"in these estimates, it is surely high time that we "should either give up teaching the Americans war, "or send them some better instructors." The former is the best, be assured! Why should commodore Macdonough be charged with affectation, because he writes a short letter? He has no sons or cousins, or patron's sons or cousins, or bastards, to recommend for the receipts of presents or pensions. But I have, at present, no room for further comment on this article. I will resume the subject in my next.

FROM COBBETT'S WEEKLY REGISTER, OF OCT. 29, 1814.

Retaliation.-A great deal has lately been said in the French, in the American, and in our own newspapers, about the destructive mode of warfare now waging in Canada, and in the United States. The two former have employed the most violent invectives against our government, on account of the burning of Washington, and other places, while we have set up, as a justification of these rigorous measures, the plea of retaliation-that is to say, have alleged that the burning and ransacking of defenceless towns, and the carrying away of private property from our provinces in Canada, began with the Americans; and that what our troops have since done, what houses they have set fire to, what property they have taken away, and what numbers of innocent people they have ruined, instead of being either wanton, barbarous, or unjust, was a fair retaliation for the injuries they have done us, and per

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fectly consistent with the established laws of nations. If the practice of shedding human blood in battle is at all justifiable, I do not see why one nation has a right more than another, of deviating from the common and prescribed rules of carrying on this work of destruction. I cannot admit, because one people, who call themselves civilized, should, in order to get the better of their neighbours, take it into their head to copy the practices of savages and barbarians, that the others have not an equal right to adopt the same practices. The one having, in a moment of frenzy, employed an instrument to cut his neighbour's throat, different from that which, in cold blood, he had agreed to use in the performance of this humane act, it seems to be only fair play that his opponent should satiate his thirst for human gore in a way, at least, as horrible and savage as his neighbour. Were the party who had been provoked to seek his revenge in a still more terrible manner, perhaps something might even then be offered in his vindication. At all events, if the Americans were really guilty, in the first instance, of the wanton and dreadful outrages of which we accuse them; if they set the example of devastation and barbarity, of which we so loudly complain, and under which we shelter ourselves for the commission of similar outrages,

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am quite sed that they have suffered nothing

more than they deserved, and that the French people, in place of assimulating us to Attila and his Huns, or Robespierre and his bravadoes, ought, in justice, to draw the comparison between these inhuman monsters and the Americans themselves.

But there is a circumstance which, it is necessary, should be attended to in determining this important question, namely, whether the acts and deeds of the Americans, which serve as a plea for the

dreadful revenge we have taken, were unauthorized, or "afterwards sanctioned, by the American government. If it appeared that these cruelties were committed, in consequence of an order from the secretary of war, or any other person holding a responsible situation in the government, then there would be no room for doubt; the question would be decided against the Americans, and Great Britain stand acquitted in the eyes of the universe. If, however, it should turn out, that neither Mr. Madison, nor any individual connected with his government, directly or indirectly, issued such an order, candour will compel us to acknowledge, that we have been rather rash in the severe censures we have pronounced upon the American government.-But if, upon further enquiry, we find, that every thing has been done by that government which prudence could dictate, or which we ourselves could devise, to soften the rigours of the war; if it should appear, that the American president, anticipating the dreadful evils consequent on a state of hostility, adopted precautionary measures, in order to ameliorate the condition of the invaders as well as the invaded; if we should discover, that where any thing contrary to the usages of war, any of those violences inseparable from a state of warfare, occurred, the individuals engaged in these, or who may have exercised any unnecessary severity, were brought to trial, or pu-nished for the impropriety of their conduct. If, I say, such should appear to have been the way in which the American government have acted in such cases, it will be impossible to condemn Mr. Madison upon just grounds, or to clear us of those charges of cruelty, barbarity, and wanton precipitancy, which our neighbours have so lavishly brought against us. The Courier, and all our hireling tribe of journals,

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following its example, have stated, that " from the "first invasion of Upper Canada by the American "forces, under brigadier general Hull, they manifested a disposition of marking out, as objects of peculiar resentment, all loyal subjects of his majesty, and dooming their property to plunder and conflagration." That the Americans invaded Upper Canada after war had broken out between the two countries, is a fact we cannot doubt; but that they should behave in the manner here pointed out; that they should shew peculiar resentment towards some of the inhabitants merely because they were loyal subjects, and doom their property to destruction, for no other reason than that they were attached to their lawful sovereign, is what no reasonable person will believe, who knows any of the respect the American ministers have always shewn to the government of other states, and the extraordinary devotion of the people to their own political institutions. The charge indeed has been held so absurd by the Americans, that they have never deigned to notice it, although they have uniformly met all general and undefined accusations with a dignified denial, and an explicit call upon their accusers to embody their charges in some tangible shape.

Finding that this manly way of silencing calumny had its proper effect, our corrupt press then pretended to discover, in certain acts of the American army a sufficient ground not only on which to rest their former accusations, but to warrant the adoption of these destructive measures that have lately attended our naval and military operations. It was said, that the proceedings of the Americans at the village of Newark, in Upper Canada, were marked with acts of the greatest atrocity, such as burning and destroying the farm-houses, and other buildings, of the

peaceable inhabitants. "It will hardly be credited," said the servile writer of the Courier," that, "in the inclemeng of a Canadian winter, the troops "of a nation ding itself civilized and christian, "had wantly, and without the shadow of a pre"text, orced 500 helpless women and children, to "q their dwellings, and to be the mournful spec"cators of the conflagation and total destruction of "all that belonged to them.". When this writer affected, in this hypocritical manner, to lament the success he has so pathetically described, he took special care not to inform his readers, that the village of Newark was situated so close to Fort George, that it was scarcely possible to carry on military operations at that place, either of a defensive or offensive nature, without destroying many of the surrounding buildings. Accordingly, when it was said, that the American officer commanding at Fort George had exceeded the bounds of propriety, he justified himself on the ground, that the measures he had taken were essentially necessary to the military plans he had adopted. It is plam, from an enquiry having been ordered by the American government into this officer's conduct, that it gave no authority to act rigorously towards the inhabitants of our states. But what establishes this beyond all controversy is, that on this very occasion, the American minister openly and distinctly disavowed all intensions of carrying on war contrary to the established practice of civilized nations. Supposing, therefore, what does not even appear to be the case, that the American officer had, in this instance, been guilty of some violence, or had even done all the mischief of which he is accused, this would not afford a ground on which to blame the government, when it cannot be shewn that it sanctioned his acts

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