, in direct defiance
of the American government, and to the direct detriment
of the United States as a nation. It was equally to the
direct benefit of the British colonies in general and of
Nova Scotia in particular. American harbours had never
been so dull. Quebec and Halifax had never been so
prosperous. American money was drained away from the
warlike South and West and either concentrated in the
Northern States--which were opposed to the war--or paid
over into British hands.

Nor was this all. The British Navy harried the coast in
every convenient quarter and made effective the work of
two most important joint attacks, one on Maine, the other
on Washington itself. The attack on Maine covered two
months, altogether, from July 11 to September 11. It
began with the taking of Moose Island by Sir Thomas Hardy,
Nelson's old flag-captain at Trafalgar, and ended with
the surrender, at Machias, of 'about 100 miles of
sea-coast,' together with 'that intermediate tract of
country which separates the province of New Brunswick
from Lower Canada.' On September 21 Sir John Sherbrooke
proclaimed at Halifax the formal annexation of 'all the
eastern side of the Penobscot river and all the country
lying between the same river and the boundary of New
Brunswick.'

The attack on Maine was meant, in one sense at least, to
create a partial counterpoise to the American preponderance
on Lake Erie. The attack on Washington was made in
retaliation for the burning of the old and new capitals
of Upper Canada, Newark and York.

The naval defence of Washington had been committed to
Commodore Barney, a most expert and gallant veteran of
the Revolution, who handled his wholly inadequate little
force with consummate skill and daring, both afloat and
ashore. He was not, strictly speaking, a naval officer,
but a privateersman who had made the unique record of
taking eleven prizes in ten consecutive days with his
famous Baltimore schooner _Rossie_. The military defence
was committed to General Winder, one of the two generals
captured by Harvey's '704 firelocks' at Stoney Creek the
year before. Winder was a good soldier and did his best
in the seven weeks at his disposal. But the American
government, which had now enjoyed continuous party power
for no less than thirteen years, gave him no more than
four hundred regulars, backed by Barney's four hundred
excellent seamen and the usual array of militia, with
whom to defend the capital in the thi