the respect, affection, and gratitude, of all who are able duly to appreciate the blessings of having a wise ruler.

The choice of president, for the succeeding term of four years, not being settled by the electoral vote, devolved on the House of Representatives. John Quincy Adams was chosen, and took the oath of office on the 4th of March, and John C. Calhoun was chosen vice president by the electors.

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The address of Mr. Adams, on his induction into office, was such as might rationally be expected. Speaking of our political creed, he says, it is, without a dissenting voice that can be heard, that the will of the people is the source, and the happiness of the people the end, of all legitimate government upon earth-That the best security for the beneficence, and the best guarantee against the abuse of power, consists in the freedom, the purity, and the frequency of popular elections.

"That the general government of the Union, and the separate governments of these states, are all sovereignties of limited powers; fellow servants of the same masters, uncontrolled within their respective spheres, uncontrollable by encroachments upon each other. That the firmest security of peace is the preparation, during peace, of the defences of war. That a rigorous, economy, and accountability of public expenditure, should guard against the aggravation, and alleviate, when possible, the burden of taxation. That the military should be kept in strict subordination to the civil power. That the freedom of the press and of religious opinion should be inviolate. That the policy of our country is peace, and the ark of our salvation, union, are articles of faith which we are all agreed."

upon

The following paragraphs we copy entire, as too valuable to be omitted, even in a condensed history.

"In the compass of thirty years, since this great national covenant was instituted, a body of laws enacted under its authority, and in conformity with its provisions, has unfolded its powers, and carried into practical operation its effective energies. Subordinate departments have distributed the executive functions in their various relations, to foreign affairs, to the revenue and expenditures,

and to the military force of the Union, by land and sea, A co-ordinate department of the judiciary has expounded the constitution and the laws; settling, in harmonious coincidence with the legislative will, numerous weighty questions of construction which the imperfection of human language had rendered unavoidable.

"The year of jubilee, since the first formation of our union, has just elapsed; that of the declaration of our independence is at hand. The consummation of both was effected by this constitution. Since that period, a popu lation of four millions has multiplied to twelve. A territory, bounded by the Mississippi, has been extended from sea to sea. New states have been admitted to the Union, in number nearly equal to those of the first confederation. Treaties of peace, amity, and commerce, have been concluded with the principal dominions of the earth. The people of other nations, inhabitants of regions acquired not by conquest, but by compact, have been united with us in the participation of our rights and duties, of our burdens and blessings.

The

"The forest has fallen by the axe of our woodsmenthe soil has been made to teem by the tillage of our farmers; our commerce has whitened every ocean. dominion of man over physical nature has been extended by the invention of our artists. Liberty and law have marched hand in hand. All the purposes of human association have been accomplished as effectively as under any other government on the globe, and at a cost little exceeding, in a whole generation, the expenditures of other nations in a single year.

"Such is the unexaggerated picture of our condition, under a constitution founded upon the republican principle of equal rights. To admit that this picture has its shades, is but to say that it is still the condition of men , upon earth. From evil, physical, moral, and political, it is not our claim to be exempt. We have suffered, sometimes by the visitation of Heaven, through disease; often by the wrongs and injustice of other nations, even to the extremities of war; and, lastly, by dissentions among ourselves dissentions, perhaps inseparable from the enjoyment of freedom, but which have more than once ap

peared to threaten the dissolution of the union, and, with it, the overthrow of all the enjoyments of our present lot, and all our earthly hopes of the future. The causes of these dissentions have been various, founded upon differences of speculation in the theory of republican government; upon conflicting views of policy, in our relations with foreign nations; upon jealousies of partial and sectional interests, aggravated by prejudices and prepossessions, which strangers to each other are ever apt to entertain."

On the 31st of May, a treaty of peace, amity, navigation, and commerce, between the United States and Colombia, was ratified by the president. The first article establishes a firm and inviolable peace, and perpetual friendship. By the second, no partiality was to be shown to any other nation to which each of the contracting parties had not an equal right. By the sixth article, merchant vessels, and ships of war, were to be protected in the bays and harbours of both parties, either in stress of weather, or to shield them from the pursuit of pirates, or other enemies. The seventh grants a return of ships and merchandise which may be taken in their respective jurisdictions. By the tenth, both the contracting parties engage, formally, to give their special protection to the persons and property of the other, and to leave open and free to them the tribunals of justice for their judicial recourse, on the same terms as are usual with native citizens of either party. By the eleventh, liberty of con science is mutually guaranteed. By the fourteenth, liberty of commerce and navigation, except contraband of war, in times which would endanger the safety of either contracting party, is freely granted. The treaty was to remain in force twelve years after the exchange of ratifications.

The 7th of September was the day appointed for the departure of the nation's guest, General La Fayette, from Washington. On Mr. Adams devolved the task of bidding him farewell, in the name of the nation to whom he had been a constant friend, and a noble benefactor. How well, and with what dignity and feeling, he executed this task, we need not attempt to describe, and we regret that

our plan does not permit us to copy the whole address. We can copy but a brief sketch, which will be found in the following selected paragraphs.

"When the contest of freedom to which you had repaired as a voluntary champion, had closed, by the complete triumph of her cause in this country of your adoption, you returned to fulfil the duties of the philanthropist and patriot in the land of your nativity. There, in a consistent and undeviating career of forty years, you have maintained, through every vicissitude of alternate success and disappointment, the same glorious cause to which the first years of your active life had been devoted the improvement of the moral and political condition of man.

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Through that long succession of time, the people of the United States, for whom, and with whom, you had fought the battles of liberty, have been living in full pos session of its fruits; one of the happiest among the family of nations. Spreading in population, enlarging in territory, acting and suffering according to the condition of their nature, and laying the foundations of the greatest, and, we humbly hope, the most beneficent power that ever regulated the concerns of man upon earth.

"In that lapse of forty years, the generation of men with whom you co-operated in the conflict of arms, has nearly passed away. Of the general officers of the Ame rican army in that war, you alone survive. Of the sages who guided our councils; of the warriors who met the foe in the field, or upon the waves, with the exception of a few, to whom unusual length of days has been allotted by heaven, all now. sleep with their fathers. A succeed ing, and even a third generation, have arisen to take their places; and their children's children, while rising up to call them blessed, have been taught by them, as well as admonished by their own constant enjoyment of freedom, to include, in every benison upon their fathers, the name of him who came from afar, with them, and in their cause, to conquer or to fall.

"You are now about to return to the country of your birth, of your ancestors, of your posterity. The executive government of the union, stimulated by the same

feeling which had prompted the congress to the designation of a national ship for your accommodation in coming hither, has destined the first service of a frigate, recently launched at this metropolis, to the less welcome, but equally distinguished trust of conveying you home. The name of the ship has added one more memorial to distant regions and to future ages, of a stream already memorable, at once in the story of your sufferings and of our independence.

"The ship is now prepared for your reception, and equipped for sea. From the moment of her departure, the prayers of millions will ascend to heaven that her passage may be prosperous; and your return to the bosom of your family as propitious to your happiness, as your visit to this scene of your youthful glory has been to that of the American people.

"Go, then, our beloved friend-return to the land of brilliant genius, of generous sentiment, of heroic valour; to that beautiful France, the nursing mother of the twelfth Louis, and the fourth Henry; to the native soil of Bayard and Coligni, of Turenne and Catinat, of Fenelon and D'Aguesseau. In that illustrious catalogue of names which she claims as of her children, and with honest pride holds up to the admiration of other nations, the name of La Fayette has already for centuries been enrolled. And it shall henceforth burnish into brighter fame; for if, in after days, a Frenchman shall be called to indicate the character of his nation by that of one indi vidual, during the age in which we live, the blood of lofty patriotism shall mantle in his cheek, the fire of conscious virtue shall sparkle in his eye, and he shall pronounce the name of La Fayette. Yet we, too, and our children, in life and after death, shall claim you for our own. are ours by that more than patriotic self-devotion with which you flew to the aid of our fathers at the crisis of their fate. Ours by that long series of years in which you have cherished us in your regard. Ours by that unshaken sentiment of gratitude for your services which is a precious portion of our inheritance. Ours by that tie of love stronger than death, which has linked your name, for the endless ages of time, with the name of Washington." 35*

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