Norfolk gazette and publick ledger — Norfolk [Va.], 1810-08-17 00:00:00, page 2

. THE PI1 BUCK LEDGER. f
' tEssSBS>fiB*UMaSaMUuuEsaa£M4Sia#*van*
* ^FRIDAY EVENING, AUOlTST 17, G»0
<h will be Mm by tbs rfrost recent intelligence
from Europe, that there ex ills hut Uie most distant
Soph <*f the recovery.»f any part of the American pro
perty which has been seized in lhns£ countries under
•« tbedominion or influence of France > on (be contrary,
that the vessels and cargoes are daily exposed tu
jvMfc, and the Captains and Seamen- returning liome.
And by the last advices from the North of Europe,
it appears that the Ports of Tomiingen and Hasuro,
(nominally under the nominal government of Den
mark, but actually under the efficient government of
'Naprdeon) are shut against our ships, '['his we
believe will be no disadvantage in tbe end to the
American merchant, for it is almost reduced to a
certainty, that whenever Napoleon should see a
fovdopportunity, be would seize all American pro
perty inthoee ports, as be has done elsewhere. The
apprehensions of the holders of American property
at Tonnmgrn, were great, lu tbe expectation of its
seizure. We have become so accustomed to the
injustice of tbe French Ruler, that nothing whirl)
he can do excites surprize, much less indignation.
The American property that has been seized in
Europe, was not in France, lul in those countries,
which, our rulersjn their construction of the Non In
tercourse Law, considered as independent of France,
tbo’ it was as Well known then, as it is now, that
• decree of the French government was paramount
to their own laws.' Uy this cun»tru«|jpn of the
Llw, it was expected, (and for what we know in
- tended) that France should derive the benefit of our
trade, while.we refused it tu heivgrivul. How rnise
xmily (bese calculations have been realized, experi
ence has demonstrated! It is also to Oils very un
just interpretation of the Law, that the great loss
; in property has been sustained. U Holland, Na
ples, andtbe ports of Spain, in "(be possession of
french troops, or acknowledging Joseph Buona
parte, hud been considered (as in effect they were)
as under the dominion of France, and that they
ought to have been to considered, their enactment
of Decrees similar to the Berlin Decree, was suffi
cient cause—-had they we say been so considered by
'our government, then the American merchants would
" J>ot have tolament the loss of ten or twelve millions
of dollars. Out no, our rulers would not so consider
matters, and now their defenders very gravely tell us
^that the merchants have nothing to complain of,
». -theirown fully or cupidity have produced their lot
' see, (hat Mr Jefferson's wise admonitions were
disregarded,. It would at this time be irksome to
attempt an exposition of that foolish measure the
-embargo, the more so as its advocates have aban
doned it, thereby confessing (bat with a very bad
grace) its fully, if nothing worse.
From France.— The folowing gentlemen arrived
■ here last eveinvji in the sch’r Saloma, of North Ca
rolina—Doctor Johnson and Mr. Ilnualdson, of
Philadelphia, Mr. itiebborn, of Boston, Sir. Pear
' Ibn and Mr. Burnett. These gentlemen were pas
sengets on board the George Dyer, liom Bordeaux,
and left that ship six days since, bound to Balti
more. The George Dyer sailed from Haiti more for
'France, at the instance of Gen. Turreau, to cany
out Frenchmen who had arrived in this country
from the Spanish West Indies. She was permitted
■ to return with 52 passengers, among whom were
the gentlemen above named.
’■,s These gentlemen confirm the news before receiv
ed from Europe, relative to American property 10
that country. They state that all Ameiican pro
perly of whatever kind or denomination, and Where
•ter found. In Franse orany of the countries under
the Commit! of Buonaparte, has hero seized and
:toW. Audi hat nothing but the most abject sub
inissiou of.nur government to the will of Buona
parte, ran give a hope that a cent of it will ever be
reitorwl. So determined whs the emperour to lay
..bands on every thing American, that he had se
... qqaslcred vessels which had been sailing under his
i own licence, The schooner Three Apprentices.
•'rapt. Irvine, of New-York—The ship-, captain
of Nantucket, and the schr.-, c aptain
Clark# which bad been trading under British and
French licenses, were seized and sold at Bmdeatix
in the mouth of June. The ship Ann, Pendergrast,
waj to sail.from Bordeaux in about 15 days after
\the,George. .Dyer (by permission) with upwards of
; 206 American seamen ; the erews of American
* Vf»S*!s whirb have lately been seized and sequester
ed. Mr. Armstrong expected to leave France about
^ tb^middle August,^that is, if the emperor would
flood* tcend to grant him permission.
; nr»i_ .l:. e... _ r% r « . .
^ mini wiis por; wai laii
^ «t by FwiKh privateer* and c»riwd iut<> Ainster.
** *»A. CapC. Dtlanorothpronrised »jih the raptors,
and the eomprniniie was sent to the cmrjpil nf pri
*09 at Parlsfftr approval; bin no rW^iou was bad
ihirehh when tbr*e gentlentfo left Paris. *'
^ The George Dyeftyt Bordeaux the 16th of June i
the ship -Ann, Perjdeigrast,' would probably leave
there aboutthe first of July. *
> Washington Moreton, E»q,'of this rity. died at
Paris oh the 3d of. May.—{iVta iVA £« Pint, of
, -t v W’.\snt:j6Tt>s City, August'15. •
'..Ik to inoeftif our renders, that various
opinions have been lop* mteitained by the nature*
tisteof our enuptty rejecting the character of the
ilararnoth, thebones of which have been found,
different garteof the union. The following let
|4frffoni Dr. Banoi^ Onev>f the most enlightened
5 < alti vstttre of aatepil science of the
,‘gifwie»t:tiii»r|, Jefferson, which we are ena
bw to pMtjtity to oar realdwt, fail to awak •
:;fjp;aod'rewa|d-*hrtp8ity.
- [tetter-TSii^iAi J^itk feiafo**. Ahi
; A l-Te J*l6. , -i
Pea* Swt—As yoo tak^mucb interest in the
knoolidge of every thing relative to the American
Mammoth, and other similar. animats, I am per
•oaded that yon will b« glad to learn, that I have re
cently received from St. PetmLargh, in Russia,
(tome fine Urge drawings of the great Asiatick
Mammoth, whose skeleton, together with wmc
portions of the skin and muscular parts, has lately
been discovered, in a elate of excellent preservati
on, under vast masses of ice, near the mouth of the
river Lama, in lat. 72 North. For this, to me in
estimable present, I am indebted to the kindness of
Mr. Tilesius, an eminent naturalist, by whom the
drawings were made, and who has, at the same
time, favoured me with some important manuscript
observations concerning the animal.
1 need not tell you that this Asiatick Mammoth
is specifically distinct from the great Mammoth of
North America; that whose bones have been disco
vered iu so many parts of our continent, and that
of which Mr. Peale has mounted the skeleton, in
bis museum. The two animals are specifically dis
tinct. though I am very far from thinking them ge
ntrically so. Out the Asiatick Mammoth has, at
some period, been a native of America, as well as
of Asia, and of Europe. The giinding teeth, the
incisors (or tusks), and other bones of this animal,
! have been discovered in several parts of the United
States, &c. as in Pennsylvania, in the river Sus
quehanna, a branch of which I have elsewhete
shewn, receives its name of “ Chemung” from the
intisors of one of these huge animals. Similar re
mains have been discovered in the county of Wythe,
in this state; in the same imiriatick lick along
' *ith the remains of the other Mammoth, or what
I will call for the present, the Ohio Mammoth ; m
South Carolina in digging the Santee canal; in Ken
tucky, and doubtless, in many other places, some
of which I could mention. I had lung suspected,
and even asserted, that the Mammoth of the Che
mung was the same us that of Siberia ; and this
matter is now pul beyond all doubt by the drawings
and information communicated to me by Mr. Tile
sius.
m least one species oi elephant, therefore (for it
is by all naturalists allowed, that the Asiatirk
Mammoth was a legitimate species of Elephas), has
been a native both of the old and the new world.—
lam imbued, however, to think, that the species
have never been so common in America as in Asia,
from whence, therefore, I venture to conjecture,
that the stock originally proceeded. It is too soon,
however, in the more cautious aud sober disrussi
ons of natural history, to press forward such con
jectures as these. We have just begun the study of
the natural history of our country. Future resear
ches and uiscoverres may render it at least highly J
probable, that the Asiatirk Mammoth, as we now
call it, was once as common in North America, as
in any part of the old world. Permit me to add,
that I um daily put in possession of facts which
prove, that our continent and Asia have had, and J
still continue to have, in common, many species of I
animals and vegetables, in all essential points the
same. |
Mr. Tilesius’s drawings are of great importance
to me : and they came, unasked and even unlooked
for, almost at the very time that I was busily occu
pied in superintending a drawing of the skeleton in
the museum, and in pulling together my materials,
the fruit of mauy years lesearch, concerning the
Ohio animal. The two animals, it is true, ure ve
ry different from each other. The affinities dre
such, that l cannot consent to consider the Ameri
can animal as any thing but a species of Elephant.
1 know, indeed, that Mr. Crine is now of opinion,
that the Ohio bones bespeak an animal gcnerkully
I different from the elephant. Bui-although ibis na
turalist's authority is deservedly high, and of great
weight, I am disposed to adhere to my own opiuion,
and to consider the Ohio Mammoth as belonging to
the same genus, or family, as the two or three still
existing species of elephant, and as the great ex
tinct Mammoth of the North of Asia and of Eu
rope ; the elephas primigenius of Biumenbach : or,
us we in America, may name it, to distinguish it
from the Ohio elephant, the ‘‘Chemung Mammoth."
Although in the general form of the molares, or
grinders, there is a much greater affinity between
the Asiatirk mammoth and the existing Aaiaiick
elephant, than there is between either of these lat
ter animals and the Ohio-mammoth, yet there are
several other characters in which the resemblance
is much closer between the Ohio animal and the ex
tinct Asiatirk mammoth, than between this latter
and the living elephant of Asia. I shall only, at
present, mention one of these characters ; that of
the incisors, or defences, which we rail tusks.—
These in the Ohio-mammoth and in the elephas
primigenius, or Chemung mammoth, are, indeed,
very similar, both in theii relative proportion to
the general mass of the skeleton of the two auimals,
and in their degrees of curvature.
On the other band, the Ohio mammoth and the
living Asiatirk elephant seem to have been more
m arly allied to earh other, in the form of their feel,
than were the latter animal aud the extinct Asiatirk
mammoth ; i. e. the Chemung mammoth. When
Mr. Tilesius shall publish his history and drawings
of the elephas primigenius, and when the history
of the elephas mastodenlus shall be completed, e
very m-.cMigtni ana ranaKi naturalist will be nim
bly struck with the circumstances which I have
mentioned : and I flatter myself, that some of the
most learned of these naturalists, and among oth
ers my candid and liberal friend Tilesius, will not
refuse their assent to my opinion, that the mam
moth of the Ohio has brena true species of elephant.
Mr. Tilrsius's drawings are important to me in
another point of view. .They plainly shew, I
think, what has been the natural direction of the
incisors in the bead of the Ohio-mammoth, In
deed, previously to the receipt of these drawings,
I had satisfied my mind as to this point, from the
information which I had received from an intelli.
j gent correspondent, who had bad an opportunity of
| seeing the incisors still occuping their original posi
tron in the head of a mammoth which was discov.
| ered, a tew years since, in one of our western mu
I riatirk licks, or salines.
An to the form of the grinders, and the dispositi
on of the vitrious tiody, or enamel, upon and thru'
them, I grant that it is very different in the Ohio
! mammoth sad in the extinct as wtH as existing *
lephants «t the old world. But if this difference be
of .sufficient importance to constitute a difference
Of gmnt between the American and Asiatick ani
mats, tbeu we must proceed consistently to break
op several of tlwr long established getreew of nuen
malia, subdividing e-uh genus imo at least two
hjsltwM gene^j. ■ 1 may mention the genus Marmot,
to which btfou^s umOtuuud-Uog, or Alanadr, «s
. * ’ • ' - 'l • 4 :• . . ..
illustrative of ibis idea. I shall rail th# Ofaio
nummotb, ElephaS Mastodeutus. It .if the Ele
pbas' Americauus of Mr. Blumtnbach.
I have nearly prepared, and shall shortly present
to our Philosophical Society, an extensive memoir
i»n the extinction of the species of mammalia. This
memoir will necessarily contain much matter mere
ly of a speculative nature ; hut I (latter myself that
■t will also contain some interesting, and hitherto
unnoticed facts. > . -v
1 shall he much gratified if this letter, written a
mong the mountains oi your state, at a distance
from my books and papers, afford yon any amuse
ment. Of all the subjects of animal natural histo
ry, there is not one more interesting than that
which relates to the characters and history of ihos<
vast organized bodies—many of them, too, endow
ed with an immense portion of intelligence—
which the God of Nature had created ; and alter
suffering them to grow and exist through ages, un
known ages, of lime, has, at length, entirely re
moved Irnm the earth ; not merely as individuals,
but as species. There is something awful in thi
consideration of this subject: and yet this very
subject is admirably calculated to display to us tht
wisdom, as well as power, of hint who formed ah
things. The harmony of nature is not, iu the
smallest degree, disturbed by the total destruction
of what many have deemed necessary integral parts
of a common whole. Nor is this business of the ex
tinction of species of an end. That which has al
ready taken place, with respect in species of Eie
phant, Rhinoceros, and other vast families-of ani
mals, will unquestionably take place, with respert
to many of the families which now cover the sur
face of this globe. 'I he steps of this vast and ge
nerally unlnnkc-d for change, are rapidly preparing,
ill ditlerent parts of the world ; and in none, 1 think,
more rapidly than in that portion of it which we
inhabit.
I am, dear sir, with very great respect, your obe
dient servant, &•. &c.
benjamin smith barton.
■ Boston, August 9.
IM PORTAN l\
Capt. Thorndike, of the Northern Liberties, ar
rived bere yesterday from St. Ubes, spoke July 28,
the ship Plato, 32 days from I'onningen, the mas
ter of which informed captain T. that the Danish
government, had issued a decree, dated June 15,
ordering the ports of Tonningeu and Hasum to be
shot against the Americans ; assigning as a reason,
the abuse of that flag Irom Helgoland; that ves
sels arriving after the date of this decree, bad not
been allowed to break bulk ; and that a privateer
was stationed oft the coast, to wain the American
shipping against entering these ports. No seizures
had taken place.
— 1
\V« were last evening politely favoured by a gen
tleman from Salem, with a copy of the decree men
tioned under the Boston Head, and the following in
formation :
In consequence of the above mentioned decree,
markets took a start, but soon fell again, fiom tbe
anxiety ot the Americans to sell, lest a general
seizure should take place ; and tears of the Danes
to the same efiei t—The Danish goverement was
believed friendly to American commerce, hut could
not resist the wishes oj higher powers.—Markets—
Sugar, high ami quick—Coffee, XX a 13—Colton,
(Geo.) 28. -
FROM THE I.ONDON COURIER.
COBBLIT.
Ecce ilerum Corispinus.
It seems a general, but is a very false and mis
taken notion, ihat this man has been sufficiently
exposed, and that by the publication of his court
martial, lie has become so well known as to render
his malice harmless, and his impudence contempli
ble. No opinion can be more rashly formed ;—his
defeuct (as he calls that most barefaced demonstra
te 11 aiwi f'lut'ssion which be has attempted to con
found and another under twenty columns of themosl
ridiculous aud disgusting braggadism) makes it ab
solutely necessary to have no meicy upon him.—
Meicy to this incorrigible imposter were rank cru
elty aud injustice tn tbe public, which he has su
long deceived with impunity !
It is not less a weak and silly fancy, that the e
vident decay of his talents (which proceeds from
nothing, but bis present contusion and alarm) enti
tles him to pity. What! because, in the fog and
perplexity of his intellects, he gives us the visible
representation ol tbe conflict of his mind, distracted
between assumed impudence and conscious shame,
we are to pity ! We aie to pity and forbear because
his last number, written under the terrible agitati
ons ol his soul, contains such marks of wietebed
impotence and imbecility, that it is cruelty to go
on. But madness has been leigned and so may be
folly ; and if we attribute this “ defenra” to volun
tary or pretended imbecility,, in order to bespeak
compassion and disarm justice, we cannot be
thought altogether uncharitable to such a man as
Cobbelt. s.
We are aware, and do not mean to deny, that it
is impossible lor any person in his senses to have
written those columns as a defence ; but we contend
that, whether this derage into t of the intellect be
mere simulation and pretence, or be the real effect of
his detection, he is in neither case entitled to com
miseration, nor indeed does be plead for it. On
the contrary, with the most unblushing effrontery,
with the most insolent contempt of the common
sense and feeling of the public, he asserts, not that
he is innocent, but that he bad a right to be guilty:
net that he did not abscond, but that he acted ho
nourably and justly in absconding, from the court
martial, where fifty-two witnesses were attending
upon bis own summons, and to whirh he had
pledged himself in the terrible fotm which followj :
“ If my accusation is without foundation, the au
thors of cruelty have not yet devised the tortures 1
ought to endure. Hell itself, as painted by tin
most fiery bigot, is too mild a punishment for me."
Extract of IV. Cubbctl'e letter to the judge advocate,
March 11,1792 / / / -
And is it to be endured that a man like this, ad
milting the damning facts alledged against him,
and confessing that be did abscond, instead of. pro*
iog his accusation, or attempting to prove it, shall j
now say that be (led |iis .country for the fear of pautsb
to'ntlrom another court than this court martial,
which, after examining upon oath his own fifty-two
Witnesses,pronounced every p-rt of his accusation
totally unfounded. Is he emitted to pity, because
in simlated or real Colly he dares to set up his own
testimony in hit uwu favour, in competition with
tbe oath* of his &U&0O wi(n*na*, and the sentence
of hii court-mariifct, and the authority of thejudge
advocate, and the opinions of Use aUornejya»d soli.
'cTtor-general. / •*'
Are we to pity him, because he confesses to
“ have talked pretty freely*^-.at an entertainment
given by himself to the Serjeants, of tbe 54tb, while
he himself was a serjeant major of the regiment ?'
Because he acknowledged that he feared it would be
sworn against him, that he had given as a. toast at ’
that meeting “ destruction to the bouse of .Bruns
wick ? or are we to permit him the same time to
boast of the favour, and produce the certificate of
lord Edward Fitzgerald? < . ,
And we are to pity the writer of this defence, to
spare the delirary of his feelings, and believe that
his faculties are impaired and his intellects con- *
founded ?—Tell us then, are we to pardon the impu
denee upon account of the folly, or the absurdity,
lor the sake of the incredible audacity, of this de
fence ? What does it amount to, hut that, being de
teimined to seek for safety in America, he thought
proper to give a pai ting stab to his honcho able officers?
What says the judge advocate general in the case t
submitted by him for the opinion of the attorney
and solicitor general ? That
" .There is, every reason to suppose that bis char- •
ges were destitute of foundation, and wi1fullj,.and
maliciously set on foot for the purpose of calumniat
ing the characters of the three oflicers in question,;
and of putting them to expence, the arcusernnt
hesitating in order to obtain the end, to deceive the
crown and make a mockery of publirk justice.**
This was the opinion formed of Cobbet by the
judge advocate general: and no doubt lhat able and
venerable judge hud a reason to think as he did of
him, although he wanted those reasons which Cob
bet has now lurnished, to demonstrate the correct
ness of his judgment. Sir Charles Gould did not
know that, while he was pledging his etern.il jewel-*
to the common enemy of .man for the truth and
inundation of his charaes. and invoking all dreadlnl
punishments upon his head if he failed in bis proofs,
he was preparing his fi ght—that, .he had already
bargained for bis passage to America, and with hi*
back and liis heart already turned in imiginationup
on this country was meditating with malignaut joy
a Parthian .wound and a post humous revenge !,
Sir Chailes Gould was able to judge the man, al
though be had not read the character of his soul in
a thousand lleristers and Porcupines, though be had
not witnessed the full circle and revolution uf his
apostacies, his portentous impudence, his monstrous
hypocrisy, and ail that low and personal malice to
wards others,, which he kneads and mixes op with
the most ridiculous and disgusting vanity and self
love. We say sii Charles Gould could find out this
man, by a single feature—And we who have all
| this experience of him—who have looked into him
—who know him intus and in cute, are to be fooled
and duped (after the publication loo of .Ml Court
Martial by his mere ipse dixit, or by the tjfpnTit and
vulgar epithets he dares to affix to every one who
tbinks the detection of him a puMii k good and a
private duty ?—Why are we, for instance, necessa
rily to be “ Robbers” and “ Peculators,” because wa
wish the pullick to be nxade acquainted with tbe
true character of a man who has duped them too
long ? Why are the detectors of Cobbett to be, of
force, Blood-suckers, or any other beastly term or
figure by which an incendiary chooses to describe
the officers of the crown ? All ibis is perhaps con
temptible, but what then is the pretence of this
man that he has always desired and provoked th*
publication of the whole of this Court Martial,
the distribution of which is so offensive to him, that
he cannot help reviling even the Indies, the *' she
peculators, who drop them from their barouches on
landaus in his neighbourhood ? But in fact is it pos
sible that the Proprietor of a Weekly Register, a
person of no slight importance in bis own eyes, not
squeamish at all in puffing himself or his commodi
ty, could have wanted opportunity or convenience
to publish his “ Court Martial T it is utterly in
credible that he wished any thing of this sort to be
done, and did not do it himself! < -
Why does he not now publish those letters of
his, of the kuppression of which be pretends to ’
complain ; but which it is evident could not be ma
terial, because they are his. It is not what he
says or said, or will say, that can signify one title.
It is his credit, his character, that are arraigned,
and the suppression of his own testimony cannot
effect the cause. If the letters are in existence, we
call upon him to publish them ; but let them prove
what they will, provided he is the wiiter of them,
they can only prove that he wrote something more,
or preferred some other accusations, besides those
which the court martial, the crown lawyers, and
his own fifty-two witnesses, have declared to be
false and malicious, and which he himself confes
ses to have preferred, with the intention of Hying
the justice of his country. , ...
rle seems lo think'that the lenity of government!
towards him, upon his return from America, lifter
eight years of banishment, affords, a kind of pre
sumption, he was not considered altogether so cri
minal. But for his presumtiou, he entirely throws *
out of the case its whole merits and its whole truth.
1 he government had no power to punish him. The
law officers, had given the opinion, that herotijj
only be prosecuted by the officers—now’some of
these officers were dead before his return, perhaps
all! But as he returned without property, what in- t
ducement could those gentlemen feel to prosecute
him? A court of justice might award them coside
rable damages, but Cobbett had not a single gui
nea in the world. They might have thrown him
into jail; but, besides that, perhaps they thought
iiiiu sufficiently punished by eight years of volunta- .
ry exile, it is extremely probable that their just re
venge was disarmed by the rf.aL services he uap4
RENDERED IN AMERICA. .
You see this coufusinn in his ideas returns with r
the present anxious state of his conisriiififce,' for in *
point of fact lie not only knows that these iervices
in America which were VERY REAL, procured *
for him not only the remission of his offences, but
very considerable protection and advantage. His .
patron, Mr. 1 Aston, very honourably supported
• him, r and he was enabled, by a very powerful -6U.K-„
srriptiua to commence the Porcupine. But Ceik
bett well knows that not only government, bnt il
lustrious individuals, have pardoned him their pri
vate injuries, upon the express account of I he (rr
vice he had rendered to this country by his uri/tugt i
against the American Democrats and Reformers—
so that for him to assign the pardons he has receiv
ed as proofs of, Jbis innocence,- is peculiarly ab^uyd
aud indecent.. ... ' ... . .