ship was off the Canaries, to October 12, off Barbuda in the West
Indies; and none from there to the United States. "Not a single vessel
was seen from the Cape Verde to Surinam," reported Warrington; while
in seven days spent between the Rock of Lisbon and Cape Ortegal, at
the northwest extremity of the Spanish peninsula, of twelve sail seen,
nine of which were spoken, only two were British.

In these conditions were seen, exemplified and emphasized, the alarm
felt and precautions taken, by both the mercantile classes and the
Admiralty, in consequence of the invasion of European waters by
American armed vessels, of a class and an energy unusually fitted to
harass commerce. The lists of American prizes teem with evidence of
extraordinary activity, by cruisers singularly adapted for their work,
and audacious in proportion to their confidence of immunity, based
upon knowledge of their particular nautical qualities. The impression
produced by their operations is reflected in the representations of
the mercantile community, in the rise of insurance, and in the
stricter measures instituted by the Admiralty. The Naval Chronicle, a
service journal which since 1798 had been recording the successes and
supremacy of the British Navy, confessed now that "the depredations
committed on our commerce by American ships of war and privateers have
attained an extent beyond all former precedent.... We refer our
readers to the letters in our correspondence. The insurance between
Bristol and Waterford or Cork is now three times higher than it was
when we were at war with all Europe. The Admiralty have been
overwhelmed with letters of complaint or remonstrance."[253] In the
exertions of the cruisers the pace seems to grow more and more
furious, as the year 1814 draws to its close amid a scene of
exasperated coast warfare, desolation, and humiliation, in America; as
though they were determined, amid all their pursuit of gain, to make
the enemy also feel the excess of mortification which he was
inflicting upon their own country. The discouragement testified by
British shippers and underwriters was doubtless enhanced and
embittered by disappointment, in finding the movement of trade thus
embarrassed and intercepted at the very moment when the restoration of
peace in Europe had given high hopes of healing the wounds, and
repairing the breaches, made by over twenty years of maritime warfare,
almost unbroken.

In London, on August 17, 1814, dire