rded
him in so doing,

"These are therefore to require and direct all captains and
commanders of His Majesty's ships and vessels of war which may
fall in with any American or other vessel bearing a neutral
flag, laden with flour, bread, corn, and pease, or any other
species of dry provisions, bound from America to Spain or
Portugal, and having this protection on board, to suffer her to
proceed without unnecessary obstruction or detention in her
voyage, provided she shall appear to be steering a due course
for those countries, and it being understood this is only to be
in force for one voyage and within six months from the date
hereof.

"Given under my hand and seal on board His Majesty's Ship
'Centurion,' at Halifax this fourth day of August, one thousand
eight hundred and twelve.

"(Sig.) H. SAWYER, Vice Admiral."

This practice soon became perfectly known to the American Government,
copies being found not only on board vessels stopped for carrying
them, but in seaports. Nevertheless, it went on, apparently tolerated,
or at least winked at; although, to say the least, the seamen thus
employed in sustaining the enemies' armies were needed by the
state.[519] When the commercial blockade of the Chesapeake was
enforced in February, 1813, and Admiral Warren announced that licenses
would no longer enable vessels to pass, flour in Baltimore fell two
dollars a barrel. The blockade being then limited to the Chesapeake
and Delaware, the immediate effect was to transfer this lucrative
traffic further north, favoring that portion of the country which was
considered, in the common parlance of the British official of that
day, "well inclined towards British interests."

On October 13, two days after Rodgers and Decatur parted at sea, the
United States sloop of war "Wasp," Captain Jacob Jones, left the
Capes of the Delaware on a cruise, steering to the eastward. On the
16th, in a heavy gale of wind, she lost her jib-boom. At half-past
eleven in the night of the 17th, being then in latitude 37 deg. north,
longitude 65 deg. west, between four and five hundred miles east of the
Chesapeake, in the track of vessels bound to Europe from the Gulf of
Mexico, half a dozen large sail were seen passing. These were part of
a convoy which had left the Bay of Honduras September 12, on their way
to England, under guard of the British brig of war "Frolic,"