An act for the relief of Moses Turner. An act for the relief of David Coffin, Samuel and William Rodman, and Samuel Rodman, jun. An act for settling the compensation of the commissioners, clerk, and translator of the board for land claims in the eastern and western district of the territory of Orleans, now state of Louisiana. An act making an appropriation for enclosing and improving the public square, near the capitol, and to abolish the office of commissioners of the public buildings, and of superintendent, and for the appointment of one commissioner for the public buildings. An act making further appropriations for the year one thousand eight kundred and sixteen. Resolution directing a copy of the documents An act to provide for the appointment of a sur- printed by a resolve of congress of the 27th of Deveyor of the public lands in the territories of Illi-cember, 1813, to be transmitted to each of the nois and Missouri. judges of the supreme court. An act making appropriations for carrying. into effect a treaty between the United States and the Cherokee tribe of Indians, concluded at Washington, on the twenty-second day of March,|| one thousand eight hundred and sixteen. An act providing for the sale of certain lands in the state of Ohio, formerly set apart for refugees from Canada and Nova-Scotia. An act supplemental to the act, entitled "An act regulating and defining the duties of the judges of the territory of Illinois, and for vesting in the courts of the territory of Indiana, a jurisdiction in chancery cases, arising in the said territory." An act to alter certain parts of the act providing for the government of the territory of Mis souri. An act for the relief of William Crawford, Frederick Bates, William Garrard, and Thomas B. Robertson. An act to indemnify Jabez Mowry and others. An act for the relief of John Holkar, formerly consul general of France, to the United States. An act for the confirmation of certain claims to land in the western district of the state of Louisiana and in the territory of Missouri. Resolution to indemnify the sureties of commodore John Rodgers. Resolution requesting the president to present medals to captain Stewart, and the officers of the frigate Constitution. Resolution requesting the president to present medals to captain James Biddle, and the officers of the sloop of war Hornet. Resolution for printing the laws relative to naturalization. Resolution requiring the secretary of state to compile and print, once in every two years, a register of all officers and agents, civil, military and naval, in the service of the United States. Resolution authorizing the president of the United States to employ a skilful assistant in the corps of engineers. Resolution relative to the more effectual collection of the public revenue. Philipsburg, Centre County, 16th April, 1806. MR. POULSON, The change in timber, which takes place in our forests, has been the cause of controversy, which seems to have ended without satisfactory An act making appropriations for the support information. Judge Peters says, "I am charged of the military establishments of the U. States, by the review makers with impiety and unphilofor the year one thousand eight hundred and six-sophical absurdity, and sentiments which I never teen. An act authorizing the payment of a sum of money to Joseph Stewart and others. An act concerning pre-emption rights given in the purchase of lands to certain settlers in the state of Louisiana, and in the territories of Missouri and Illinois. held, to wit, that new and spontaneous productions are brought into existence by a new order of things."* I shall not be umpire between the Judge and the British Reviewers, as what he has written and sanctioned on the subject, ought to determine the question. But my residence in the back woods induces me to think the changes in timber, &c. may be very readily explained on simple and rational principles, and, consequently, such as do not militate against either revelation, philosophy, or common sense. The changes in timber and plants has been, in general, well described in the first volume of the Memoirs of the Philadelphia Agricultural Sociebut the causes which produce this effect have been misunderstood. An act declaring the consent of congress to acts of the state of South Carolina, authorizing the city council of Charleston to impose and collect a duty on the tonnage of vessels from foreign ports; and to acts of the state of Georgia, authorizing the imposition and collection of a duty on the tonnage of vessels in the ports of Savannah and St. Mary's. An act to authorize the survey of two millions of acres of the public lands, in lieu of that quan-ty, tity heretofore authorized to be surveyed, in the territory of Michigan, as military bounty lands. An act supplementary to the act passed the thirtieth of March, one thousand eight hundred and two, to regulate trade and intercourse with the Indian tribes, and to preserve peace on the frontiers. An act to increase the salary of the register of the treasury. Au act concerning invalid pensioners. An act fixing the compensation of the secretary The wisdom of the great Creator is wonderfully displayed in the formation of seeds. For the tender texture of them is, for the most part, as capable of withstanding the destroying hand of time, as if they were formed of the most durable substances, provided they be permitted to ⚫ See 2d vol. Mem. Phi. Agr. Sac, page 360. See 1st vol. of same work, for what Mr. Peters has said on this subject, and also Dr. C. Cadwell's letter to him, which was published m the same book. remain where nature scatters them; and although than it is to be found at the present time. But as this is best seen in the back woods, where the the locust seems to be nearly as durable as red rude hand of man has not marred the face of na-cedar, much time had elapsed since it prevailed ture, still we might have seen in our older settle- -and yellow pine either preceded or followed it, ments, that the seeds of the grasses, (on which for notwithstanding but very few of these trees the support of innumerable animals, great and now appear, the farmers here gather their knots small, principally depend,) have been so con-plentifully, as a substitute for candles, and also structed, that art cannot annihilate them, so far for making of tar, where no other traces of the as to prevent nature, when the grounds are left fallen timber appear: and these knots seem to to be managed by her, from spreading this neces- be nearly indestructable, for they are often sary provision over the soil: and also, to effect ploughed out of the ground, without the least proper changes of vegetation even there for appearance of decay upon them. after a bad system of husbandry has impoverished the ground so much, that even the seed of white clover, (which will grow in a very thin soil,) can no longer vegetate: if gypsum be applied, the ground is quickly covered with that grass; and if enriching manure be spread over the clover, it is soon rooted out by green grass, sometimes called blue grass, for it is also a hardy native: but as that plant cannot find sufficient nutriment in a thin soil, the seed remains dormant until the ground is enriched. It is a notorious fact, that forest trees, different from any that have been remembered to grow in the neighbourhood, have taken possession of old fields-the cultivation of which appears to have favoured the process-First, by promoting the gradual decomposition of the vegetable substances of which a soil, when recently cleared from its wood, is principally composed; and although this covering is thick, if the soil be deep, it becomes very thin, after the vegetable matter is reduced to apparent earth. Secondly, the reBut to return to the forest.-Some seeds are gular cultivation destroys all the seeds above calculated to be wafted far by the winds; water those that lay deeply buried; and, thirdly, the sweeps off and carries many of them to distant furrows made by the plough in the last cultiva shores, and numbers are scattered wide by birds tion, uncovered and brought up the seeds that and quadrupeds; still the effects produced by had lain buried beyond the power of vegetation, those causes are very partial, and very trivial-for ages; therefore, it is by no means wounderful for the changes are principally effected by the seeds of scattering plants, that are always seen growing in greater or smaller numbers among the plants that may happen very generally to In the cases mentioned above, it clearly apprevail on the soil where the change is produced, pears, that provision has been made to enable or from the seeds of other plants which had not nature to resume her violated domain, long after for a long time before appeared on the soil, and art had apparently destroyed every vestige of the which had been so deeply buried by a long conti-forest, glade, or prairee, which had been for nued falling of the foliage, as well as the branches ages left to be managed by her, and that this is and bodies of the plants, (which had grown there) effected by seed. could not vegetate until the thickness of this covering had been reduced by burning the woods or the cultivation of the soil. || that the plants grown from these seeds should be different from the prevailing timber in the neighbourhood. When the timber in our forests is destroyed by age, tornadoes, or in any other way that has claimed my attention, except those that have been mentioned above, a growth of plants different from the prevailing timber, commonly takes place. Burning quickly reduces the covering; and as the Indian, as well as the white hunter, selects a dry time for setting fire to the woods, the tim-But as in these cases, the covering over the seeds, ber is also very often destroyed, together with which had been long buried beyond the power all the seed within the reach of this destructive of vegetation, can be but little reduced by the element; and the sun being freely admitted, decomposition of it, before a new growth of the seed which had been deeply buried for ages, plants takes place, from the strata of seeds laying vegetate and come up. But the plants that in nearer to the surface; the young plants or trees this case appear, are for the most part different are very generally composed of such kind of timfrom those that were destroyed by the burning ber as was at the time the destruction took place, and from the prevailing timber in the neighbour-thinly scattered, in greater or smaller numbers, hood., But when the new crop happens to be one of the very durable woods, we have sometimes direct testimony that similar timber to the young plants had existed there; as the remains of the same kind of wood is frequently found among the fallen timber. Hence it is, that when log heaps are burned in this neighbourhood, where white and spruce pines are the generally prevailing timbers, locust quickly springs up in abundance where the log heaps were burnt, but no where else in the clearing for the intense heat occasioned by the burning of so large a body of combustible matter, within so small a space, seldom fails to reduce the covering sufficiently to admit the seed to vegetate, and the remains of the fallen locust, clearly proves that this kind of timber formerly prevailed, or was at least much more plentiful among the timbers that generally prevailed. This determines, that nature sets the example of change-but mark, that, as she is principally indebted for the means to effect this change in vegetation, to the seeds grown on the soil where the change is produced, the changes made by her are immediately opposed to that very injurious change in the " locality" of seeds, which Mr. Peters endeavours to establish by the changes which take place in our forests, &c. Yours, respectfully, JOHN LORIAN. Extract of a letter from Bordeaux to the editor of town of St. Foy, in this neighborhood. The mayor to make known to the public that the American of that town insulted him, by insisting on his tak-consul and officers in this city were not present, is ing out his eagle from his cockade.-They forced || worthy of notice, as it proves what I have before him to quit the place, and on his arrival here he stated to you, that every occasion that offers is was arrested by the gendarmes, and conducted eagerly seized to insult and irritate us. A public through the streets like a vagabond to the may dinner is to be given in a few days by the English or's office, where he was examined and questioned merchants established here to Mr. George Canin an infamous manner. They wanted to force ning at which all the authorities are to assist. What capt. Stanton, of our army, to take out his cock- a change. The French authorities of Bordeaux ade, but he refused, and swore he would run the feasting and entertaining the British, who has confirst man through the body who dared to molest || tributed so much to the degradation of their counhim. As the royalists are not noted for their cou-try, and to the destruction of the commerce of rage, they thought proper to let him wear it. this city! But believe me, this is done by the au Col. Drayton was ordered at Lyons by the mayor thorities in direct opposition to the public sentito desist from wearing his e gle-He made an element; for at no period of French history were gant reply, and concluded by telling the agent the bulk of the people of this nation so inveterate sent to him by the mayor, that nothing but force against the English. You will have seen the farce could oblige him to conform to their wishes. They between the president and some of the members did not repeat the demand.These gentlemen, of the legislative body. The latter, suspecting our consul, and indeed all of us, are indignant ai the king meant to dismiss them as soon as the dethe conduct of this anglo faction. This city is full bates on the budget were finished, brought forof Englishmen-Hundreds are establishing com- ward in the midst of those discussions, a project mission nouses-others are here for a short time, to regulate the future elections. The president and many have taken country houses in this vici-having his cue from the ministers, opposed the renity. The famous George Canming has taken a port of the committee of elections, in which,though house for his family. He was at the ball given disgraced in the attempt, he finally succeeded. last evening by the prefect to celebrate the anniWhen the discussion on the budget was completversary of the first arrival of Louis XVIII. at Pa-ed, and forty-two millions with &c's. were voted ris. The rooms, I am told, were crowded with to the clergy, together with fifteen hundred thou Englishmen. All the foreign consuls were invited || sand francs per year to the duke of Berri for his except ours, and not one American was asked. How services, (say 300,000 dollars) the king, whom the different from former times, when our consuis royalists call the Solon of the age, dismissed this were the first to be invited. How disgraceful to humble chamber! Frenchmen to see the apartments of one of their chief magistrates filled with British officers and traders, while such respectable men as our consui col. Drayton, col. Fenwick and others are not only treated with neglect, but insulted. Mr. Hyde de Neuville may make as many flourishes as he pleases, and try all he can to wipe off the stain which the conduct of his party towards us has fixed on them-he will not succeed. "The trial of the English officers, Wilson, Bruce and Hutchinson, for the saving of Lavalette, has finished; they have been condemned to three months imprisonment. I send you the trial, which you will find very interesting. They appear to be Englishmen of the old school. 66 "I send you also one of the Sunday handbills, which are printed and stuck up by the prefect at every church in the department, to instruct the loyal peasants of the state of things, and of the health of all the legitimates. You will see, on perusing this Sunday sheet, that Louis 18th prostrated himself at the feet of the statue of St. Ann, but not being able, from the feeble state of his health, to perform all the rites due to that saint, his royal brother had the goodness to wash the feet of the statue for him. This will paint to you better than any words I can use, the fanatacism of these poor wretches. "Disgusted and enraged, our consul is about embarking to return home. We have presented him with a handsome address, and given him an elegant dinner in testimony of our regard. He is universally esteemed by all of us here. || "Just as I am finishing this letter, the daily pa-|| per appears, giving a splendid description of the prefect's ball above mentioned. After mentioning all the authorities that were present, it concludes by saying, "with all the European consuls and officers of distinction." This, though a pitiful attempt || "The state of the country is wretched indeed; bread and wine, the staff of the poor, is enhancing in price; labor is lower than ever; all the money the lower classes can collect goes for taxes, while the opulent are gathering into their coffers all they can collect, fearing a revolution. One of the best writers on finance in France has proved, that if the present system of taxation was persisted in for twenty-four years, the whole territorial value of France would pass through the public chests in that period!! These are the blessed effects of "legitimacy." I was in the consul's office yesterday the greater part of the morning, engaged in perusing our gazettes, which he gives us all free access to, notwithstanding the authorities here have endeavored to prevent it. During that short time, five French officers of different grades, and eleven manufacturers of various branches, applied to him for a passage to the United States, most of them in a starving condition. These classes of people look with anxious eyes towards the western world, regarding it as the only asylum left for suffering humanity." Spain.-A letter from an officer on board the Mediterranean fleet, states, that Messrs. Hall and Murray, have returned from Madrid, and think that Spain will declare war against the United States. She is said to have an army of 100,000 men, many of whom are good soldiers. War is not, however, considered by the writer as proba ble. France-McDonald, Talleyrand, and St. Cyr are said to have been implicated as friends to the Duke of Orleans, in the late conspiracy in France, The violence of the ultra royalists, says a private of Independence. The death warrant of J. Smith, letter, the unreasonable pretensions of the return for the murder of Carson, has been signed by the ed emigrants, the courtiers who screen the bril-governor of Pennsylvania, and he is to be executliant characters of the revolution from the royaled on the 10th of August. An official history of eye, are the causes of the disaffection which ex-the late war is advertised for publication-it is to ists." Talleyrand and Fouche, those two politi- contain the official accounts in detail of all the cal scape-goats, are at last overthrown and crush-battles by land and sea. The Spanish governor, ed, and Blacas, it is believed will come again in- with 1500 troops has arrived at the Havana-he is to power. The celebrated painter, David, and determined to shut the ports against all foreigngen. Chartrand, have been tried, condemned and ers. Lahanal, a distinguished French gentleman, shot. Savary and l'Allemand have obtained and M. Vairin, a professor of Mathematics, have permission to embark for the U. S. Dedier has arrived in Kentucky, from France, with their fabeen given up by two of his associates-the con- milies, and have purchased estates on the Ohio. spiracy of Grenoble was intended to extend all over France. CONSTITUTION OF INDIANA. The constitution not subject to amendment till after twelve years, in any one of its provisions, and never in the one excluding involuntary stavery. England.-Lord Holland in a late debate asserted that those in favor of the income tax, in England, and those in favor of the Bourbons in France, might conveniently find room in Elba, or St Helena," and Mr. Coke, at an agricultural meeting observed "what has been the termination of the present war? you are saddled with a debt of 800 millions, and you have succeeded in placing a USURPER on the throne of France.-Yes, gentle-sand dollars per annum, to be elected by the peomen, I say a usurper, who is kept there by 30,000 || British bayonets.-Let them be withdrawn, and Louis XVIII. would not remain upon the throne an hour." Mr. Broughan has given notice of a motion to destroy the records of the income tax, and the chancellor of the exchequer has said they should be destroyed. There is a report of an intended Union between the duke of Gloucester and the princess Mary. The executive part of the government is to be composed of a governor with a salary of one thou ple for three years, and may be re-elected oncea lieutenant, who is elected in like manner, for a like term, and is to receive two dollars per diem, during the session of the legislature. The legislative part, a house of representatives and senate-the latter elected every three years: the former annually. Any person is eligible for the senate being 25 years old-for the lower house 21 years old, holding when elected, no office of profit. They are to meet annually on the first Monday in December, except the first session, which will be in November next. The judiciary. A supreme and circuit courts Algiers.-The British fleet is about to return to Algiers to obtain a revision of a treaty made by the dey with America, by which, the London prints say, "an undue advantage has been grant--the former, to be composed of three judges, to ed to that nation as it respects the disposal of their be appointed by the governor and senate for 7 prizes in the dey's ports.-The dey has written years, to have appellate jurisdiction, and to set at two letters to the president of the U. S. one in the seat of government, with a salary of not exArabic, and the other in the Turkish language. ceeding $800 per annum-the latter, to be held Egypt.-Lady Hester Stanhope, the niece of the in each county by one presiding judge, who is to late Wm. Pitt, is said to be at present the leaderbe appointed by joint ballot of the legislature for of the Bedowin Arabs. They regard her as a su- 7 years, and two associates who are to be elected perior being and she declares she will never for- by the people for 7 years. sake them. Turkey. The grand senior has accepted the mediation of England and Prussia, to settle and arrange his differences with Russia. Sheriff, clerks and justices are to be elected by the people-the sheriff for 3 years, the clerks and justices for 7 years. Militia officers to be elected by those subject to Austria.-The Austrian marine is to be increas-militia duty-all above a colonel by commissioned to 10 frigates, 20 brigs, and 50 gunboats. DUMESTIC. ed officers. There is to be a state bank established at the The Macedonian frigate, has, it is said, receiv- seat of government, with one branch for every ed orders to sail for Lima, to demand of the royal three counties-the branch banks must have Spanish authorities there the restoration of an$30,000 each, in specie, before they can go into American whale ship, seized in Peru for not hav-operation. ing a sea letter which is not required but when The dwelling-house at the Creek Agency, octhe European nations are at war. M. de Neuville cupied by the family of the late Col. Hawkins, the French ambassador will leave the city in a we understand, has been consumed by fire, tofew days for New-Jersey, where he means to con-gether with the furniture and papers, including tinue during the summer. The Swedish minister, his valuable manuscripts. Much of the colonel's M. de Kantzow, is now in the city. The Intelli- leisure from official duties had been devoted to gencer states that the paymaster general has, science and literature, and his friends had consince the 10th of April, 1815, placed at the dis- soled themselves at his death with the reflection, posal of his deputies in Tennessee, about 1,200,000 that his works had not perished, but would surdollars, for the pay of the troops of that state.-vive him, to enlighten his countrymen and im Gen. Mina, from Spain, has arrived in this country ||mortalize their author. By this accident the puban exile, and Mr. Beasley, late agent for Americanlic have lost more than his family, No man living prisoners in London, has arrived in this city.- was more conversant with the character of the The American mineralogists assert that there has North American Indians, or better knew the never been a foul 4th of July since the declaration || habits, customs, and traditions of the aborigines. [Milledgeville Journal. NO. 22. VOL. I.] WASHINGTON, SATURDAY, JULY 27, 1816. [WHOLE NO. 22. PUBLISHED WEEKLY, BY JOEL K. MEAD, AT FIVE DOLLARS PER ANNUM. that the Asiatics found their way to this country through this strait, another difficulty will arise, much less easy of solution. Why are the original natives of America invariably possessed of a complexion different from that of the natives of other influence of climate, and Smith,‡ an American author, to that and other causes. We do not pretend to give an opinion, but we would barely suggest, whether the most sultry climate will ever convert the transparent white of Europe into the glossy black of Africa, and why the natives of America, under the same parallel of latitude with those of Europe, should still preserve the same dingy complexion. The prodigious difference in language, manners, customs, &c. from those from whom they are supposed to have derived their origin, and even among themselves, is another subject that has not yet been, and in all probability never will be, satisfactorily explained. In addition to those who have endeavoured to prove that the ABORIGINES OF AMERICA. There has been, & still is, great diversity of opinion on the subject of the aborigines of this country. The origin of every nation is buried in the gloom of obscurity, or amid the wilds of unsatis-the nations. Buffon* has, indeed, ascribed this to factory conjecture. History is lost in fable, & oral tradition only serves to bewilder and confound. Involved, as this subject must be, in inexplicable difficulty and embarrassment, we are left only to the guidance of wild, and sometimes irrational conjecture, without a solitary fact to conduct us through the labyrinth in which we wander. Lord Kaines and Voltaire, with a view, perhaps, to get rid of these difficulties, have boldly asserted, that every nation has had an Adam and Eve of its own, from whom its inhabitants have descended, and who may have been created at a period coeval with our first parents in the bowers of Paradise. But many who are disposed to adhere tenaciously to every letter of the sacred volume, regard this hypothesis as visionary and irreligious, and la-new was peopled by the natives of the old world, bour to account for that variety of complexion, and that diversity of manners, customs, and habits, which exist among the original natives of the four quarters of the earth, on philosophical principles. They have been industrious in collecting facts to convince mankind, that this continent was peo-long before the existence of Columbus, and quote pled by the natives of the old world, who, in process of time, very naturally lost every vestige of their former complexion, and every trace of their former origin. To a union which, it is said, once existed between the Asiatic and American continents, and which thus afforded an easy passage to such as felt inclined to emigrate, they ascribe the first peopling of this continent. It was stated, says Buffon, in a paper of St. Peters-trade-winds, have been blown apon some of the burgh, that M. Stoller had discovered, beyond Kamtschatka, one of the North-American islands, and that he had demonstrated that he could go there from Russia by a short passage. Some Jesuits and other missionaries have also pretended that they have recognized in Tartary some savages whom they had previously catechised in America; which would induce a supposition that the strait was very small indeed: and P. Charlevoise, in his " Histoire de la nouvelle France," as serts, that this pass is nothing more than a bay, around which one may pass by land from Asia to America. These assertions, however, require confirmation, and the mind must yet wander in uncertainty and doubt. But should we grant VOL. I. there are some who assert that the ancients were acquainted with it; and in corroboration of this hypothesis, adduce what they term facts, which we do not think it necessary to recapitulate.—Others again assert, that America was discovered the authority of Martyr, the first Abbot of Jamaica, who states that a colony of negroes was discovered at Quariqua, in the gulph of Darien, and of Columbus himself, who states that he found the stern post of a ship lying on the shore at Guadaloupe. These facts, if incontrovertible, would prove that the vessels of the old world might, after getting within the influence of the West-India Islands, but it furnishes no evidence of its ever having been known in those countries to which they belonged. Another class, still more extrordinary, have arisen, who boldly declare that America was dicovered many centuries prior to its discovery by Columbus, by Madoc, the son of Owen Guyneth, a Welch king. As this has been recently revived and insisted upon in a letter lately published in the New-York Evening Post, which we have inserted below, we shall, to gratify the voyage of Madoc, in the language of the the curiosity of our readers, give the account of compiler, Richard Hakluyt, published among other very miraculous things, in 1589. |