or driven back. A body of troops had also been sent across the
river, where they routed a small detachment of Kentucky militia;
but they were, of course, recalled when the main assault failed.

At last the men who had conquered the conquerors of Europe had
themselves met defeat. Andrew Jackson and his rough riflemen had
worsted, in fair fight, a far larger force of the best of
Wellington's veterans, and had accomplished what no French
marshal and no French troops had been able to accomplish
throughout the long war in the Spanish peninsula. For a week the
sullen British lay in their lines; then, abandoning their heavy
artillery, they marched back to the ships and sailed for Europe.



JOHN QUINCY ADAMS AND THE RIGHT OF PETITION

He rests with the immortals; his journey has been long:
For him no wail of sorrow, but a paean full and strong!
So well and bravely has he done the work be found to do,
To justice, freedom, duty, God, and man forever true.
--Whittier.


JOHN QUINCY ADAMS AND THE RIGHT OF PETITION

The lot of ex-Presidents of the United States, as a rule, has
been a life of extreme retirement, but to this rule there is one
marked exception. When John Quincy Adams left the White House in
March, 1829, it must have seemed as if public life could hold