the same period, a new system was commenced, for diverting them from hunting, to the employments of civilized life, by furnishing them with implements for agriculture, and giving them instructions in manufactures.

In this manner, during the presidency of George Washington, peace was restored to the frontier settlements, both in the north and southwest, which has continued ever since, and it is likely to do so, while, at the same time, the prospect of meliorating the condition of the savages, is daily brightening; for the system first begun by Washington, with a view of civilizing these fierce sons of nature, has been ever since steadily pursued, by all his successors.*

• Except general Jackson; by whom, a different policy has been pursued, in relation to the Creeks and Cherokees.-ED.

In

In the mean time, (1791,) the president prepared to make his long contemplated tour through the southern states. passing through them, he was received universally with the same marks of affectionate attachment, which he had experienced in the northern and central parts of the union. The addresses presented to him, from all classes of his fellow citizens, exhibit a glow of expression, which is the genuine offspring of ardent feeling, and evince that the attachment to his person and character, which they professed, was undissembled. To the sensibilities which these demonstrations of regard and esteem of good men, could not fail to inspire, was added the high gratification produced by observing the rapid improvements of the country, and the advances made by the government, in acquiring the confidence of the people. The numerous letters, written by the president, after his return to Philadelphia, attest the agreeable impressions made by these causes. "In my late tour through the southern states," said he, in a letter of the 28th of July, to Mr. Gouverneur Morris, "I experienced great satisfaction, in seeing the good effects of the general government in that part of the union. The people at large have felt the security which it gives, and the equal justice which it administers to them. The farmer, the merchant, and the mechanic, have seen their several interests attended to, and from thence they unite in placing a confidence in their representatives, as well as in those in whose hands the execution of the laws is placed. Industry has there taken place of idleness, and economy of dissipation. Two or three years of good crops, and a ready market for the produce of their lands, have put every one into good humour; and, in some instances, they éven impute to the government, what is due only to the goodness of Providence.

"The establishment of public credit is an immense point gained in our national concerns. This, I believe, exceeds the expectation of the most sanguine amongst us :—and a late instance, unparalleled in this country, has been given, of the confidence reposed in our measures, by the rapidity with which the subscriptions to the bank of the United States, were filled. In two hours after the books were opened by the commissioners, the whole number of shares was taken up, and four thousand more applied for, than were

allowed by the institution. This circumstance was not only pleasing, as it related to the confidence in government, but also as it exhibited an unexpected proof of the resources of our citizens."

During the session of congress, in 1791, an act passed, for establishing a uniform militia. Impressed alike from reason, from observation, and from feeling, with the necessity imposed upon a nation as powerful as the United States, to provide adequate means for its own security; convinced, that in America, the objections to a military establishment which might serve even as the germ of an army, were insurmountable; and that the militia, without great improvement in the existing system, must be found, in time of danger, a very inadequate resource; the president had manifested, from the commencement of his administration, a peculiar degree of solicitude on this subject.

At the succeeding session of congress, not only was this recommendation repeated, but a plan, which had been digested during the recess, was transmitted to both houses, in form of a report from the secretary of war, "that they might make such use thereof, as they might think proper." A bill, conforming to this plan, in many of its essential principles, was introduced into the house of representatives, at an early stage of the session, but the subject was found to be involved in much greater difficulties than had been apprehended. To reconcile the public interest with private convenience, was a task not easily to be performed. Those provisions which were required to render the bill competent to the great purposes of national defence, involved a sacrifice of time and money, which the representatives of the people were unwilling to exact from their constituents, and the propriety of demanding which was the more questionable, as the burthen would be imposed, not so much upon property, as upon per sons. The different ideas entertained on this subject, in different parts of the union, and the difficulty of drawing the precise line between continental and state authority, created additional obstacles to the progress of the measure; and the first congress passed away, without being able to devise any system in which a majority could concur.

In his speech at the opening of the present session, the president again called the attention of the legislature to this