who, as we have intimated, already considered Hamilton a monarchist in his principles, regarded all his financial schemes with suspicion, as intended to strengthen the influence of the treasury and make its chief the master of every vote in the legislature," which might give to the government the direction suited to his political views." Under these impressions, Jefferson looked back with an angry and resentful eye, to the manner in which Hamilton had procured his aid in effecting the measure of assumption. He How regarded it as a finesse by which he had been entrapped, and stigmatized the measure itself as a "fiscal manœuvre, to which he had most ignorantly and innocently been made to hold the candle."

Frequent depredations had of late been made on our frontier settlements by what Washington termed "certain banbitti of Indians" from the north-west side of the Ohio. Some of our people had been massacred and others carried into deplorable captivity. The Indians of the Wabash and the Miami rivers, who were the present aggressors, were numerous, warlike, and not deficient in discipline.

Washington had deprecated a war with these savages, but finding all pacific overtures unavailing, and rather productive of more daring atrocities, he felt compelled to resort to it, alike by motives of policy, humanity and justice. An act had been provided for emergencies, by which the President was empowered to call out the militia for the protection of the frontier; this act he put in force in the interval of Congress; and under it an expedition was set on foot, which began its march on the 30th of September from Fort Washington (which stood on the site of the present city of Cincinnati). Brigadier-General Harmer, a veteran of the revolution, led the expedition, having under him three hundred and twenty regulars, with militia detachments from Pennsylvania and Virginia (or Kentucky), making in all fourteen hundred and fifty-three men. After a march of seventeen days, they approached the principal village of the Miamis. The Indians did not await an attack, but set fire to the village and fled to the woods. destruction of the place, with that of large quantities of provisions, was completed.

The

An Indian trail being discovered, Colonel Hardin, a rontinental officer who commanded the Kentucky militia, was detached to follow it, at the head of one hundred and

fifty of his men, and about thirty regulars, under Captain Armstrong and Ensign Hartshorn. They followed the trail for about six miles, and were crossing a plain covered by thickets, when suddenly there were volleys of rifles on each side, from unseen marksmen, accompanied by the horrid war-whoop. The trail had, in fact, decoyed them into an ambush of seven hundred savages, under the famous warrior Little Turtle. The militia fled, without firing a musket. The savages now turned upon the little handful of regulars, who stood their ground, and made a brave resistance with the bayonet until all were slain, excepting Captain Armstrong, Ensign Hartshorn, and five privates.

The army, notwithstanding, effected the main purpose of the expedition in laying waste the Indian villages and destroying their winter's stock of provisions, after which it commenced its march back to Fort Washington. On the 21st of October, when it was halted about ten miles to the west of Chillicothe, an opportunity was given Colonel Hardin to wipe out the late disgrace of his arms. He was detached with a larger body of militia than before, and sixty regulars, under Major Willys, to seek and bring the savages to action. The accounts of these Indian wars are very confused. It appears, however, that he had another encounter with Little Turtle and his braves. It was a bloody battle, fought well on both sides. The militia behaved bravely, and lost many men and officers, as did the regulars; Major Willys fell at the commencement of the action. Colonel Hardin was at length compelled to retreat, leaving the dead and wounded in the hands of the enemy. After he had rejoined the main force, the whole exhibition made its way back to Fort Washington, on the banks of the Ohio.

Congress reassembled, according to adjournment, on the first Monday in December, at Philadelphia, which was now, for a time, the seat of government.

Congress, at its opening, was chiefly occupied in financial arrangements, intended to establish the public credit and provide for the expenses of government. According to the statement of the Secretary of the Treasury, an additional annual revenue of eight hundred and twenty-six thousand dollars would be required, principally to meet the additional charges arising from the assumption of the State debts. He proposed to raise it by an increase of the impost on foreign distilled spirits, and a tax by way of excise on spirits distilled at home. An Impost and Excise bill was

accordingly introduced into Congress, and met with violent. opposition. An attempt was made to strike out the excise, but failed, and the whole bill was finally carried through the House.

Mr. Hamilton, in his former Treasury report, had recommended the establishment of a National Bank; he now, in a special report, urged the policy of the measure. A bill, introduced in conformity with his views, was passed in the Senate, but vehemently opposed in the House; partly on considerations of policy, but chiefly on the ground of constitutionality. On one side it was denied that the constitution had given to Congress the power of incorporation; on the other side it was insisted that such power was incident to the power vested in Congress for raising money.

The question was argued at length, and with great ardor, and after passing the House of Representatives by a majority of nineteen votes, came before the executive for his approval. Washington was fully alive to the magnitude of the question and the interest felt in it by the opposing parties. The cabinet was divided on it. Jefferson and Randolph denied its constitutionality; Hamilton and Knox maintained it. Washington required of each minister the reasons of his opinion in writing; and, after maturely weighing them, gave his sanction to the act, and the bill was carried into effect.

The objection of Jefferson to a bank was not merely on constitutional grounds. In his subsequent writings he avows himself opposed to banks, as introducing a paper instead of a cash system-raising up a moneyed aristocracy. and abandoning the public to the discretion of avarice and swindlers. Paper money might have some advantages, but its abuses were inevitable, and by breaking up the measure of value, it made a lottery of all private property. These objections he maintained to his dying day; but he had others, which may have been more cogent with him in the present instance. He considered the bank as a powerful engine intended by Hamilton to complete the machinery by which the whole action of the legislature was to be placed under the direction of the treasury, and shaped to further a monarchial system of government.

[The opposite policy of these rival statesmen brought them into incessant collision. "Hamilton and myself," writes Jefferson," were daily pitted in the cabinet like two cocks.” In the meantime two political parties were forming under their adverse standards.] Both had the good of the country

at heart, but differed as to the policy by which it was to be secured. The Federalists, who looked up to Hamilton as their model, were in favor of strengthening the general government so as to give it weight and dignity abroad and efficiency at home; to guard it against the encroachments of the individual States and a general tendency to anarchy. The other party, known as republicans or democrats, and taking Mr. Jefferson's view of affairs, saw in all the measures advocated by the Federalists, an intention to convert the Federal into a great central or consolidated government, preparatory to a change from a republic to a monarchy.

The particulars of General Harmer's expedition against the Indians, when reported to Congress, gave great dissat isfaction. The conduct of the troops, in suffering themselves to be surprised, was for some time stigmatized as disgraceful. Further troubles in that quarter were apprehended, for the Miamis were said to be less disheartened by the ravage of their villages than exultant at the successful ambuscades of Little Turtle. Three Seneca chiefs, Cornplanter, Half Town and Great Tree, being at the seat of government on business of their own nation, offered to visit these belligerent tribes, and persuade them to bury the hatchet. Washington, in a set speech, encouraged them in the undertaking.

In the course of the present session, Congress received and granted the applications of Kentucky and Vermont for admission into the Union, the former after August, 1792; the latter immediately. On the 3d of March the term of this first Congress expired.

As the Indians on the north-west side of the Ohio still continued their hostilities, one of the last measures of Congress had been an act to augment the military establishments, and to place in the hands of the executive more ample means for the protection of the frontiers. A new expedition against the belligerent tribes had, in consequence, been projected. General St. Clair, actually governor of the territory west of the Ohio, was appointed commander-in-chief of the forces to be employed.

Washington had been deeply chagrined by the mortifying disasters of General Harmer's expedition to the Wabash, resulting from Indian ambushes. In taking leave of his old military comrade, St. Clair, he wished him success and honor, but gave him a solemn warning. "You have your instructions from the Secretary of War. I had a strict eye to them, and will add but one word-Beware

surprise! You know how the Indians fight. I repeat itbeware of a surprise!" With these warning words sounding in his ear, St. Clair departed.

CHAPTER LXXII.

TOUR SOUTHWARD.-DEFEAT OF ST. CLAIR.-DISSENSIONS IN
THE CABINET.

IN the month of March, Washington set out on a tour through the Southern States; travelling with one set of horses and making occasional halts. The route projected, and of which he had marked off the halting places, was by Fredericksburg, Richmond, Wilmington (N. C.), and Charleston to Savannah; thence to Augusta, Columbia, and the interior towns of North Carolina and Virginia comprising a journey of eighteen hundred and eighty-seven miles; all which he accomplished without any interruption from sickness, bad weather, or any untoward accident.

He returned to Philadelphia on the 6th of July, much pleased with his tour. It had enabled him, he said, to see, with his own eyes, the situation of the country, and to learn more accurately the disposition of the people, than he could have done from any verbal information. He had looked around him, in fact, with a paternal eye, been cheered as usual by continual demonstrations of a nation's love, and his heart had warmed with the reflection how much of this national happiness had been won by his own patriotic exertions.

A few weeks of autumn were passed by Washington at Mount Vernon, with his family in rural enjoyment, and in instructing a new agent, Mr. Robert Lewis, in the management of his estate; his nephew, Major George A. Washington, who ordinarily attended to his landed concerns being absent among the mountains in quest of health.

The second Congress assembled at Philadelphia on the 24th of October, and on the 25th Washington delivered his opening speech. After remarking upon the prosperous situ ation of the country, and the success which had attended its financial measures, he adverted to the offensive operations against the Indians, which goverment had been com