dispute that the French
decrees were never exactly annulled; and the Emperor was pursuing an
insidious policy which confiscated American vessels in French ports at
the very moment he was professing friendship with the United States. His
object was to force the government of that country into war with
England, and, unfortunately for its interests, its statesmen lent
themselves to his designs.

The Democratic leaders, determined to continue in power, fanned the
flame against England, whose maritime superiority enabled her to inflict
the greatest injury on American shipping and commerce. The governing
party looked to the south and west for their principal support. In these
sections the interests were exclusively agricultural, while in New
England, where the Federalists were generally in the majority, the
commercial and maritime elements predominated. In Kentucky, Ohio, and
other states there was a strong feeling against England on account of
the current belief that the English authorities in Canada had tampered
with the Indian tribes and induced them to harass the settlers until
Harrison, on the eve of the war of 1812, effectually cowed them. It is,
however, now well established by the Canadian archives that Sir James
Craig, when governor-general in 1807, actually warned the Washington
government of the restlessness of the western Indians, and of the
anxiety of the Canadian authorities to avoid an Indian war in the
north-west, which might prejudicially operate against the western
province. This fact was not, however, generally known, and the feeling
against Canada and England was kept alive by the dominant party in the
United States by the disclosure that one John Henry had been sent by the
Canadian government in 1808 to ascertain the sentiment of the people of
New England with respect to the relations between the two countries and
the maintenance of peace. Henry's correspondence was really quite
harmless, but when it had been purchased from him by Madison, on the
refusal of the imperial government to buy his silence, it served the
temporary purpose of making the people of the west believe that England
was all the while intriguing against the national interests, and
endeavouring to create a discontent which might end in civil strife.
Under these circumstances the southern leaders, Clay of Kentucky, and
Calhoun of South Carolina, who always showed an inveterate animosity
against England, forced Madison, then anxious to be