The Sun.
London, England, 1814-12-17 00:00:00

PEACOCK AND EPERVIER:

The Mouse resolved into a Committee of
the whole, .Mr. Desha,. of, Ky. in. the chair, on
the resoltitioi. from the Senate expressive of the
sense.of Congress, relative to the victory of the
'Peacock over the Epervier.. Ile resolution hav-
ing been read,
Mr. Plea-ants, of Va. (the Chairman of the Na-
val Coinini; tee) said, it was not his intention to
detain tut Conimittec by any extended remarks on
Abis stibrqt. • Thre actiorr to- which this resointion
_vett rre,4, yore • particularly, perhaps, tnan any
trltic in'tvOiled -it, demonstrated the superiority
at Atitertekin gunnery. To shew this; Mr. P.
quoted Captain •Watrington's letter to the Secre-
tary die Navy, announcing the victory, and
bd. rred from -it, that no action had ever taken
between vessels of any thing like equal
force, in which there had been so great a dispa-
rity of execution.

BOSTON, 0cr.17.
LEGISLATUILL OF MASSACHUSETTS.

IN SENATE.--SATURDAY, OCT. 15:

The Cominittee appointed to inquire whether
any Members of the Senate have voluntarily as-
sumed upon themselves any obligation to the
King of tiovernment,of Great Britain, incompa-
tible with their duty as Members of the Legisla-
ture of the Commonwealth, or their oath to sup-
port the Constitution of the United States,
Reported a statement of facts relative to the
Hon. iNde”rs. Folger, of Nantucket, and Camp-
bell, trout the district of Lincoln, Hancock, and
Washington.
That the said Campbell having voluntarily en-
.gaged tot to bepr arms, or in any way to serve,
against his Britannic Majesty, his successors and
allies, and to consider himself under the British
.Goverinnent until further orders, has thereby as-
sumed upon himself obligations incompatible with
his duty as a Meutber of the Legislature, and has
vacated nis seat as a Senator of this Common-
Ivezlth. They therefore, recommended that the
teat of the JAmes Campbell, a SenatOr of
this Commonwealth, from the district comoosed
of [tic counties of LincoluiHancoCk, acs„ Yash-
iogton, be declared vacant, which report was
read, and Monday, at twelve o'clock, assigned
for consideration of the same.

OCTOBER IB.—That part of 'the report which
was published yesterday relative •to the scat
Hon. Mr. Campbell, a Senator from . the
district of Lincoln, Hanoock, and Wa§bington,
was debated,. and finally referred to the next Ses-
sion.

'NKW-YORK, OCT, is rumoured-- (says
the Philadelphia Democratic Press) that Thomas
Jetlcrson, late Ptesident of the United States,
bas consented to accept,the office of Secretary of
State. ,This appointment, however unexpected, ,
would. not surprise us in the least. Mr. Jefferson
secs the difficulties his old friend- is struggling
with, and it is but just, as:well as generous, to
Lelp hi=u thrOugh them.
G. W. Erving, late special Minister to Den-
!Park, is appointed by the President of the United
States, with the consent of the Senate, to be our,
Minister to the Court of Madrid.

People of Colour.—A bill is before the Senate
of this State, for raising two regiments of people
44 colour, to consist of 1080 each, by voluntary
enlistment, .commissioned_ officers to consist of
white men.

-• Sea Fencibles.7—A bill, is also before the Senate,
for raising 21 companies of Sea •Feucibles, for
the term, of. three years, for the defence of the
port and harbour of New York.
And a bill for granting additional pay to the
volunteers raised by general orders of tue 13th
of March last, serjeants to be 'equal. to 15 dollars
per month, corporals and musicians 14, and
privates 13.
The 1'2,000 conscription bill was yesterday
-.taken up in the House of Assembly, in Committee
of the whole, and so much of the first clause was
carried as authorises the raising of this
The Committee then rose. The details of this
bill, many of which. are extremely objectionable,
will; we have no doubt, be ably discussed and
manfully combated,. and we trust, and hope, will
he finally, vxwinged, or
,so amended as that our
civil rights and priyilegekulay yet be preserved to
us a little longer.

A Bill declaratory of the assent of tl►e Legisla-
tore to the c,tahlishment of a National Bank by
,Congress in this State a Bill for encouraging
privateering ; and a Bill extending the. time of
payment
,of monies loaned by the State, have
been reported, and are.now under consideration.
As is also) a Bill postponing the next term of the
Supreme Court in the city of New York, to the
.26th inst.

PHILADELPHIA, OCT. T2.—Great additions are
speedily_ to be made by, Congress to the direct
taxes-, additiobs, which, if Ave are ciarectly in-
formed, will wore than double the land tax of the
_present year. The direct tax of this year was, -in
its tcrips avd.provisio.ps;
_extremely izppressive on

this city. We were charged with a tnuri, larger
sum than our fair proportion of the State's quota.
The whole sum charged on the State of Pennsyl-
iania, for the direct tax of the present year, was
365.,479 dollars 16 cents. The tax of next year
will probably be 630,958.d11ars 32 cents at least.
The proportion fixed on 'the city of Philadel-
phia, by the act at Congress, 'vas 79,000 dollars;
between a fourth and fifth part of the tax paid by
the whole State.
NEW onLEANs, Sm. 23.
TNDEPENDENCE OF MEXICO. _ _

A vessel from. Vera Crtr4 is in the river, bring-
ing the important-information., that as soon as the.
refusal of Ferdinand 'to accept the Constitution
made by the Cortes was known hr the kingdom
of Mexico, all parties were unanimous the Roy-
alists joined the Patriots ; the new Viceroy was
deposed,. and the independence Of that delightful
country proclaimed at Mexico,- Vera Cruz, abet
all other cities of that, province..
Private letters from; Pensacola state, that the
British having, a false pretext,' gained pos-
session of a fort which commands the entrance-of
the harbour to drill nod discipline the Indians,
now refute to gii,re it back to the Spaniards.' These
.letters add, that the creoles of I,4ouisiana, who
serve at Pensacola as officers; are not all disposol.
to act against--their native country ; and finally,
that all Spaniards there express their hatred against
the. British. . _

[From Me Georgetown Federal Rep4l,licaO' Oct. 17.]
We speak it not in the joy of our hearts, be.,
cause it opens a prospect of relieving the country
from tyranny and kcobinisin, but in the bitter-
ness of .our sorrow, because it must induce con,
sequences the most grievous and awful; but, we
believe, and for some time have believed, hat there
is no hope of preserving this union six months, if
six weeks. unless Mr. Madison resigns, or is re-
moved froM office. - The storm is distinctly seen
shove the horizon—that it will pass over, and
May. lay waste our country, there ceases to be
a doubt: We give it distinctly as our belief,
founded upon observation, with goo,' oppotrunities
of forming an opiniln, that the general governe-
ment will dissolve in its own weaknesS before the
Ist of July, if there be not peace, or Mr. Madi-
son is not .itit of office before that day. Our object,
we aver, is not to excite a false alarm. We speak
not in a menacing;. hilt a monitory spirit. That
in our hearts we deplore, and would unite in the
most energetic measures to avert such a calamity,
we trust no one is disposed to doubt, hut we be-
lieve. it to be inevitable. • The obstinacy of the
President, his ignorance of human-nature, and .his
total destitutiuupf sensibility, will ensure the pur-
suit of a policy which will hasten instead of avert-
ing the catastrophe which we .would stave off.

(FROM THE HALIFAX JOURNAL, OCT. 10.)
TO THE EDITOR OF THE JOURNAL.

" Sta,—When I call to mind the warm-congra-
tulations on the arrivakof Sir George Prevost to
be our Governor, about six years ago"; our grate-
ful feelings towards the King's_Ministei s for send-
ing such a than to protect us ; the universal sa-,
tisfaction he gave while amongst us ; and the no_
less universal sorrow expressed by every face
And every tongue when we were informed that
we must lose him ; I can hardly believe myself in
the same prOvince; when I read OA! torrent of low
and malignint abuse of his character its last Sa-
turday's Recorder. The scribbler who writes the
paragraphs in that, Paper (for nobody suspects the
_,ter) has long endeavoured, in a covered and
oblique way, to prejudice the public against a
character which they reverenced and loved ; but
now having .foun'd in our misfortunes at Platts-
burgh, a delightful repast for his gloomy and ve-
nemous spirit, be bas put forth all his power of
bespattering in the form of paragraphs and es-
silts, under the false signature of Free Speaker and
An Englishman ; and so eager was lie to till his
columns with his precious stuff, that although he
mentions the burial of the brave General. Ross; he
could not spare room, or quite- forgot to tell us
when, or where, or how,he died. For any thing
the readers of the Recorder will find it, he may
have fallen in a.duel or died of a fever. But it
was doubtless a more suitable employment for the
Editor of the Acadian Recorder' to criticise ...the
campaigns of. the Commander-in-Chief, .'than to
.give us any account of theuttempt on Baltimore,
or the fall of the gallant associate of Duke IYel-
-lington. •
". And what is the amountof his criticism
Why even this, that Sir George Prevost was a
great fool to make his operations by land depend
upon operations by water. This the candid and
acute Writer of the Recorder's paragraphs calls
" depending on chance," nay, " trusting to mi-
racles." Really ! is it trusting to miracles that
a flotilla of ninty-three gums, manned by Britons,.
might beat one manned with Americans, carrying
eighty-six ? If this be thought a miracle, it-is a
very poor complement to our Navy. •
Or would this wiseacre have us think it a new
thing for Commander on laud to combine his
movements with those of an attending-. Naval
force ? Did not the lamented General Ross
do so in the Chesapeake ? Is it not stated iii
vour Paper of yesterday, on the authority of an
Officer present, that our Army would have made
a serious attack on Baltimore, if the• ships at-
tending could have forced the batteries at the
entrance of the • Harbour ? Sir A. Cochrane
could not effect impossibilities, and the Army
retraced its steps.. There is surely no need to
multiply examples of . what may be called the or-
dinary mode of British warfare. But one oc-
curs to me which took place in- the very same
scene of action, Sir Guy Carleton (perhaps as
good a General as the Editor of the Acadian Re-
corder) invading the 'evoked Colonies in 1776,
by Lake Champlain, did not, as this sage planner
of campaigns would have Sir George to db, wait
until .his fleet had tried his strength with that
of the enemy ; but trusting to chance and mi-
racles, he brought his:whole army, step for step,
along with it. N'or need we doubt, if that fleet
bad been destroyed by Arnold' on the -11th and
13th of October, instead of utterly defeating his,
the Gallant General would have immediately re-
treated into Canada, as Sir George .Prevo,,t has
done, which the Recording General calls a dis-
.gracefal• retreat ; since •Sir Guy, even after yt com-
plete victory, did actually so retreat, rather than

risk his army's- wintering its that situation. Tn
the following year Geueral Burgoyne followed the
same course, his flotilla attending his army.--
Whilst he operated in conjunction with his ves-
sels he was successful ; when he parted front them
he and his army were made prisoners. If this
eras the fate of General Tturg,ivne, in 1777, when
Vermont, on one side of the Lake, had but a few
scattered inhabitants, and New York, on the
other, had none at all, it is easy to see what Sir
George's fate would have been, if with an army
no stronger than Burgoyne's, and without a
navy, he had been so ignorant, or rather mad, as
to think of penetrating those countries, which
now swarm withwen. like bee-hi% eS. We may
venture to assert, that the Duke of Wellington
could not march from Plattsburgh to New York,
with less than 30,000'. These his .country has not
thought fit to give hint, though she might. She
has not made hint superior by water to the paltry
flotillas of the enemy, though she is the greatest
naval power in the world. In short, as in 75 and
76, Sir Guy Carleton, with a - handful of men,
saved Canada to the Crown of- Britain, anti was
ill-used for his pains ; so Sir George Prevost, in
1812, 13, has saved it to the Crown again, by his
popularity, his vigilance, and talents ; and with
a handful of Regulars and his Canadian Militia,
has captured several invading Generals and their
armies. And he has now retreated within his Pro-
vince, as Carleton did, to save it again. He is_
got, indeed, like Carleton, ill-treated by the,Mi-.
nistry. He enjoys their utmost confidence, and
that of his Prince, who as as be wrote with his
own hand to Wellington, so did he lately to the
Governor7General of Canada, expressing his full
satisfaction with his conduct. This may, per-
haps, console him, though a base libeller in the
Recorder should say lie has , neither talents nor
merit, nor has performed any services ; and raore7
over, that his mother was a Republican."

LAW INTELLIGENCE.