th Congress, vol. 3, 9.]

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas great and weighty matters claiming the consideration of the
Congress of the United States form an extraordinary occasion for
convening them, I do by these presents appoint Monday, the 19th day of
September next, for their meeting at the city of Washington, hereby
requiring the respective Senators and Representatives then and there to
assemble in Congress, in order to receive such communications as may
then be made to them and to consult and determine on such measures as in
their wisdom may be deemed meet for the welfare of the United States.

In testimony whereof I have caused the seal of the United States to be
hereunto affixed, and signed the same with my hand,

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, the 8th day of August, A.D. 1814, and of
the Independence of the United States the thirty-ninth.

JAMES MADISON.

By the President:
JAMES MONROE,
_Secretary of State_.

[From Nile's Weekly Register, vol. 7, p. 2.]

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas the enemy by a sudden incursion have succeeded in invading the
capital of the nation, defended at the moment by troops less numerous
than their own and almost entirely of the militia, during their
possession of which, though for a single day only, they wantonly
destroyed the public edifices, having no relation in their structure to
operations of war nor used at the time for military annoyance, some of
these edifices being also costly monuments of taste and of the arts, and
others depositories of the public archives, not only precious to the
nation as the memorials of its origin and its early transactions, but
interesting to all nations as contributions to the general stock of
historical instruction and political science; and

Whereas advantage has been taken of the loss of a fort more immediately
guarding the neighboring town of Alexandria to place the town within the
range of a naval force too long and too much in the habit of abusing its
superiority wherever it can be applied to require as the alternative of
a general conflagration an undisturbed plunder of private property,
which has been executed in a manner peculiarly distressing to the
inhabitants, who had inconsiderately cast themselves upon the justice
and generosity of the victor; and

Whereas it now appears by a direct communication from th