United States oracle and Portsmouth advertiser — Portsmouth, N.H., 1803-10-01 00:00:00, page 2

,ime after this finguinary tranfa&ion, Bonaparte,
Saving made prisoners of three thousand eight
'hundred Turks, in the forftefs of Jaffa, and with
*ing to relieve himfelf from the trouble and ex
peafe of guarding and supporting them, ordered
them to be mrched to an open place, where
part of his army fired on them with mufquetry
and grape (hot, dabbing and cutting to death the
fee who escaped the fire, while he himfelf looked
on, and rejoiced at the horrid feene. Nor were
his cruelties while in Egypt, confined to thole
-whom he called his enemies ; for finding his hos
pitals at Jaffa crowded with sick soldiers, and
desiring to difincumber himfelf of them, he or
dered one of his physicians to destroy them by
poifoh. The physician refufed to obey ; but anj
apothecary was found, willing to perpetrate thel
deed ; opium was mixed with the food ; and thus
fiv.e hundred and eighty Frenchmen perished by
order of the general, under whose flag they had
fought; by the order of that very man, to whose
despotic sway, the whole French nation now pa
tiently submits ! Let them so submit, but let us
not think of fitch fhameful, such degrading sub
mission. Let us recoiled, that this impious and
ferocious invader was stopped in his career of
rapine and blood, by a mere handful of Britons ;
and was finally induced to desert his troops and
to flee from the land he had invaded, at the ap
proach of that gallant British army, by which
Egypt was delivered from the most odious and
mott deftrudive of all its plagues. This is for
us to recollect ; and so recolle&ing, shame and
disgrace upon our heads, if we do not refill, if
we do not chastise this rapacious, this bloody
minded tyrant, who has now marked out our
country for fubjugation,our fields for devastation,
our houses for pillage ; and who, in the insolence
of his ambition, has held us forth to the world,
as a meek, a feeble, and cowardly race, defined
to grace his triumphal car, and to augment the
number of his Haves.
Not,however,to the deeds of Bonaparte alone,muft
our reccolleaion be confined. Not only Italy and
Egypt, but Holland, Switzerland and Germany, &
indeed,almoft every country inEurope have been the
feenes of French rapine, intuit,and cruelty. Holland
formerly the feat of freedom, commerce, industry,
and affluence, presents at this moment,the fad spec
tacle of a country divided against itfelf, torn to pie
ces by factions, contending, not for the fuffrages of
the people, but for the favour of France ; a coun
try governed by the haugh y mandates of a forereign
power ; awed oy foreign arms ; holding the remains
of its wealth, together with the residue of its milita
ry and naval means, in constant readincis to be dis
posed of in the service of another nation, and that
nation its ancient and implacable enemy, and now
its inexorable oppressor. — W hen the French armies
entered the rerritories of Holland their motto was
" War to the Palace, but Peace to the Cottage." —
They came to deliver the people from their rulers
and from the burthens which those ruleis impeded.
The Dutch like the Italians, lent an ear to theft
artful and perfidious declarations,beleiving that then
cottages would be Ipared, and careless of the fate
of the palace. But, alas! they loon found, that
Frenco rapacity like the hail &:he thunder, fell alike
on the t hatched roof,and the gilded dome. The pa|
aces once seized on, the cottages soon followed ;
while all thole who were found in the intermedia e
space, the merchant the manufacturer, the farmer,
and the tradefman,were funk in one common ruin :
happy, if, by the loss of their property, they had
the good fortune to preserve their lives. Bonaparte
is, indeed, now,not only the sovereign of the coun
try, not only dots he exercise the powers of domin
ion, but he is, as to every pradical effect, the mas
ter and the owner of all the property,and of all the
people in Holland. These miserable beings poff.ls
nothing of their own ; they can acquire nothing
with the hope of enjoying, or bequeathing it ; they
can make no provision for the weakness 1 f difeafe,the
feeblenefs of old age, or the helplessness of infancy ;
they are, the mere political drudges of a nard heart
ed tyrant, who fuffers them to live only while their
labours administer to his projects of ambition, and
who, when his purposes demand it, putsan end at
once to their toils and their exiftnee.
In Switzerland, where high rank and great rich
es were unknown,where men were nearer upon an
equality than in any other country in the world ;
in a country having no commerce, scarcely any
manufaaures, and possessing few of the sources of
wealth and diftinaion ; a country of Ilieperds and
labourers; a country which might be truly said to
Contain a nation of poor men ; in such a country
to cry “ war to Palaces" seemed ufelels and absurd.
Yet did the French find a prtext for War with this
poor and harmless race, and for invading and
laying waftetheir territory. The Swils, fromtheir
anxiety to prefeve peace consented to every facri
fice demanded of them by France, they exposed
themselves to the hostility of other nations by fen
ding away the ambassadors of those nations ; they
broke off their connexion with some of their most
powerful allies ; they banished the loyal fubieas of
their ancient protestor the King of France, men
whom the ties of gratitude and the laws of hospital
ity bound them to cherifli; and when they bad thus
exhausted the source of concession, when they could
grant no more, because France could find nothing
more to demand, when they had humbled them
selves in the dust and degraded the charader of
their country in the eyes of all Europe when they
had thus done and fuffered rather than fee their
country the feene of war, then did the French in
vade their territory ; then did these reliefs disturb
ers of the world march an army into the heart of
Switzerland,in order to compel the people to change
the nature and the form of their government, and
to commit it to the hands of traitors who had been
chosen by France, and by the affiftence of whose
treachery the French invasion had been effeded.
After having by means of an armistice, joined
to the most solemn promise of refped for Persons
and property, lulled the people into a state of ima
ginary security, the armistice was broken and the
French pushed on their forces, when those of the
Swiss were dispersed. Resistance on the part of the
latter, whose numbers did not amount to a tenth of
those of their flagitious enemy, now became hope-,
less: & though the little army was brave, though the
people were faithful and adive, though the last bat
tle was long, obstinate and bloody ; though the
Swiss achieved wonders, and though the women
Such are the barbarities which have been inflided on 0-
ther nations. The recollection of them will never be ef
faced; the melancholy story will be handed down from
generation ft generation, to the everlasting infamy of the
re üblicans of France and as an awful warning to all those
options whom they may hereafter attempt to invade. We
are one of th # fe nations; we are the people whom they
are now preparing to invade : awful indeed is the warning,
and if we defyife it, tremendous will be the judgment. The
fame generals, the fame commissaries, the fame officers, the
fame foHiers, the very fame rapacious and fanguitiary host,
that now hold Holland and Switzerland in chains, that def
olatcd Egypt, Italy and Germany, are, at this moment, pre
paring to make Engichl, Ireland, and Scotland, the feenes
of their atrocities. For some time past, they have bad little
opportunity to plunder : Peace, for a while, suspended their
devastations, and now, like gaunt and hungry wolves, they
are looking towards the rich pastures of Britain :—Already
we bear their threatening howl; and if, like deep, we
(land bleating for mercy, neither our innocence nor our ti
midity will save us from being torn to pieces and devoured.
The robberies, the barbarities, the brutalities they have
committed in other countries, though at the thought of
them the heart finks and the blood runs cold, will be mere
I trifles to what they will commit here, if we fuffer them to
triumph over us. The Swiss and the Suabians were never
objects of their envy ; they were never the rivals of French
men, either on the land or on the sea : they had never dis
concerted or checked their ambitious projects, never hum
bled their pride, never defeated cither their armies or their
Accts. l We have been and we have dene all this: They
have long entertained against us a hatred engendered by the
mixture of envy and of fear—and they are now about to
make a great and desperate effort to gratify this ruinous,
this unquenchable, this deadly hatred. What then, can
we exped at their hands ? What but torments even sur
passing those which they have inflided on other nations.
They remained but three months in Germany ; here they
would remain forever; there, their extortions and their
atrocities were, for want of time, confined to a part of the
people , here they would be universal. No fort, no part, no
particle of property, would remain unfeized, no man,woman
or child would escape violence of some kind or other. Such
of our manufactories as are moveable, they would transport
to France, together with the most ingenious of the manu
facturers, whose wives and children would be left to starve.
Our (hips would follow the fame course, with all the com
merce and commercial means of the kingdom. Having
Gripped us of every thing, even to the stoutest of our sons,
and the most beautiful of our daughters, over all that re
mained they would eftablilh and exercise a tyranny, such as
the world never before witnessed. All the estates, all the
farms, all the mines, all the land and the houses, all the shops
and magazines, all the remaining manufa&ories, and the
workfllops of every kind and description, from the greatest
to the smallest ; all these they would bring over French
men to possess ; making us their servants and their laborers.
To prevent us from uniting and riling against them, they
would crowd every town and village with their brutal sol
diers, who would devour all the best part of the produce
of the earth, leaving us not half a fufficiency of bread.
They would, besides, introduce their own bloody laws, with
additional severities—They would divide us into feparatc
claftes, hem us up into diftrids; cut off all communication
between friends and relations, patents and children, which
latter t'bey would breed up in their own blasphemous prin
ciples; they would affix badges upon us. mark us in the
cheek, fh^Ye our heads, split our ears, cr clothe us in the
habit of flames! —And shall we submit to misery and degra
dation like thV rather than encounter the expences of war;
rather than me<% the honorable dangers of military combat,
rather than make a generous use of the means which Prov
idence has so bounfeoufly placed in our bands ? The fun in
his whole course rofWd the globe, Ibines not on a spot so
blessed as this great, a,d now united Kingdom—gay and
produaive fields and gardens, lofty and extensive woods, in
numerable flocks and herds', rich and inexhauftibic mines, a
fought b, the sides of their husbands, inciting them to
vi9ory or death, all was in vain—hundreds and thou •
sands perished by the fabres of the French, and while the
earth was brewed with their dead bodies, and while the
flames afeended from the once happy dwellings of this val
iant and innocent people, the hard-earned and long-preserv
ed liberties of Switzerland expired.
Germany, which elofes this awful liffon, was invaded by
the French in 1796 and 1798. These invasions were at
tended with crimes too atrocious to be credited, were they
not proved by indisputable evidence, and did they not ac
cord with the general pradice of the inhuman wretches by
whom they were committed. In adverting to these de
testable a&s of oppreflion and cruelty, we muff recolle&,
that they were perpetrated upon a people, who had made
no resistance of any fort against the invaders, and who in ev
ery infiance had entered into an agreement with the French
Generals, to pay them great funis of money, in order to
preserve their country from plunder. In consequence of
the ranfem thus wrung from the people, the invaders de
clared by public proclamation, that the persons and proper
ty of the inhabitants should be flri&ly refpedted; and that
their rights, usages, laws and religion should remain invio
late and undisturbed. On these assurances, thus solemnly
made, the credulous people all implicitly relied, while some
of the poorer daffies regarded the French, not as enemies,
but as their deliverers from taxes and labour. No sooner,
however, had the invasion taken place, no sooner had the
French become makers of the country, than they spread
themselves over it like beads of prey, devouring and de
stroying every thing before them. They spared neither
cities nor towns, neither villages nor hamlets, nor felitary
houses; from the church to the cell, from the catlie to the
cottage-; no state of life however lofty or however humble,
escaped their rapacious assaults; no fandlity excited their
veneration ; no grandeur their refped ; no misery their
forbearance or their pity. After having plundered the
houses of the gentry, the clergy, and the tradesmen ; after
having pillaged the shops, warehouses, and manufactories,
they proceeded to the farm houses and cottages ; they rifled
the packets and chests of the inhabitaats, cut open their
beds, tore up the floors of their rooms, searched the newly
made graves, and broke open the coffins in hopes of finding
fecretcd treasure. They Sometimes threatened people with
immediate death, sometimes put them to the torture, some
times lacerated and crippled them, in order to wring from
them a difeovery of their little pittance of ready money.
The deeped and most apparent poverty was no protection
againfl their rapacity ; grey heirs and Iffping infancy ; the
sick ; the dying, wowen in child-bed, were alike exposed to
the mod barbarous treatment ; dragged from their beds,
kicked, wounded, and frequently killed, under pretence that
they were the keepers of concealed wealth. The teams and
flocks, cattle of every kind, the marauders drove off, cut to
pieces on the spot, or left in a date of mutilation; corn,
hay, and draw, they wafted or burnt ; they demolished the
houfhold furniture, destroyed the utensils of the dairies, the
barns, and the Cables; tore down the gates, levelled the
fences, In many places they flripped the clothes from the
backs of the people, set their liquor flowing in the cellar,
burnt their provisions to allies. The churches, whether
Romilh or Protestant, they rendered a feene of indiferimi
nate robbery, of sacrilege and blasphemy too fllocking to
describe. Towards women of all ages and all conditions,
they were guilty of brutality never before heard of: Nei
ther extreme youth nor extreme age ; neither weakness nor
deformity ; nor the most lolthfome disease; neither the
pangs of labour, nor the agonies of death could retrain
them ; cries, tears, supplications were of no avail; and
where fathers, husbands, or brothers interfered, murder sel
dom failed to elofe the horrible feene. To spread nakedness
and hunger, to introduce misery and disease amongst all
ranks, seems to have been their uniform desire; but the
lower orders of the people, the artisans and the labourers,
were the objeas of their direst malignity ; against them was
diruded the sharpest bayonets; for their bodies the choicest
torment, for their minds the keened anguish was teferved !
from one end of the country to the other, we trace the
n ercilcfs ruffians through a feene of conflagration and
blood ; frequently ue fee them butchering whole families,
and retiring by the light of their blazing habitations; but
amongst rhe poor alone, do we find them deferring the
murder of the parents, for the purpose of compelling them
to hear their children fltrick amidst the flames!
In the United States, lands are " superabun
dant," but labourers are few and scarce. They
have not yet attained even to the twentieth part
of i full population : therefore any more lands,
for the mere purpose of fettlenent and cultivation,
* Holland has the average number of two hundred
and thirty Jr.; person, to each square mile.
The United States contain about one million
square miles, and are inhabited by about five
million white people ; making only five persons
to a square mile ; which is less than the thirtieth
part of the population of France, apportioned to
the refpe&ive areas of each country. The wil
derness North Weft of the Ohio bears, to all the
rest part of the territory of the United States, a
little more thart the proportion of four to fir.
Mr. Hutchins, late Geographer of the United
States, estimated this trad (after deducting all
the furface covered with water) to contain two
hundred and twenty million acres. South of
the Ohio,and in the fneighbourd of the Mississip
pi, are immense tra&s of unoccupied lands. In
the Weftern territory of Georgia; about twenty
two million acres of excellent land was fold, by
the government of that State, so lately as the
year 1795, for the sum of five hundred thousand
dollars ; which is from two to three cents an
acre. The population of the State of Georgia,
Kentucky and Tennessee does not average two
persons to a square mile. In the State of Vir
ginia, the oldest State in the Union, there are
(including the negroes) but about eleven persons
to a square mile. In the States of Pennsylvania
and New-York, there are, to each square mile,
but about ten persons ; which is less than a fif
teenth part of the population of Fr nee.—
Massachusetts (exclusive of the Province of
Maine, most of which is yet a wilderness) has
about forty inhabitants, to every square mile :
Connecticut about forty-four. Those two States
are, through mi^ake, supposed to be full ; vast
emigrations from eac > of them, and especially
from the latter, have been yearly prefling toward
the South and Weft ; yet the population of France,
which, (as the memorial dates) is very far from
having reached its ultimate term, is much more
than treble to theirs.
mild and wholesome climate, giving health, activity, and
vigour to fourteen millions of people ; and Ihall we, who
are thus favored and endowed; (hall we, who are abund
antly supplied with iron and Reel, powder and lead; ihall
we who have a fleet superior to the maritime force of all
the world, and who are ahle to bring two millions of
fighting men into the field ; Ihall we yield up this dear
and happy land, together with all the liberties and honours
to preserve which our fathers so often dyed the land and
the sea with their blood ; shall we, thus, at once dilhonour
their graves, and flamp disgrace and infamy on the brows
cf our children ; and shall we too, make this tafe and das
tardly surrender to an enemy, whom, within these twelve
years, our countrymen have defeated in every quarter cf
the world? No; we are not so miserably fallen; we can
not, in so short a space of time have become so detestably
degenerate—We have the strength and the will to repel the
hostility, to chastise the infolance of the foe. Mighty in
deed, mud be our efforts, but mighty also is the meed.
Singly engaged against the tyrants of the earth. Bri
tain now attracts the eyes and the hearts cf mankind ;
groaning nations look to her for deliverance ;---juftice, lib
erty and religion are inferibed on her banners; her success
will be hailed with the fhbuts of the Universe, while tears
of admiration and gratitude will bedew the heads of her
sons, who fall in the glorious contest.
From the Balance.
No. IV.
A COMPARATIVE VIEW OF THE DISADVANTAGES
AND BENEFITS, WHICH WOULD PROBABLY
ACCRUE TO THE UNITED STATES, FROM AN
ENLARGEMENT OF THEIR TERRITORIAL LIM
ITS BY THE PURCHASE OF EITHER
LOUISIANA or the FLORIDAS.
Germany, which lis in the neighbourhood of
Fiance, is iomething larger, in extent of terri
tory, as well as in population. Now, making
the supposition that Germany were a wildernel's,
and that France were offered the possession of it,
riot in commutation for millions of dollars, but
gratis ; would it be wife policy in France, merely
for the fake of possessing additional territory, to accept
the girt and consequently to disperse her popula
tion in fettling this neighbouring wilderness ?—
On the rcfpc&nblc authority of Mr. Livingdon,
We confidently fay, NO : according to his con
clusive reasoning, such a measure would be rather
injurious, than beneficial to France ; because, not
having a " superabundance of population," she
can utefully employ all her people at home ; and
" one man alone is more ufeful by remaining at
home, than two by removing at a distance." —
Her frontiers would be double in extent, and
would therefore require a double expence in de
fending them ; and by thus spreading her capitals
and her population over twice the furface which
she now possesses, she would be impoverished and
weakened in nearly the fame proportion. But
Mr. Livingflon's reasoning, which is clear and
conclusive as it refpeds France, is Rill much
r^re abundantly forcible in its application to
the United States.
AN enlargement of a nation's territory, that
is already more than fufficiently extensive,
by dissipating its capitals, by dispersing and
thinning its population, and by “ multiplying
points of defence, tends to diminish, rather than
to increase its riches and strength. Mr. Living.
Ron, in his memorial, sagaciously remarks :
" As one man is more ufeful by remaining at
home, than two by removing at a distance, a wife
nation does not seek to colonize, until the has a
superabundance of population, which ihe cannot
employ in any other way." And applying this
remark particularly to the French nation, he
proceeds to fay, “ Though very considerable, the
population of France is very far from having
reached the term which renders colonies neceiTa
ry." These fehtiments of our honourable am
bassador are undoubtedly just.
France is populous, but not full '; in proportion
to her area or furface, she is a little more popu
lous than Germany, England and Wales; but
she is considerably less populous than Italy, and
much less than Holland.* France is not quite
a sixth part so large, in furfaco, as the United
States : her population is estimated at twenty
four million eight hundred thousand ; which
averages one hundred and fifty-two inhabitants
in each square mile.
Rabelais tells us a story of one Philpot
Placut, who being brisk and hale, fell dead as he
was paying an old debt ; which perhaps causes
many, fays he, not to pay theirs for fear of the
like accident.
An Irish G ntlemau is said to have refufed to
quit Paris until he had paid his debts, notwithstand
ing he was peremptorily ordered immediately to
depart by the FirftConful.
A number of young English ladies, who had been
at boarding school at Rouen were prevented em
barking from Calais on their return ; the First con
fill de firing that they might be detained rill the En
glish government lent back M fter and Mils L^pa
gene, nephew and niece to Madame Bonaparte, who
..re prisoners in England.
F. R.
<►•»•+••>» •„thfy.D±»«+►>>•►» +»+>_.fy.
^ valuable hint to Farmers. —A difeovery cf
considerable importance has been announced,
with regard to the preservation of corn. To
preserve Rye and fecu-e it from infers and rats,
nothing more is necessary than not to fan it after
it is threshed, and to flow it in the granaries
mixed with chaff. In this date it has been kept
more than three years, without experiencing the
smallest alterations, and even without the neces
sity of being turned to preserve it from humidity
and fermentation. Rats and mice may be pn#
vented from entering the barn by putting some
vine or hedge plants upon the heaps ; the Imell
of this wood is so offenfive to those animals that
they will not approach it. The experiment has
not yet been made with any other kinds of grain,
but they may probably be preserved in the chaff
with equal advantage.— Englifo paper.
they no more need, than they need plant
in the moon. Aside from the confideratio, ;!
the settlement of Louisiana or the Flori< s,
either of them, might tend to bar off dan .ros
neighbours and permanently to secure th nav
gation of the Mrffrffippi, it is questionable whether
they would be worth receiving, if they were to
be offered to this nation as a gift. If a promise
of speedily fettling the bequeathed terr to:y
were made a condition in accepting the bequest,
national interest would imperiously require its
rejeament. The truth of this sentiment will, I
trust, be rendered apparent, from arguments and
reasons, which will be offered hereafter.
CALCULATOR.
0
From the Ne^hampfoire Sentinel
—
= the Ardelian Office, occupied by
Fabius Rofquin.
Meanly pofftffed
Os a mere, lifelcfs, violated form. Thompson.
T . °~°—
1 HE great aim of mankind is to be happy.
The gratification of certain propensities, appe
tites & passions is the constant work of man, and
to which labor he calls forth all the energies of
his body and mind : the means of obtained tem
poral happiness, or of enjoying secular pleasure
are without number : that is, they are fought
through various mediums. The youth, just Set
ting out in the world, places his happiness in by
and-by, having a competence, and supposes his
cup of happiness will be full, when he, indepen
dent of poverty and care, shall spend his declin
ing years in ease and dignity. The voluptuous
man places his happiness in gorging his appetite
—he looks forward to the hour of gormandize g
and views the table groaning with piled platters
and copious bowls, and thinks with Epicurus,
all happiness in this world. The miser's happi
ness is in the poffeflion of one ginea more,^//-
out end. The ambitious fancy they shall be hap
py when they shall possess the greatest honors &
be looked up to as the greatest people in the worlds
But to all those who do not think and expert ra
tionally, the anticipation of pleasure is the chief
source of gratification The thing possessed is no
longer fought, and little longer enjoyed. Alex
ander was only happy when meditating or mak
ing cogqueSl; but we fee how happy he was
wkfen we hear him lament, that, having con
quered the world, that there were no more worlds
to conquer. There is a certain distance, at which
certain objects of pleasure are best enjoyed—if
nearer they satiate—is removed further off, they
become uninteresting : Amongst these are the
objeds of animal paoffin. Or in other words,
there are certain pleasures, which delight most
while we anticipate them; but the enjoyment
of them leaves the mind disgusted and un
happy. All human happiness may, perhaps, be
summed up in these two propositions. t. In an
ticipation—zdly. In recalling to mind objects of
pleasure, when the enjoyment is past and gone.
Here we, as it were, Stand in the middle, and
have real enjoyment on each hand at equal dis
tances. On one hand the objed of pleasure
is pleasing, because it has been pleading ; and on
the other, it so pleating, because it «urilt be r fo. The
more a man is intoxicated with fancy, the less is
his real fatisfaftion ; but the more rationally he
conceives of things, the greater are his solid en
joyments ; and when he is so rational that he can
approach, and adually possess the objed of plea
sure, without its appearing less inviting, or less
pleasing, then he is most happy, and enjoys all
that a man can enjoy.
There are but two things which can qualify the
mind to be thus happy, namely, Religion and
Philosophy. The latter, by teaching us the na
ture, disposition, and properties of natural things,
learns us to estimate them according to their real
value ; and the former, by shewing us the uncer
tainty of earthly things, and the permanency and
fullnefs of immortal joys, inftruds us to value
the fading and unfatisfying pleasures of the world
as they are, unworthy the sole attention of an
immortal mind. If these only can qualify our
pleasures, we may justly conclude that all un
happy people, who complain that there is no hap
piness in this world, either do not possess those
shields against trouble and disappointment, or
have not the courage and (kill to use them.
If the reader hence learns any thing of the na
ture of secular happiness, and how it may be belt
enjoyed, “ ITis ail I wish, 'tis all I ask."