defeated, by the estimate of their superintending
surgeon, had ten or twelve killed and forty wounded.[379] Such a
disparity of injury is usual when the defendants are behind
fortifications; but in this case of an open field, and a river to be
crossed by the assailants, the evident significance is that the party
attacked did not wait to contest the ground, once the enemy had gained
the bridge. After that, not only was the rout complete, but, save for
Barney's tenacity, there was almost no attempt at resistance. Ten
pieces of cannon remained in the hands of the British. "The rapid
flight of the enemy," reported General Ross, "and his knowledge of the
country, precluded the possibility of many prisoners being
taken."[380]

That night the British entered Washington. The Capitol, White House,
and several public buildings were burned by them; the navy yard and
vessels by the American authorities. Ross, accustomed to European
warfare, did not feel Drummond's easiness concerning his position,
which technically was most insecure as regarded his communications. On
the evening of June 25 he withdrew rapidly, and on that of the 26th
regained touch with the fleet in the Patuxent, after a separation of
only four days. Cockburn remarked in his official report that there
was no molestation of their retreat; "not a single musket having been
fired."[381] It was the completion of the Administration's disgrace,
unrelieved by any feature of credit save the gallant stand of Barney's
four hundred.

The burning of Washington was the impressive culmination of the
devastation to which the coast districts were everywhere exposed by
the weakness of the country, while the battle of Bladensburg crowned
the humiliation entailed upon the nation by the demagogic prejudices
in favor of untrained patriotism, as supplying all defects for
ordinary service in the field. In the defenders of Bladensburg was
realized Jefferson's ideal of a citizen soldiery,[382] unskilled, but
strong in their love of home, flying to arms to oppose an invader; and
they had every inspiring incentive to tenacity, for they, and they
only, stood between the enemy and the centre and heart of national
life. The position they occupied, though unfortified, had many natural
advantages; while the enemy had to cross a river which, while in part
fordable, was nevertheless an obstacle to rapid action, especially
when confronted by the superior artillery the Americans had. The
result ha