roused them to a show of
self-defence. Early in May he declared war against the United States,
although Consul Cathcart offered him ten thousand dollars to leave the
American flag-staff up for a short time longer. Even then, if Mr.
Jefferson could have consulted no one but himself, not a ship would have
sailed from these shores. But the merchants were too powerful for him;
they insisted upon protection in the Mediterranean. A squadron of three
frigates and a sloop under Commodore Dale was fitted out and despatched
to Gibraltar; and the nations of the earth were duly notified by our
diplomatic agents of our intentions, that they might not be alarmed by
this armada.

In June of this year a fire broke out in the palace at Tunis, and fifty
thousand stand of arms were destroyed. The Bey sent for Eaton; he had
apportioned his loss among his friends, and it fell to the United States
to furnish ten thousand stand without delay.

"It is only the other day," said Eaton, "that you asked for eighty
twenty-four pounders. At this rate, when are our payments to have
an end?"

"Never," was the answer. "The claims we make are such as we receive from
all friendly nations, every two or three years; and you, like other
Christians, will be obliged to conform to it."

Eaton refused to state the claim to his Government. The Bey said, Very
well, he would write himself; and threatened to turn Eaton out of
the Regency.

At this juncture Commodore Dale arrived at Gibraltar. The Bey paid us
the compliment of believing that he had not been sent so far for
nothing, and allowed Eaton a few months' respite.

Now was the time to give the Turks their lesson; but Dale's hands were
tied by his orders. Mr. Jefferson's heart was not in violent methods of
dealing with his fellow-men in Barbary. He thought our objects might be
accomplished by a display of force better and more cheaply than by
active measures. A dislike of naval war and of public expenditure[2]
made his constitutional conscience, always tender, very sensitive on
this question of a cruise against Tripoli. Fearful lest our young
sailors should go too far, he instructed the Commodore not to overstep
the strict line of defence. Hence, when Sterret, in the Enterprise,
captured a Tripolitan schooner, after a brisk engagement, he disarmed
and dismantled her, and left her, with the survivors of her crew on
board, to make the best of their way home again. Laymen must have found
it difficult, ev