adjustment of capital and trade to an enforced industrial
policy, the American people passed through a commercial crisis which
paralyzed the flourishing sea-ports of the New England coast. Newburyport,
Salem, Plymouth, New London, Newport, and intermediate places sank from
lucrative commercial centres into insignificant towns. Manchester, Lowell,
Fall River, Pawtucket, Waterbury and other New England cities on the other
hand became great manufacturing places.

The Fourteenth American Congress, under the leadership of Clay, imposed a
protective tariff of about twenty-five per cent on imported cotton and
woollen goods, with specific duties on coal and iron. The average duties on
imports amounted almost to prohibition. Late in the year Indiana was
admitted as the nineteenth State.

[Sidenote: War with Florida Indians]

The tranquillity of the end of Madison's administration was broken by new
troubles with the southern Indians. General Jackson by his impulsive
manner of dealing with the Indians of Florida nearly forced the United
States into a war with Spain and England. The Indians had reason to
complain of the injustice that had marked their treatment by the whites.
Florida had become a refuge for runaway slaves from Georgia and South
Carolina. The treaty of 1814 was repudiated by many of the Creeks, who
resented the new settlements of the whites. Those who were most
dissatisfied made common cause with the Seminoles. For a year, General
Gaines, in command at the frontier, complained to the authorities at
Washington of the conduct of the Indians and Spaniards. General Jackson, to
whom the matter was referred, wrote to Gaines that the forts standing in
Spanish territory "ought to be blown off the face of the earth, regardless
of the ground they stand on." In July, a detachment of men and gunboats
under Colonel Church advanced upon Fort Negro. A shot from one of the boats
blew up the powder magazine. The fort was laid in ruins. Of the 324 inmates
270 were killed. Most of the survivors were wounded.

[Sidenote: Death of Gouverneur Morris]

During this year, the "Washington," the first American line-of-battle ship
put to sea with seventy-four guns on her decks. The first American rolling
mill and plant for puddling iron-ore were built at Red Stone Bank in
Pennsylvania. Bishop Asbury, the founder of Methodism in the United States,
preached his last sermon at Richmond, Virginia. During the same year he
died at the age of se