nocence by meeting his accuser in battle; under an ancient
statute this was possible, and as Thornton's accuser declined the proposed
combat, the prisoner was set free. The obsolete law was thereupon
repealed. Patent leather and strychnia discovered. Steam first used for
heating purposes.

Independence of Chile finally declared, after eight years of fighting, on
February 12.

=RULERS--The same as in the previous year, except that Charles XIV
(formerly Marshal Bernadotte) succeeded Charles XIII as King of Sweden and
Norway.=

1819

Most of the Cherokee Indians removed from Georgia to lands west of the
Mississippi. Congress agitated by the Missouri discussion; bill to
prohibit slavery in the territory of the Louisiana Purchase north of the
parallel of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes, excepting in Missouri,
introduced, and passed the following year. Opposition to slavery increased
in the Northern States. Yellow fever in New York. Alabama admitted to the
Union. Wuertemberg abolished serfdom. August Kotzebue, German playwright
and leader of the opposition to liberal ideas and education, assassinated
by Sand, a Jena student; severe measures of repression, under the
influence of Metternich, the great Austrian minister, followed. Throughout
the German States censorship of the press was established, wholesale
arrests of liberals occurred, student societies were forbidden, and
ninety-four students were executed for wearing black, red, and yellow
ribbons, the emblems of liberalism.

Richard Carlisle, of London, arrested for reprinting Paine's "Age of
Reason." Velocipedes, hobby-horses, and other forerunners of the bicycle
became popular. Oersted, of Copenhagen, made important discoveries in
electromagnetism.

Queen Victoria born; James Watt, Scottish inventor; General Bluecher,
Prussian soldier; and Warren Hastings, first governor-general of India,
died.

=RULERS--The same as in the previous year.=

1820

Riego's revolt in Spain failed, but was followed by other movements in
favor of liberalism. In Madrid, the prison of the Inquisition was
stormed, and the political prisoners it contained set at liberty. King
Ferdinand was forced to convoke the Cortes and agree to restore the
comparatively liberal constitution of 1812. Divorce suit of George IV of
England before the House of Lords; when the prosecutor had just started
his opening address, the peers rose suddenly and rushed out in a body to
witness an eclipse