in all the elements of warlike strength the British Empire
was vastly superior to the United States. Thus there
cannot be the slightest doubt that if the British had
been free to continue the war they must have triumphed.
But they were not free. Europe was seething with the
profound unrest that made her statesmen feel the volcano
heaving under their every step during the portentous year
between Napoleon's abdication and return. The mighty
British Navy, the veteran British Army, could not now be
sent across the sea in overwhelming force. So American
diplomacy eagerly seized this chance of profiting by
British needs, and took such good advantage of them that
the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the war on Christmas
Eve, left the two opponents in much the same position
towards each other as before. Neither of the main reasons
for which the Americans had fought their three campaigns
was even mentioned in the articles.

The war had been an unmitigated curse to the motherland
herself; and it brought the usual curses in its train
all over the scene of action. But some positive good came
out of it as well, both in Canada and in the United
States.

The benefits conferred on the United States could not be
given in apter words than those used by Gallatin, who,
as the finance minister during four presidential terms,
saw quite enough of the seamy side to sober his opinions,
and who, as a prominent member of the war party, shared
the disappointed hopes of his colleagues about the conquest