e as Decatur made, by his own showing. Unless
the "President" was really thrashed out by the "Endymion," which was
the British assertion,[468] she might have put one of his Majesty's
thirty-eight-gun frigates, the "Pomone," out of commission for a long
time; and that, in addition to the "Endymion,"--the two fastest
British vessels,--would have been no light matter in the then state of
the New York blockade. If the finding of the American Court of
Inquiry,[469] that "the 'Endymion' was conquered, while the
'President' in the contest with her had sustained but little injury,"
be admitted, there seems no reply to the comment that the "President"
surrendered within musket-shot of a thirty-eight-gun frigate which
with three or four broadsides she should have nearly annihilated. She
was out to destroy commerce and enemy's cruisers, and she struck
before her powers in that respect--by the Court's finding--were
exhausted. Escape was impossible; one object of her cruise--the
enemy's commerce--had become impracticable; was it justifiable to
neglect the last opportunity for the other? Decatur's personal
gallantry is beyond question; but, if the defence of the "President"
is to be considered "glorious," and "heroic," it is difficult to know
what term can be applied to that of the "Essex." War is violence,
wounds, and death. Needless bloodshed is to be avoided; but even more,
at the present day, is to be deprecated the view that the objects of a
war are to be sacrificed to the preservation of life.

After a long detention, through the closeness of the Boston blockade,
the "Constitution," still commanded by Captain Charles Stewart,
effected her escape to sea towards the end of December. On February
20, 1815, two hundred miles east-northeast from Madeira, she fell in
with two British ships of war, the "Cyane," and the "Levant," then on
their way from Gibraltar to the Azores, and thence to the American
coast. The "Cyane," a frigate-built ship, carried a battery of
carronades: thirty 32-pounders, two 18-pounders. She had also two long
9-pounders; making a total of thirty-four guns, throwing a broadside
weight of five hundred and seven pounds.[470] The "Levant" was a sloop
of war, of the American "Hornet" class, carrying eighteen 32-pounder
carronades and two long 9-pounders; giving two hundred and
ninety-seven as her broadside weight. Between the two they therefore
threw eight hundred and four pounds of metal. The "Constitution's"
broa