We have now to enter upon a new era in the history of this infant settlement; and a new current of events claim our attention. The prudence, wisdom and good conduct of General Oglethorpe had realized the most sanguine expectations, in engaging and retaining the Indians in the interest of England. But the territory of Georgia was claimed. by the king of Spain, and this colony was the source of increasing jealousy with the Spaniards of Florida. General Oglethorpe, sensible of the tendency of this feeling, and anxious for the safety of the colony, went to England in the latter part of the year 1736, and procured a regiment to be raised, of which he was appointed colonel, with the rank of general and commander-in-chief of the forces of South Carolina and Georgia. Difficulties between the courts of Madrid and St. James continuing unadjusted, war was formally declared by England against Spain in 1739. Oglethorpe received instructions to commence offensive operations against Florida and to exert his power of annoyance. The invasion of Florida, in the summer of 1740, and an unsuccessful attempt upon St. Augustine followed.

After suffering many hardships from disease and exposure, and losing nearly a whole company of Highlanders surprised at Fort Moosa, this siege was raised; and Oglethorpe returned to Frederica. The scene of action was soon to be shifted, and Georgia in turn was invaded by the Spaniards. Restored to the freedom of the seas, by the withdrawal of the British fleet under Admiral Vernon from the West Indies, the Spaniards in 1742 fitted out a large armament at Havannah destined for the conquest of Georgia; which, being strengthened by the forces at St. Augustine, entered St. Simon's sound with thirty-two sail carrying five thousand men. The garrison at Frederica consisted of but six hundred and ninety men and some Indians. A dark and portentous cloud now lowered over this feeble colony, threatening to burst upon it with overwhelming ruin. The destiny of Georgia and the fate of Carolina were involved in the result. The enemy entered the river Alatamaha, cut off all supplies from the garrison, hoisted the red flag at the mizzen mast of their largest ship, debarked upon the island, erected a battery and mounted twenty eighteen pounders.

The General perceived and appreciated his situation; he determined, in the face of this overwhelming force, to main

tain his position and act defensively. The haughty Don ordered his detachments to march to the attack of Frederica

but they had to pass "deep morasses and dark thickets lined with fierce Indians and wild Highlanders," and many a Spaniard who penetrated these wilds never emerged from them. In these repeated conflicts the enemy were always repulsed with great loss of men, and some of their best officers. Oglethorpe, learning from a prisoner that the forces from Havannah and St. Augustine encamped separately, conceived the bold design of surprising one of these encampments in the night; almost at the moment of attack he was disappointed by one of his men, who ran off, fired his gun and gave the alarm. The General's embarrassment was now greatly increased from an apprehension that the deserter would discover his weakness to the enemy. His ingenuity supplied the means of escape. He addressed a letter to the deserter desiring him to acquaint the enemy with the defenceless state of Frederica, and how easily they might cut him and his small garrison to pieces. He urged him as his spy to bring them on the attack and assure them of success; but if he could not prevail with them to make that attempt to use all his art and influence to persuade them to stay at least three days more, within which time, he would be reinforced with two thousand land forces and six British

This,

ships of war. This letter was entrusted to a Spanish prisoner to be delivered to the deserter, but who, as was foreseen, placed it in the hands of the commander-in-chief. While the Spaniards were deliberating how to interpret the letter, fortunately, three vessels, which the governor of South Carolina had despatched, appeared off the coast. seeming to confirm the contents of the letter, ended their deliberations and struck such a panic into the Spanish army that they immediately embarked, having set fire to their fort, and leaving a quantity of military stores and provisions with several pieces of cannon. Thus, by the firmness, skill and ingenuity of the General, was the colony rescued from the impending danger of total destruction.

The tempest which threatened to sweep her from existence had ineffectually spent itself, and was succeeded by the joys and gratulations of the colony. A high sense of

* Hewatt.

the character and signally good conduct of the General, upon this trying occasion, was entertained and abundantly manifested by the different provinces through the many complimentary epistles addressed to General Oglethorpe by their respective governors.

We approach the termination of General Oglethorpe's administration in Georgia. Having spent eleven years of his life in settling and defending the colony, during which time he had exercised a sole control over its affairs, he was now about to leave it, never to return to Georgia. He had watched over it with paternal solicitude and care - he had encountered the severest hardships and exposed himself to disease and dangers of every kind in its defence. He sailed for England in 1743, leaving behind him a character combining all that was lovely in generosity, benevolence and philanthropy, with the sterner attributes of the soldier. At the tender age of thirteen Oglethorpe entered the army as an ensign. He was soon a lieutenant in the guards of Queen Anne, and afterwards an aid of the Earl of Peterborough. Between the ages of seventeen and eighteen he passed over to the continent; and upon the recommendations of the Dukes of Argyle and Marlboro' was received into service by the invincible imperial General, Prince Eugene. He was with the Prince in the great battle at Petuwarden on the Danube, in which fifty thousand troops of the imperial army encountered and defeated one hundred and fifty thousand Turks under the Grand Viser Ali. He was also with him at the great battle and taking of Belgrade, where the Turks were again signally defeated and overthrown.

His distinguished gallantry and chivalric bearing upon these great occasions commended him to the notice of the Prince, who received him into his military family. It was upon this vast theatre, and under this great captain, that young Oglethorpe was schooled in the art of war. The chivalry and military capacity of the youthful soldier had not been impaired by time, but uniting with his strong benevolence of soul, was now, at this later period in Georgia, nobly exerted for the benefit and happiness of mankind.

Upon the restoration of peace on the continent of Europe, Oglethorpe returned to England and entered Oxford; where he successfully sought to retrieve the interruption in his education occasioned by his early devotion to military life. At

the age of twenty-four he was returned a member of the British parliament, where those great and virtuous traits of character, originating in the heart, were soon displayed, which commanded for him, through life, the admiration of mankind.

We may not compare this justly distinguished man with the great captains of modern Europe. His family adherence to the house of Stuart deprived him of those opportunities of advancement, necessary to mature and display his military capacity and character. But where every point of comparison would fail, it may not be uninteresting to sketch a contrast.

Napoleon Bonaparte was the greatest man of his age and the first captain the world ever saw. At the head of the French army he overcame the barriers which nature opposed to his progress, and, like Hannibal of old, from the summit of the Alps, regaled his exhausted troops with a view of the verdant vales and fertile fields of beautiful Italy.* He passed into Egypt, and the crescent waned at his approach. From the banks of the Nile he returned to the banks of the Seine, and the Directory was dissolved. In a few months he gave a permanency and power to the consular government which commanded the recognition and respect of the world. He assumed the imperial purple, and kingdoms became his territories and monarchs his subjects. He marched into Russia, and all human opposition vanished the elements of nature combined to check his career, and the snows of the north were alone able to cool the impetuous ardor of his vaulting ambition. With an army of new recruits he manoeuvred and battled with the combined hosts of Europe. Yesterday a prisoner at Elba, an Emperor to day in the palace of the Tuilleries. Truly Bonaparte was the greatest man of his age, and the first captain the world ever saw. He may have done much for France. He gave her a constitution and a code of laws. He beautified her with the labors of art, and adorned her with the splendid relics of the ancient masters of genius-rich trophies of his triumphant victories. Still, Bonaparte was a warrior and a conqueror, and the glory which encircled him was won by the shrieks and tears, and the wreath which adorned his brow was dyed in the blood of Europe. He closed his days a solitary captive on a lonely and distant isle of the ocean.

*Livy, Bisset.

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I can conceive of some act of unassuming benevolence, some balm of consolation poured into the wounded spirit of a single sufferer; some delicate sympathy exerted for the relief of a suffering family I can conceive of a yet more enlarged and extended benevolence, busying itself with the distressed of a whole community; of a nature so big with philanthropy as to extend its sympathies to suffering humanity, wherever within the range of its noble efforts wretchedness was found. Yes, I can conceive of such principles and such actions that would have conferred upon Napoleon Bonaparte more deserved fame, and handed down his name to posterity with a higher claim to its gratitude and veneration, than all the splendors of his military achievements, and all the trophies of his conspicuous victories.

These will be found to constitute the enviable basis upon which is erected the fame of the founder of Georgia. These will transmit his memory with an unfailing claim to the admiration of posterity.

He penetrated the recesses of the dungeons of England and gave life and liberty to many a suffering captive — he searched into their abuses, and humanity and kindness succeeded to cruelty and oppression -he dragged before the public the authors of these outrages, and the rigors of legal confinement became tempered with mercy. With paternal affection he gathered together the poor and destitute of his own country, and the wandering exile from Germany, the victims of religious intolerance;-with these he crossed the Atlantic and became in this western world the founder of a new State. Abandoning the honors and pleasures of the first court in Europe, he devoted the best years of his life to the interests and happiness of those whose welfare he had espoused. In this cause he expended a large portion of his fortune. To encourage the settlers to labor, he wielded with them the implements of labor- to protect them against the effects of French and Spanish intrigues upon the natives, he travelled four hundred miles through a desert wilderness without a path to guide or a house to lodge him, that he might drink with the Indian warrior the safkey and smoke the pipe of peace. * He legislated for them-he fought he never forgot them. When at the period

their battles

he never forgot them.

* His visit to the Coweta Towns.