Such wide differences in the views of the two nations produced
endless difficulties. To escape the press-gang, or for other
reasons, many British seamen took service under the American flag;
and if they were demanded back, it is not likely that they or their
American shipmates had much hesitation in swearing either that they
were not British at all, or else that they had been naturalized as
Americans. Equally probable is it that the American blockade-runners
were guilty of a great deal of fraud and more or less thinly veiled
perjury. But the wrongs done by the Americans were insignificant
compared with those they received. Any innocent merchant vessel
was liable to seizure at any moment; and when overhauled by a
British cruiser short of men was sure to be stripped of most of
her crew. The British officers were themselves the judges as to
whether a seaman should be pronounced a native of America or of
Britain, and there was no appeal from their judgment. If a captain
lacked his full complement there was little doubt as to the view
he would take of any man's nationality. The wrongs inflicted on our
seafaring countrymen by their impressment into foreign ships formed
the main cause of the war.

There were still other grievances which are thus presented by the
British Admiral Cochrane. [Footnote: "Autobiography of a Seaman,"
by Thomas, tenth Earl of Dundonald, Admiral of the Red; Rear-Admiral
of the Fleet, London, 1860, vol. i, p. 24.] "Our treatment of its
(America's) citizens was scarcely in accordance with the national
privileges to which the young Republic had become entitled. There
were no doubt many individuals among the American people who, caring
little for the Federal Government, considered it more profitable
to break than to keep the laws of nations by aiding and supporting
our enemy (France), and it was against such that the efforts of the