HE ADVANCE OF THE REPUBLIC.

The administration now began to suffer at the hands of the people, many
of whom criticised the conduct of the war and that of the President
also. People met at Hartford and spoke so harshly that the Hartford
Federalist obtained a reputation which clung to him for many years.

There being no cable in those days, the peace by Treaty of Ghent was not
heard of in time to prevent the battle of New Orleans, January 8, 1815,
there having been two weeks of peace as a matter of fact when this hot
and fatal battle was fought.

General Pakenham, with a force of twelve thousand men by sea and land,
attacked the city. The land forces found General Jackson intrenched
several miles below the city. He had used cotton for fortifications at
first, but a hot shot had set a big bunch of it on fire and rolled it
over towards the powder-supplies, so that he did not use cotton any
more.

General Pakenham was met by the solid phalanx of Tennessee and Kentucky
riflemen, who reserved their fire, as usual, until the loud uniform of
the English could be distinctly heard, when they poured into their ranks
a galling fire, as it was so tersely designated at the time. General
Pakenham fell mortally wounded, and his troops were repulsed, but again
rallied, only to be again repulsed. This went on until night, when
General Lambert, who succeeded General Pakenham, withdrew, hopelessly
beaten, and with a loss of over two thousand men.

The United States now found that an honorable peace had been obtained,
and with a debt of $127,000,000 started in to pay it up by instalments,
which was done inside of twenty years from the ordinary revenue.

In the six years following, one State per year was added to the Union,
and all kinds of manufactures were built up to supply the goods that had
been cut off by the blockade during the war. Even the deluge of cheap
goods from abroad after the war did not succeed in breaking these down.

James Monroe was almost unanimously elected. He was generally beloved,
and his administration was, in fact, known as the original "era of good
feeling," since so successfully reproduced especially by the Governors
of North and South Carolina. (See Appendix.)

Through the efforts of Henry Clay, Missouri was admitted as a slave
State in 1821, under the compromise that slavery should not be admitted
into any of the Territories west of the Mississippi and north of
parallel 36 deg. 30' N.

Clay was one