Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/92

62 of territory. Although we have grown to greatness, like &quot;the great robber, Rome,&quot; by successive wars and successive acquisitions of territory, yet these wars have not been undertaken for the purpose of foreign conquest. Such a purpose has never been charged against the United States except in the case of the Mexican war.

These several wars, accompanied by acquisitions of territory, have been so interspersed along our history, that they form the true key of our chronology. Not the successive presidential administrations, but the successive epochs of growth in the acquisition of territory, and the corresponding eras of development in the assimilation of the territory acquired, form the true principle upon which the history of the United States should be studied and written.

Whether these several wars and acquisitions shall be viewed as connected by the relation of cause and effect, or as forming a chain of remarkable coincidence, it is certain that an examination of the territorial map, in connection with a table of dates, will verify the chronological sequence, with the surrender of Corn wall is at Yorktown, was formally terminated in 1783 by the treaty of Paris, confirming the title to our original territory, and defining its limits.

2. The war with France is sometimes omitted from the list of wars, on account of its short duration and its distance from American shores. War, however, actually existed, and had an important influence upon foreign relations. Peace was restored by the convention of September 30, 1800. On the next day, October i, 1800, France acquired Louisiana, by retrocession from Spain. April 30, 1803, Louisiana was ceded to the United States.

3. Our next war, growing out of the purchase of Louisiana, and a logical sequence of the transaction, was the second war with Great Britain, closing in 1815 with