EAST INDIES. TIPPOO SULTAN had submitted to a treaty which had deprived him of half his dominions, as the only means of preventing his capital from being taken by storm, and his whole empire from being conquered by the powers confederated to oppose his violent attack on the rajah of Travancore. But he did it, as has since appeared from authentic documents, with a full intention to embrace the first fair opportunity to regain his dominions, and to establish his ascendency over the neighbouring powers. Such evidences were already 'discovered, in his warlike preparations, and his intrigues at the Maratta court and that of the Decan, of an intention to disturb the peace of Indostan, that it was deemed expedient, at this time, to assemble an army of observation in the Carnatic, in order to counteract any enterprises which his ambition, or his enmity to the British company and government, might lead him to undertake. 1796 AMERICAN some remains of beauty. Her hair was always dressed in the old style of simplicity, and with "peculiar neatness, and no head ever became a crown better than her's. She was of the middle "stature, and corpulent; few women, however, with her corpulence, would have attained the "graceful and dignified carriage for which she was remarked. In private, the good-humour "and confidence with which she inspired all about her, seemed to keep up an unceasing scene of "youth, playfulness, and gaiety. Her charming conversation and familiar manners placed all "those who were admitted to her dressing-room or assisted at her toilette, perfectly at ease; but "the moment she had put on her gloves to make her appearance in the neighbouring apartments, she assumed a very different countenance and deportment. From an agreeable and "facetious woman, she appeared all at once the reserved and majestic empress. Whoever "had seen her then for the first time would have found her not below the idea he had pre"viously formed, and would have said, This is indeed the Semiramis of the north!"-Secret Memoirs. 1. 72. 74. Wood's Review of the War. 7. 1796 AMERICAN STATES. COULD the French government have engaged the Americans in hostilities with Great Britain, they would not only have deprived their enemy of her chief source of commercial wealth, and have conveyed it to their own subjects, but, having strengthened themselves with an American fleet, they might have conquered her West India islands, and have driven her, by stress of pecuniary embarrassment, to submit to the terms of peace which they might have thought proper to prescribe. Nothing, therefore, could be so mortifying, so vexatious to that state, as to find not only that all their intrigues against the peace of America and the government of Washington were foiled by his circumspection, and his weight in the congress, but that the states had entered into a new treaty of amity and commerce with his Britannic majesty.—After employing every artifice to sow dissension among the Americans without success, they now expressed their resentment in reproaches against those who had disappointed them; endeavouring still to render the people disaffected to the ruling powers by declaring that they were void of all principle but that of avarice, and inattentive to every pursuit but that of sordid gain. With a design to distress the American merchants, the French government now issued a decree, directing "their privateers and ships of war to treat the vessels of neutral "nations in the same manner as they suffered themselves to be treated by "the English." But Washington, who was conscious that he had been guilty of no breach of faith in the neutrality, which he had observed, who had triumphed over their insidious arts by convincing the nation of the wisdom of his policy, and was daily more thoroughly persuaded of the pernicious tendency of the principles of the French republicans by the intelligence given him of their practices, steadily adhered to the path which he had entered upon.-Confident that he could not so essentially promote the prosperity of the states as by confirming their amity with Great Britain, he, this year, rendered the treaty with that crown more effectual by a Annual Register. 73. by an explanatory article, intended to further the mutual accommodation of their subjects, and to obviate the occasions of dispute. b With this transaction Washington may be said to have closed the career of his public actions.-In the autumn of this year he signified his intention to resign his appointment as president of the congress; and as a last testimony of his affection for a people to whose welfare he had devoted all his talents, he published an address to them, replete with those sentiments of virtue and patriotism which had shone forth in every part of his conduct. Having earnestly exhorted them to persevere in that line of policy, and to adhere to those principles, which they had experienced to be so auspicious to their happiness, he affectionately bade them farewell, and returned to his favourite retreat amidst the heartfelt applauses of his countrymen. + * * c If we may judge from the general tenour of his conduct, the selfsatisfaction which he felt from having established and confirmed the independency of America must have been enhanced by a reflection on its eventual tendency to the general good. The patriot had been already gratified by the signal services which he had rendered his country: and, as a convincing proof of his liberal and enlarged mind, we have seen him laying aside all animosity towards the state against which he had fought, and becoming himself the instrument of making the revolution conducive to its prosperity by a firm adherence to its interests.-And the philosopher might now amuse himself with a contemplation of the benefit which the world + December 7. We are enabled to judge of the good effects of the president's pacific councils, and of the flourishing state of the American states by the following extract from the Duke de la Rochefocault's Travels. "The exports of the general commerce of America are the result of those of the particular 66 states. "Here follow the totals, as presented annually to the congress by the secretary of the treasury. Dollars. 19,012,140 1796 1796 world will, in future ages, derive from this event: when America shall become a mean of facilitating a communication between the old and the new world: and when the inhabitants of the latter may be made acquainted with the Europeans, not as merciless conquerors or persecuting bigots, but as merchants, as christians, as men come among them to partake with them in the profits of trade, to promote their happiness, to shew them the advantages of social order, to teach them a more pure morality, improved by the precepts and enforced by the sanctions of religion. The station of president of the congress being thus become vacant, the eighth day of february in the ensuing year was named for the election of a person to fill it, agreeably with the constitution of the states.d In the mean-time we must advert to another event which rendered the present year memorable-that was the admission of the Tenasee state, or the territory south of the Ohio river, into the general government, in conformity with an ordinance of congress, passed in 1787, which provides, that whenever any of the said states shall have 60,000 inhabitants therein, such state shall be admitted by its delegates into the congress of the United States, on an equal footing with the original states." с The population of this district had been comparatively trifling before the revolution. But the fertility of the soil and other circumstances held out such inducements to settlers that, on a census now taken of the inhabitants, it appeared that they amounted to 77,262, of whom 66,649 were free persons. When it was seen that they were entitled to admission into the states, therefore, the governor in pursuance of the law, called a convention by which a constitution was framed, and the state was formally received as a member-state of the congress. * d Ann. Regist. 208. The state of Tenasee, before called the Territory south of the Ohio, is a tract of country which was ceded to the United States by the state of North Carolina in 1789, situated between the latit des of 35° and 36° 30.-It forms an extent of country not less than 500 miles in length and 105 miles in width, bounded by Kentucky on the north, by Georgia on the south, by North Carolina on the east, and the river Mississippi on the west.-It is thus described by an officer employed as a commissioner for laying out lands in the back settlements."Few places are more healthy; there is none more fertile; and there is hardly any other place in which the farmer can support his family in such a degree of affluence. The soil is not only fertile, but easily "cultivated. Six hogsheads of tobacco for one man does not require more labour than three hogsheads 66 "hogsheads in the Atlantic states; and a difference similar to this appears in every other crop. "In the culture of corn the difference is greater."-This circumstance, among others, gives the Tenasee settlement importance in the eyes of the Europeans, that the soil is deemed proper for vines. It is thus described by a resident in the country. "The natural advantages which this temCC perate climate possesses, exceed those of any other part of the United States, or perhaps of the "world. A circumstance peculiar to this country is, that the soil will yield all the productions common to both the northern and southern climates: here it is customary to see in the same "field, or fields contiguous to each other, wheat, indian corn, rye, barley, rice, tobacco, hemp, "indigo, cotton, and every kind of vegetable, growing to the greatest perfection. Persons who "have seen this country, and who have been accustomed to the cultivation of vines, say that "there is no doubt but that it will be extremely productive of wine, whenever it becomes suffi"ciently populated to make it proper to attend to that object; and it is probable that the time "is not far distant, when population will have made such advances as to enable the people to "attend to the raising those articles which will be most proper for exportation."-Imlay's Description of the Western Territories of North America. 517. 524. 1796 APPENDIX. VOL. III. 4 A |