and difficulties; and so they made for peace. The general
current, however, was against them, even before the
_Chesapeake_ affair; and several additional incidents
helped to quicken it afterwards. In 1808 the toast of
the President of the United States was received with
hisses at a great public dinner in London, given to the
leaders of the Spanish revolt against Napoleon by British
admirers. In 1811 the British sloop-of-war _Little Belt_
was overhauled by the American frigate _President_ fifty
miles off-shore and forced to strike, after losing
thirty-two men and being reduced to a mere battered hulk.
The vessels came into range after dark; the British seem
to have fired first; and the Americans had the further
excuse that they were still smarting under the _Chesapeake_
affair. Then, in 1812, an Irish adventurer called Henry,
who had been doing some secret-service work in the United
States at the instance of the Canadian governor-general,
sold the duplicates of his correspondence to President
Madison. These were of little real importance; but they
added fuel to the Democratic fire in Congress just when
anti-British feeling was at its worst.

The fourth cause of war, the desire to conquer Canada,
was by far the oldest of all. It was older than
Independence, older even than the British conquest of
Canada. In 1689 Peter Schuyler, mayor of Albany, and the
acknowledged leader of the frontier districts, had set
forth his 'Glorious Enterprize' for the conquest and
annexation of New France. Phips's American invasion next
year, carried out in complete independence of the home