t_ and the _Wasp_, four names
to conjure with wherever the Stars and Stripes are flown.
The _Constitution_ fought the first, when she took the
_Guerriere_ in August, due east of Boston and south of
Newfoundland. The _Wasp_ won the second in September, by
taking the _Frolic_ half-way between Halifax and Bermuda.
The _United States_ won the third in October, by defeating
the _Macedonian_ south-west of Madeira. The _Constitution_
won the fourth in December, off Bahia in Brazil, by
defeating the _Java_. And the _Hornet_ won the fifth in
February, by taking the _Peacock_, off Demerara, on the
coast of British Guiana.

This closed the first period of the war at sea. The
British government had been so anxious to avoid war, and
to patch up peace again after war had broken out, that
they purposely refrained from putting forth their full
available naval strength till 1813. At the same time,
they would naturally have preferred victory to defeat;
and the fact that most of the British Navy was engaged
elsewhere, and that what was available was partly held
in leash, by no means dims the glory of those four
men-of-war which the Americans fought with so much bravery
and skill, and with such well-deserved success. No wonder
Wellington said peace with the United States would be
worth having at any honourable price, 'if we could only
take some of their damned frigates!' Peace was not to
come for another eighteen months. But though the Americans
won a few more duels out at sea, besides two annihilating
flotilla victories on the Lakes, their coast was blockaded
as completely as Napoleon's, once the British Navy had
begun its concerted movements on a comprehensive scale.
From that time forward the British began to win the naval
war, although they won no battles and only one duel that
has lived in history. This dramatic duel, fought between
the _Shannon_ and the _Chesapeake_ on June 1, 1813, was
not itself a more decisive victory for the British than
previous frigate duels had been for the Americans. But
it serves better than any other special event to mark
the change from the first period, when the Americans
roved the sea as conquerors, to the second, when they
were gradually blockaded into utter impotence.

Having now followed the thread of naval events to a point
beyond the other limits of this chapter, we must return to
the American movements against the Canadian frontier and
the British counter-movements intended to checkmate th